492 Case
492 Case
COMMENT: Executive Summary
This section should outline what is going to be told throughout the entirety of the business plan. The executive summary typically serves as a trailer to what should be expected in the plan. In many cases, the executive summary serves as a cover letter and can be the deciding factor in the rest of the plan being reviewed or not.
Strengths
Palmistry does an excellent job of describing the nature of the business from a basic perspective. It then provides advanced details to outline the specific business and summarizes it effectively so that investors may gather the necessary information for evaluating the company’s potential.
Deficiencies
The executive summary is supposed to encompass the rest of the plan and essentially tell a reviewer what is going to be told. Palmistry seems to focus a little too much effort outlining the deficiencies of the industry it is involved with, rather than focusing on its own characteristics. Conversely, the executive summary does establish credibility citing only information that can be seen throughout the rest of the plan.
As outlined in the Ernst & Young literature, the executive summary is more effective when it provides subtitles for each section it is summarizing. The Palmistry executive summary fails to do so and likely contributes to the company drifting from its overall purpose of the plan.
Palmistry does outline its age as a company, however in establishing a better image of the company to its potential investors more milestones would be helpful. Simply outlining the expenses necessary for the product achieving readiness for market only shows that the company has debt to repay. Touching on the sales incurred during the first year could show potential investors that the company has great promise and might be more likely to contribute funding.
Lastly, Palmistry might want to include a summary of the financial statements. This provides a preview of what the reviewer can expect to see....