Business Administration

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. The course focuses on the main international models of corporate governance and their specific problems. Special attention is placed on minority shareholders' protection and on the integration of the European Financial markets through the recent harmonization of financial regulations. The course discusses topics including an introduction to international corporate governance models; agency costs from separation of ownership and control in a public company; the US Enron scandal and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act; the Continental European Model; investors' protection around the world; corporate governance reforms and investors' protection in Italy; the value of the voting right in dual class firms; the Financial Services Action Plan and major EU directives; economics of takeovers and the EU takeover directive; and the Nabisco takeover and the movie "Barbarians at the gates."

This course offers perspectives on corporate social responsibility both as a governing mechanism for businesses as well as a form of business practice. Students examine the theoretical paradigms surrounding the corporate objective, international movements in corporate social responsibility led by organizations such as the OECD and the UN, and delves into the role of corporations’ vis-à-vis social rights at both domestic and international levels. The course devotes a significant proportion of time to the role of corporations in human rights and furthering social welfare and discusses key critical perspectives on other social rights, including labor and the environment, where relevant. This course challenges students into viewing the role and responsibility of the corporation from perspectives beyond the traditional idea of profit making.

The course studies the basic theory of stochastic processes and research methods through and economics and management perspective. Topics include financial engineering theory, conditional mathematical expectation, martingale, Poisson process, update process, Markov chain, Brownian motion, stochastic integral, and stochastic financial model.

This course provides practical experience in early stages of starting a technology-based start-up. The course is based on principles from lean-startup and business model canvas. Through practical experience, student-driven seminars, inspirational lectures and literature studies, understanding of business model components in the start-up process, as well as ability to analyze and validate an idea or invention is mainly achieved through customer-based development and experimentation with minimum viable products. This understanding is used to develop an efficient and scalable business model and review the business model from sustainable and ethical perspectives.