Administrator and Teacher Interview Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Administrator and Teacher Interview - Essay Example After enrolling at Hardin-Simmons University, I realized what my calling was. A professor noticed that I had many hours in Spanish and asked me if I had ever considered teaching Spanish or bilingual education. I had always loved working with children, as I had worked with children in my high school years, helping them to read and practice math. And so, my career in education began. After some time in school, I began to realize all the benefits of being an educator: summers and holidays off, time with my family, working with children, and a love for a career unlike any other. (2) Would you recommend the education profession to others? Why or why not? I would only recommend the education profession to others that truly want to teach. The rewards from the students’ successes are wonderful. Most parents are kind and helpful. There are many more positive aspects to teaching, but there are also negative aspects to teaching. For example, teachers are some of the lowest paid professio nals in the country. Teachers must continue to educate themselves to stay current in educational trends, often at their own expense. There is immense pressure to make students perform on state accountability tests because student scores are tied to state funds for the schools. (3) Are there any other teachers in your family? If so, who? I have two cousins who are educators in Texas. (4) What is your highest level of education? (Masters) Leadership of Learning, M.Ed. (5) How long have you been an educator? I have been an educator for thirteen years. (6) What is your greatest challenge as an educator? My greatest challenge is getting parents involved in their children’s education. (7) How do you balance the demands of your profession with the political realities of the education system? It is difficult. I often take the political realities personally. I try to do my job and leave the other â€Å"stuff† at school. Sometimes I vent to those I trust, and sometimes administr ators hear my voice if I feel passionately enough about the topic. I try not to rock the boat too often because I feel like everyone is constantly critiquing my actions and me. (8) Do you live in the community that you work in? If yes, do you believe that it is important for educators to live in the community in which they work? Why or why not? I live in a nearby town. I believe that it is important for the educator to be involved in the community. An educator does not have to live in the community to be involved. I loved living in the community where I taught because the students could come over at any time. On the other hand, living outside the community offers more privacy. (9) Who was your greatest educational influence? My high school science teacher helped me love learning. He taught me to become a life-long learner. Later, he hired me in my first teaching position. During my time working with him, Mr. Hardy taught me what a true leader is: one who serves others. (10) What is the greatest benefit of being an educator? The greatest benefit is watching young people learn and love learning. When a child realizes that he/she can do anything with effort, it is amazing to watch them try new things and succeed. It is more amazing to watch them fail and try again in a different way. That shows that they are growing as students. When they accomplish what they thought was impossible, their smiles and hugs are the greatest pay. b) Administrator and Teacher Interview i) Make arrangements to interview both an administrator and a teacher. Utilize the questions below in the interview and record their responses: (1) Why did you choose to go into education as a career? I chose to go into edu

Sniffing Attacks Prevention and Detection Techniques

Sniffing Attacks Prevention and Detection Techniques Security in Wired/Wireless Networks:  Sniffing Attacks Prevention and Detection Techniques in Wired and Wireless Local Area Networks (LAN) ABSTRACT During the past era, Information Technology made a revolution in RD. No doubt Internet becomes an essential backbone for all sciences and research nowadays. Accordingly security threats and data banks attacks turn out to be a phenomenon. Thus, granting protection to such crucial information becomes a high demand. While reviewing the latest studies in this area, there are strong signs that attacking information warehouse is the hot topic nowadays. Moreover, preventing attacks to TCP/IP networks and what are the most efficient techniques to protect it, is the most targeted research area for security experts. For instance, what so called the Man-in-the-Middle attack [MiM] and Denial of Service [DoS] are just some ways of vulnerable attacks to TCP/IP networks, using some tools available free on the internet. They are sniffing the data traffic or causing service denial. In our research, we evaluated the most famous security solutions and classifying them according to their efficiency against detecting or preventing the types of Address Resolution Protocol [ARP] Spoofing attacks. Based of the surprising