Business 101-Company Research

This Research Guide is intended to help you in becoming familiar with Business resources and research strategies specific to investigating companies. 

There are many places you can find information about a company and its history and will explore the following approaches:

• Company's website
  • Company websites often include an "about us" section that sometimes detail their history. Remember, this information isn't regulated and the company will often explain its history the way it wants to be seen.
• Annual reports
  • Public companies are required to file an annual report to the U.S. government, known as a 10-K. These reports will often include a section on the company's history. Again, remember this is a self-reported history.
• Search for articles, company reports, or profiles in WWCC Library's Business Databases
  • Newspaper, trade/magazine, and scholarly articles that mention or are about specific companies might provide some historical information.

When researching a company, it is important to know whether it is public, private or a subsidiary of a larger company.

Public companies sell shares of the company (stocks) to the general public, and are required to submit financial information and annual reports to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.  Public companies are therefore easier to research as a general rule of thumb.

Subsidiaries of public companies can be difficult to research because the parent company is not required to report on each of them individually.  Therefore, when researching a subsidiary, you often have to read carefully through reports about the parent and look for references to the subsidiary.

We're not researching Private companies for this assignment but it is good to know the definition.

Private companies do not sell publicly traded stocks and as a result, are not required to release as much information to the government or the general public  They are therefore more challenging to research.