Wal-Mart’s top executives…defined the company as a knowledge firm, pointing to its highly sophisticated information logistics systems as being at the heart of its remarkable growth in profits, sales, and stock market value over the past decade. Wal-Mart’s $250 billion market capitalization in 2001 was over seven times its book value. A plausible explanation was that ‘Wal-Mart’s main assets are…the intangible business process they have built around those computer systems.’ Wal-Mart’s computer system is the most powerful in the corporate world; only the US government has a larger computer network. Its web-based Retail Link network system, which is hooked up to suppliers and customers so they and Wal-Mart can track merchandise inventory and sales in any of its stores or regions, is the envy of retail marketers around the globe. These knowledge assets, however, do not show up on Wal-Mart’s balance sheet.
Macintosh - Accounting, Accountants & Accountability, p. xxi (via writingcapital)

(via nomadic-thought)

06/17/13 at 4:32pm
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