experimental results in the security lab, we proposed an optimal algorithm to enhance their ability Keywords: Sniffing Attacks, ARP cache poisoning, Man-in-the-Middle [MiM], Intrusion Prevention Detection technique [IPS/IDS], Denial of Service [DoS] CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Overview As we mentioned in the abstract section that this research is focusing on the internal attack within the local area network [LAN] which is forming the major and critical attacks which the network resources are exposed to according to recent studies conducted in the Information Security domain[1]. We will demonstrate two major attacks affecting the Internet users the local network; The MiM attack[2] (Man-in-the-Middle Attack) and DoS (Denial-of-Service). There are many tools and softwares widely available and for free of cost which can carry out many attacks over the network and violate the privacy of users, such tools like Sniffers[3] monitors data traveling over a network, it either can be of authorized or unauthorized function. It was started initially as a Network Analyzer to help the Administrator to perform health check and maintain the network activities; however it is used today to redirect the traffic and access confidential files. Traditionally, research in the area of information and communication security focused on helping developers of systems prevent security vulnerabilities in the systems they produce, before the systems are released to customers. the majority of studies on network security, are considering only the external attacks. Internal as well as external are of the outmost importance when it comes to information security, but need to be complemented with more depth research for developing detection and prevention mechanisms, and studying internal threats. The research plan we followed in our work presented here are as follows: a. Address Resolution Protocol [ARP] b. ARP Spoofing attack [Poisoning] c. ARP Spoofing based MiM DoS attacks d. Experiments e. Optimal ARP Spoofing detection algorithm f. Results analysis g. Conclusion 1.1.1 What is an ARP: The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) [4] is used by computers to map network addresses (IP) to physical addresses or what is usually refer to: Media Access Control addresses (MAC). It translates IP addresses to Ethernet MAC addresses and classified as a Networking protocol used to find hosts address given its IP address. Some network expert consider it as a DataLink Layer protocol because it only operates on the local area network or point-to-point link that a host is connected to[5]. The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) is documented in RFC 826[1] and later it was adopted by other media, such as FDDI[6]. For more details about Internet Protocols Suits; see appendix [1] 1.1.2 How it works: The ARP Process RARP As we stated formerly from an architecture perspective, ARP is a layer 3 function (Network), however in a programming perspective ARP is considered as layer 2 (Datalink) because it calls the LAN data like layer code. RARP is stand for; Reverse Address Resolution Protocol, and it is a network protocol used to resolve a MAC address to the corresponding network layer address, i.e. RARP is used to map a MAC address to an IP address exactly the reverse function of the ARP request/reply. 1.1.3 Types of ARP/RARP protocol messages: There are four types of ARP massages that are sent by an ARP protocol: a. ARP request b. ARP reply c. RARP request d. RARP reply As we just said in the definition, ARP is used to map network address (IP) to physical address (MAC) and when a host need to communicate with another host it needs to know its MAC address. Here comes ARP protocol and works by broadcasting a packet (ARP-Request) for any hosts connected over the Ethernet network. The ARP packet contains the IP address of the sender and the IP address of the target it is interested in communicating with. See (1.2) and (1.3): However, the target host, identifying that the IP address in the ARP request packet is belong to itself, so it returns an answer back in a unicast reply (ARP-Reply) and the host which initiated the ARP request catches the [IP,MAC] pair and keeps it in ARP cache memory. Keeping the host reply in cache will minimize the ARP traffic in the LAN. See (1.4): So simply when the ARP request is broadcasted to all PCs on the network it asks the following question: Is x.x.x.x is your IP address?, if Yes send back your MAC address. Then every PC checks if its IP address is matching the one in ARP request and sends ARP reply with its MAC address. But the repeated ARP requests especially when it is broadcasted every time a MAC address is required; creates a high traffic in the network, and hence the Operating Systems keep copy of the ARP replies in the computers cache memory and update it frequently with any new pair, this will help in reducing the ARP requests number[9]. By the way ARP spoofing technique which we are going to talk about in the next chapter is occurring when forged ARP replies is created and sent to the source computer who initiated the ARP request formerly and updated its ARP cache with fake information. We will know afterward this kind of exploitation is called poisoning the ARP cache. The Reverse Address Resolution Protocol [RARP] is broadcasting a RARP request packet with the target MAC address which will be received by all hosts in the Ethernet network. Host which its MAC address is matching the one in the RARP request will reply with its IP address in the RARP reply packet and sends it to the host which initiated the RARP request. Afterward the IP address which consists of 32 bit will be converted to 48 bit Ethernet address, by the suitable encapsulation mechanism. This is the common practice for the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP), which is documented in RFC 826 [51]. ARP defines the exchanges between network interfaces connected to an Ethernet media segment in order to map an IP address to a link layer address on demand. Link layer addresses are hardware addresses (although they are not unchallengeable) on Ethernet cards; where the IP addresses are logical addresses assigned to machines attached to the Ethernet. Accordingly a Datalink layer address is known by other names, i.e. Ethernet Addresses, Media Access Control (MAC) Addresses, and even Hardware Addresses. However, the correct term from the kernels perspective is Link Layer Address because this address can be changed via command line tools [50]. 1.1.4 ARP and RARP message formats: The ARP packet consists of Ethernet Header and Data packet; the Ethernet header is divided to: 6 bytes for the destination address 6 bytes for source address 2 bytes for the frame type in hexadecimal (e.g. 0806 for ARP 8035 for RARP) Where, the data packet structure of ARP packet is encapsulated and the information that every part holds are demonstrated in the following table[10]: Table 1.1: ARP and RARP packet structure + Bits 0 7 Bits 8 15 Bits 16 31 0 Hardware type (HTYPE) Protocol type (PTYPE) 32 Hardware length (HLEN) Protocol length (PLEN) Operation (OPER) 64 Source hardware address [MAC] (SHA) (first 32 bits) 96 Source hardware address (last 16 bits) Source protocol address (first 16 bits) 128 Sender protocol address (last 16 bits) Destination hardware address (first 16 bits) 160 Destination hardware address (THA) (last 32 bits) 192 Destination protocol address (TPA) Hardware address type (2 bytes). 1=Ethernet Protocol address type ( 2 bytes). 0800H (hexadecimal) = IP address Operation type; 1 = ARP request, 2=ARP reply, 3=RARP request, 4=RARP reply etc†¦. 1.1.5 TCP Standard Ports/Services The table below is showing, a list of services and ports used by TCP protocol: Table 1.2: TCP Ports and Services Port # Keywords Description 20 FTP-DATA File Transfer [Default Data] 21 FTP File Transfer [Control] 23 TELNET TelNet [Telecommunication network ] 25 SMTP Simple Mail Transfer 37 TIME Time 42 NAMESERVER Host Name Server 43 NICNAME Who Is 53 DOMAIN Domain Name Server 79 FINGER Finger 80 HTTP WWW 110 POP3 Post Office Protocol Version 3 111 SUNRPC SUN Remote Procedure Call CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Background 2.1.1 ARP Spoofing based on MiM and DoS attacks ARP spoofing is also called; ARP poison routing (ARP) or ARP cache poisoning or ARP Cache Corrupting. It is a method of attacking an Ethernet local area network by updating the target ARP cache with a forged ARP request and reply packets[9]. This will try to change the target MAC address by another one which the attacker has a control on it. Updating ARP cache with a fake entry value is so called ARP Poisoning. What is sniffer? or (The Network Analyzer); it is a software or a hardware which log the traffic over a network and captures the data packets, then decodes the packets and analyzes the content. Kindly notice in our research that the following terms; Spoofing, Poisoning and Cache Corrupting are referring to the same term . Furthermore, since ARP is considered as a trusted protocol within the network and is not designed to deal with malicious activities in the network, so attackers found unusual ways to illegitimately penetrate into the network; causing harmful costs. These harms or costs can be much worse when the attacker tries to impersonate another user, performs Man-in-the-Middle attacks (MiM), or even causes Denial of Service (DoS) on a Server or even the whole Network[11]. P.S. Spoof means: hoax or imitation. Thanks to the British comedian Arthur Roberts (1852-1933), who introduced the word spoof to the world in the 19th century. He invented a game and called it Spoof, it incorporates tricks nonsense[12]. Why it is so difficult to detect sniffers? †¢ The attack is essentially performed in the passive mode, which means it is hidden and working in the backend so the standard user will not recognize such attacks. Besides it is not easily for user to detect the sniffing since this kind of attacks is generating usual traffic over the network. †¢ The other point is the fact that sniffers can be normally linked to an active intrusion attacks. While talking about the requirement and resources; sniffing is only requiring a standard machine connected over the network with normal hardware configurations and there is no need to special requirements or high performance. †¢ Threat is always seen as external and many researches shows that most of the attacks are from the internal resources; according to the recent Global security surveys in 2009[13], another study [14] shows that internal threat is incredible increased to more than 80% of the security breaches, where external attacks showed about 15% with internal help and 5% just from pure outsiders. 2.1.2 How ARP caches are updated? Let us recall how the communication happens on an Ethernet LAN. As we early stated that all communications in layer 2 is based on the MAC address, so for any PC wants to talk to a target on the network is has to address it to the targets MAC address. If a source computer tries to communicate with another computer in TCP/IP based network it has to translate the targets IP into the corresponding physical address (MAC) and here where we use an ARP protocol. The translation happens by request/reply ARP broadcast processes. When the ARP requester receives the reply, it catches the pair and keep it in its ARP cache memory so it wont ask for it over again[15]. 2.1.3 ARP Cache Poisoning (Spoofing) Attack It is the process of corrupting an ARP cache with fake IP/MAC entries. It also used to perform some other attacks, for instance:  § Man-in-the-Middle (MiM) attack, also known as (MITM)  § Denial of Service (DoS) attack (refer to section 3.2) As we discussed earlier if an entry is exist in the ARP cache, then it can be updated or corrupted using ARP reply or ARP request. But what about if the entry; is NOT exist in the ARP cache? The answer is: ARP request packets always work to corrupt any Operating System ARP cache whether the entry exists or not in the ARP cache. On the other hand, for hackers, ARP requests allow them to corrupt always the target ARP caches! A recent study[16] showed by experiment the impact of the ARP request update on different Operating Systems. An experiment revealed which OS with dynamic entries in the ARP cache was vulnerable to the ARP cache poisoning attack. 2.1 [17], an evaluation for the impact of the ARP request update on different Operating Systems, e.g. Windows XP Professional, Windows 2000, 2003 Server, Linux 2.x, and Solaris 5.9: Table 2.1: ARP request impact on various OS Windows XP Windows 2000 Windows 2003 Server Linux 2.4 Linux 2.6 Free BSD 4.11 SunOS Solaris5.9 Entry exist in ARP cache? Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes No ARP request √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ √ ARP reply √ X √ √ √ X √ X √ X √ √ √ √ √ = ARP request or reply message is accepted by the system allows the update or creation of MAC / IP entry X = ARP request or reply message is rejected by the system doest NOT allow update creation MAC/IP entry The results of the experiment indicated that: 1. If the entry does not exist in the ARP cache, all tested OSs, except Windows 2000, Free BSD 4.11 and SunOS Solaris 5.9, will not allow the creation of a new entry by an ARP reply message. 2. If the entry does not exist in the ARP cache, all tested OSs allow the creation of a new entry by an ARP request message. 3. However, if the entry existed already in the ARP cache, all tested OSs allowed its update by an ARP reply (even in the absence of an ARP request) or request message. Therefore, when using ARP reply messages, the ARP cache poisoning attack becomes difficult to realize against most OSs. However, it remains indeed possible when using ARP request messages. In conclusion, most common OSs are still vulnerable to the ARP cache poisoning attack. Malicious users can first use ARP request messages to create fake IP/MAC entries in the ARP caches of their target hosts. Then, fake ARP reply massages are used to maintain the existence of fake IP/MAC entries in the ARP caches of the target hosts. 2.1.4 Example of ARP Cache Spoofing As mentioned above the ARP Spoofing process is mainly to corrupt the ARP cache of any host over the network with fake IP/MAC pair in order to perform some serious attacks such as Man-in-the-Middle attack [MiM] or Denial-of-Service [DoS]. In the following demonstration we will show the two different steps before and after the ARP cache poisoning is taking place, in the (2.1) and (2.2). 2.1.4.1 ARP Cache Spoofing (before ARP corruption) In (2.1) its clear that the ARP cache table is legitimate for all hosts connected to the network via a switch, where we can see that every IP-address is mapped to a valid and corresponding MAC-address for that host. For instance; in ARP cache table of the host â€Å"A† ; the IP-address of the host â€Å"B† is mapped with the MAC-address of the host â€Å"B†. And the same case is applied on host â€Å"C†. On the other hand, in ARP cache table of the host â€Å"B† for example; the IP-address of the host â€Å"A† is mapped with the MAC-address of the host â€Å"A†. And the same case is applied on host â€Å"C†. Let us see what changes may occur after the cache poisoning: 2.1.4.2 ARP Cache Spoofing (after corruption) In (2.2): Host â€Å"C† is the malicious host in this scenario. It corrupted the ARP cache tables for both hosts â€Å"A† and â€Å"B†. The ARP cache table for host â€Å"A† is becoming illegitimate now, where we can see that every IP-address is mapped to an invalid and not the corresponding MAC-address for that host. For instance; in ARP cache table of the host â€Å"A† ; the IP-address of the host â€Å"B† is mapped with the MAC-address of the host â€Å"C†. And the same case is applied on host â€Å"B†. In this case whenever the host â€Å"A† want to communicate with host â€Å"B†, the TCP/IP traffic will be guided to pass by the malicious host â€Å"C† instead of â€Å"B†..! So what..? Hackers use the process of generating such abnormal ARP request packets to corrupt the ARP cache for certain hosts and perform different attacks over the network (e.g. MiM or DoS). 2.1.5 Gratuitous ARP: This process is concerned about IP address duplication attack. Such a situation is due to the case when a host sends an ARP request to look for its MAC. This may occur when the host reboots, or once changing its Ethernet Number or the IP address[17]. Gratuitous ARP is doing the following tasks: i. Finding IP address conflicts in the Network by verifying if there is another host that has the same IP address and displaying this message:  « duplicate IP address sent from Ethernet address: a:b:c:d:e:f » . ii. If a host changing its MAC or IP address by sending an ARP request, then it will force to update the ARP cache on the Network with the new MAC/IP address P.S. ARP Gratuitous is mainly influence old Operation Systems, such as; Windows XP SP1 or older. 2.1.6 MiM attack: The man-in-the-middle attack, (abbreviated as: MiM, or sometimes: MITM[18]) comes from the Packet-Sniffing[19]. MiM doesnt listen to all the packets that walk along the network as the Sniffer works, however it interfere with one or more hosts in the network and starts snooping between them. Such hosts been listened by a MiM are commonly called victims. A victim can be a normal host (e.g. PC or Notebook), gateway or even a router! An attacker who is mainly spying between two or more victims; is establishing a autonomous connections between the victims and convey messages between them as if they are directly connected. And hence we call him: Man-in-the-Middle. So far MiM is just listening to the traffic passing through two victims. Although this kind of outrage is illegitimate and can reach sensitive information like passwords, e-mail messages, encryption keys†¦etc. however it become worse and worse when he tries to go further than and inject false and fake packets and convey them between the deceived victims. According to[20] MiM attack is classified as an active attack, because the hacker manages the traffic in the network between the source and the destinations. MiM is very famous approach used by hackers nowadays and uses the ARP protocol in order to attack the ARP-Cache tables and hence control the targets[21]. By poisoning the ARP tables for all hosts in the network for example; will instruct the hosts to reroute the traffic to the Attacker host instead of the Gateway, where he starts interfering between any two or more victims. One more thing needs to be mentioned that the attacker has to forward all the interrupted packets to the original destination, so that the synchronized connection will remain and doesnt time out! In the above ; ARP spoofing occurs when sending a fake and spoofed ARP reply to the target, i.e. if the Attacker has an IP: [10.10.1.10] and wants to sniff the traffic between the Victim who has an IP: [10.10.1.20] and the Gateway which has an IP: [10.10.1.254] it simply sends fake ARP replies to associate its own MAC address with the Gateway IP [10.10.1.254]. The Victim then is trapped and starts sending all the packets intended to the Gateway to the Attacker address as in the above illustration. 2.1.7 Denial of Service [DoS]: DoS attacks; occurring when any suspicious host over the network performs ARP cache poisoning and receives any packet designated to the original target to the suspicious host and cause a block in the connection between the host and the target which is being attacked. Kindly notice that more details regarding Denial of Service [DoS] will be discussed in section (3.2) in chapter No. 3. 2.2 Evaluation Of Common Intrusion Detection Systems And Intrusion Prevention Systems 2.2.1 ARP cache poisoning and MiM attacks: The ARP cache spoofing attack and the Man-in-the-Middle attack are usually maintained and controlled by humans[22]. There are many solutions proposed in solving this type of security threat, based on different mechanisms or protocols at different OSI model layers; such as; Application layer, Network layer and Data link layer[16]. 2.2.2 Detection of ARP cache poisoning attack: Arpwatch[23] and Snort[24] are tools that are able to detect ARP cache poisoning attack by checking each packet contents. To do that, these tools monitor Ethernet activities and keep databases of Ethernet MAC/IP address pairs. If an analyzed packet has an Ethernet MAC/IP address pair, which does not appear in their databases, then the system administrator is alerted. Arpwatch and Snort are sensors that need to have access to monitoring ports on the switches (usually, known under the name of SPAN port, or mirroring port) or be placed in locations where they can see all the network traffic. Therefore, it would be more interesting and efficient to detect any ARP anomalies without the use of any access privilege or special ports on the switches. This is the case since substantial performance impact can be caused when port mirroring is in effect. This strategy makes ARP spoofing detection based on sniffing not quite viable on switched LAN networks[16]. 2.2.3 Packets sniffing and MiM attacks: On shared broadcast LAN networks, such as hubbed and wireless networks, packets sniffing can easily be achieved with minimal efforts. However, a switched LAN environment presents a different problem with few available techniques for sniffing. The first technique consists of connecting to an administrative port on the Switch and setting it to broadcast mode. The administrative port will now receive all traffic. A second technique is summarized by sending a large number of spoofed packets, which is usually an ARP packet (Address Resolution Protocol) to the Switch so it fails to open and sends all packets to all ports. However, a recent study[25] shows that only old switches models are vulnerable to this attack. Another technique, which is based on the MiM attack, is to tell target hosts on the LAN network to use an attackers MAC address in order to get to any other host. This technique is based on the generation of malicious ARP traffic. The attacker host takes a copy of the received t raffic then forwards it to the correct host. Today, security devices, such IDSs (An intrusion detection system) [26] and IPSs (An Intrusion Prevention System)[27], have become a standard component of security solutions used to protect computing assets from hostile attacks. IDSs are able to detect many types of attacks, such as denial of service (DoS) and IP spoofing attacks. But, their ability and reliability to detect certain attacks are still questionable, notably the MiM attack. Prevention mechanisms, such as S-ARP[28] and O-ARP[29] lack efficient implementation on real systems and for a performance evaluation 2.2.4 Prevention mechanisms based on secure ARP protocols: A number of cryptographic protocols have targeted issues related to ARP security. For example, S-ARP[28] is a popular ARP security protocol that uses asymmetric cryptography utilizing digitally signed ARP replies. At the receiving end, an entry is updated if and only if the signatures are correctly verified. S-ARP is considerably slow as can be deduced from the results presented in[28]. Furthermore, S-ARP can not prevent against cache poisoning attacks. a. O-ARP technique: O-ARP[29] is a secure ARP technique that is similar to S-ARP with regards to its message format and key management. However, it uses cryptography only when necessary and tries to avoid it when ever possible. The authors in[29] claim that O-ARP is much faster than S-ARP on the average, and can be used as security measure to prevent against cache poisoning attacks. Meanwhile, the authors did not implement O-ARP in any operating system to obtain measurements for its performance. In[30] the authors proposed another Secure Address Resolution Protocol. In this protocol, a secure server shares secret keys with each host on a subnet. The server maintains a database of MAC/IP address mappings, which is updated periodically through communication with each host. All ARP requests and replies occur between a host and the server, and replies are authenticated using the shared pair keys. The main drawback of this technique is congestion at the server, which constitutes a single point of failure in the network. b. Ticket-based Address Resolution Protocol Ticket-based Address Resolution Protocol (TARP)[31] is another secure ARP protocol. TARP is built as an extension to ARP. TARP implements security by distributing centrally issued secure MAC/IP address mapping attestations through existing ARP messages. These attestations, called tickets are given to clients as they join the network and are subsequently distributed through existing ARP messages. Unlike other popular ARP-based solutions, the costs per resolution are reduced to one public key validation per request/reply pair in the worst case. However, networks implementing TARP are vulnerable to two types of attacks-active host impersonation, and DoS through ticket flooding. In addition, TARP does not include support for dynamic environments, mainly when hosts IP addresses changes dynamically. c. Cryptographic Technique Another approach was presented in[32], where the authors proposed a cryptographic technique. The technique is based on the combination of digital signatures and one time passwords based on hash chains. d. ARPSec protocol Moreover, in[33], the ARPSec protocol was proposed as an ARP security extension that intends to solve the security weaknesses of the ARP protocol. ARPSec provides an anti-replay protection and authentication using a secret key shared only by the source and the destination of the packet computed by an authenticated Diffie-Hellman exchange. Unfortunately, no real-time implementation or performance evaluations on actual network systems were performed to quantify their efficiency. At the network layer, the IPSec[34] protocol can be used to facilitate the confidentiality, integrity, and authentication of information communicated using the IP protocol. IPSec proposes solutions for many security issues within the IP protocol, but does not prevent any malicious users from manipulating ARP packets, at the Data link layer, or redirecting target network IP traffic to other destinations. IPSec guaranties the confidentiality and integrity of the redirected IP traffic, but cannot prevent malicious users from causing DoS attacks on target hosts. 2.2.5 Protection mechanisms at the Application layer: Recently, several security protection mechanisms have been proposed at the Application layer. However, such mechanisms might not be effective against certain attacks at the lower layers, mainly at the Data Link layer. For example, in[35], the authors argued that most deployed user authentication mechanisms fail to provide protection against the MiM attack, even when they run on top of the SSL/TLS protocol or other similar protocols. The authors then introduced the notion of SSL/TLS session-aware user authentication, and elaborated on possibilities to implement it. Another example is the Interlock protocol, proposed in[36], which was later shown to be vulnerable to attacks when used for authentication[37]. For enhanced security at the Application layer, in[38] a new proposed technique called Delayed Password Disclosure (DPD) was shown to complement a password-based authentication and key exchange protocol to protect against a special form of the MiM attack, the doppelganger window att ack. On the other hand, in[39] the authors proposed the notion of a Password Protection Module (PPM) that provides protection against the MiM attack for certain situations. PPMs are effective only if they take into account network-related information, such as IP addresses and URLs. This makes PPMs very difficult to deploy and manage. Additional protection mechanisms were proposed in[40] to secure tunneled authentication protocols against the MiM attack. In most cases, prevention mechanisms at the Application layer guarantee the confidentiality and integrity of the traffic exchanged but do not prevent malicious users from redirecting network traffic to their hosts. 2.2.6 External protection mechanisms: Several attempts have been made to address the above security issues through methods external to the ARP protocol. For example, it has been proposed that hosts can statically be cond[41] . This would incur a huge administrative overhead and is largely intractable for dynamic environments. Conversely, the port security[42] features available in recent switches restrict the use of physical ports to con MAC addresses. If an attacker forges its own MAC address and includes an additional frame header containing malicious mapping, poisoning a victims ARP cache can still be possible. This approach only prevents certain kinds of MAC hijacking, but does nothing to prevent MiM attack. Hence, it is only a partial and in many ways limited solution

Macbeth - A Good Guy :: Macbeth essays

Macbeth - A Good Guy In the beginning of the play Macbeth was portrayed as a "good being" he fought for his country and for his king. Shakespeare describes Macbeth in such quotes as "for brave Macbeth-well he deserves that name" (pg. 38, line 16), and "What he hath lost, noble Macbeth hath won."(pg. 40 line 67). These types of quotes in the play seem to be placed with the so called "Good guys" when they achieve or accomplish something that is great. The thoughts of killing the king only began after the three witches had made the three predictions. When Lady Macbeth had read her husbands letter about what the witches had promised. Lady Macbeth waited until Macbeth arrived home and pushed him to make the predictions come true. Macbeth knew the murder of Duncan is wrong but Lady Macbeth pushes him to act. Unlike Macbeth, Lady Macbeth does not struggle with the battle against evil she simply brings it upon herself. "Come you spirits that tend my mortal thoughts, unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe, top full of direst cruelty. Come thick night, and pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, that my knife see not the wound it makes, nor heaven peep through the blanket of dark."(pg. 51 line 41) These lines are stated in a soliloquy, asking for the evil spirits to be bought upon her. Lady Macbeth could never of killed Duncan as he reminder her of her own father ,proving Macbeth had to also fulfil Lady Macbeth's ambitions as well as his own. The heroic loyal character of Macbeth is forced into a internal battle to decide between ambition and loyalty to his king. Macbeth overcomes the evil within him, though Lady Macbeth crushes his thoughts of loyalty to the king by calling him a coward or threatening his manliness. Macbeth allows the evilness to grow within him, which allows ambition to take control of his life. Due to the evilness that has started to control his life he prepares to kill the man who has given him everything to his credit, to fulfil his ambition, and to become King.

Evolution Of Diabetes Treatment Health And Social Care Essay

Diabetess mellitus is a group of metabolic diseases characterized by hyperglycaemia ensuing from defects in insulin secernment, insulin action, or both. The chronic hyperglycaemia of diabetes is associated with long-run harm, disfunction, and failure of assorted variety meats, particularly the eyes, kidneys, nervousnesss, bosom, and blood vessels.1 Figure 1: Prevalence estimations of diabetes ( 20-79 old ages ) in South – East Asiatic part Globally diabetes mellitus is one of the most common non-communicable diseases. It is quickly going the epidemic of the twenty-first century. Diabetes, one time considered a disease of the West has now become a planetary wellness precedence. Harmonizing to the International Diabetes Federation, the planetary load of diabetes in the age group 20-79 old ages will increase from 285 million in 2010 to 439 million in 2030. Around 80 % of the disease load is in low and in-between income countries.2 American indians have a younger age of oncoming of diabetes as compared to other cultural groups.3 A temporal displacement to a immature group in the age of diagnosing has been reported by the CURES ( Chennai Urban Rural Epidemiology Study ) study.4 Harmonizing to IDF, the 40-59 group has the greatest figure of people with diabetes. By 2030, it is projected that there will be 188 million people with diabetes as compared to 132 million in 2010. History of diabetes can be traced back to 2000 old ages. A Grecian doctor Aretaeus foremost described diabetes as â€Å" the thaw of flesh and castanetss into urine † . In the sixteenth century, Swiss doctor Phillipus Aureolus Paracelsus identified diabetes as a serious general upset. The Indian Sushruta identified diabetes with fleshiness and sedentary life style reding exercisings to â€Å" assist bring around it † . Treatment of diabetes saw enlightment in the twentieth century. In 1921, Sir Fredrick Grant Banting and Charles Herbert Best discovered that infusion from cattle foetal pancreas lowers blood glucose degrees of depancreatized Canis familiariss. The find of insulin was in fact a collaborative research of Fredrick Benting, Charles Best, J.J.R MacLeod and J.B McLeod. 5 In 1930, unwritten medicines Sulphonylureas were developed for the people with type 2 diabetes. Metformin was approved in 1995 by FDA for usage in type 2 diabetes. Precose, an alpha-glucosidase inhibitor was approved for usage in patients with type 2 diabetes. As of this twelvemonth, 11 categories of drugs are available for clinical usage in diabetes.INTENSIVE Vs STANDARD GLYCEMIC CONTROLDCCT and UKPDSDiabetess is associated with a decreased lifetime, mostly as a effect of its association with hyperglycaemia specific microvascular complications and a two- to four crease hazard of cardiovascular disease ( CVD ) .6 Although important morbidity and premature mortality are due to microvascular complications, the greatest cause of decease in people with diabetes is CVD.6 The association between elevated blood glucose and complications ( both micro and macrovascular ) has been postulated since the early portion of the century.7Several surveies have conducted to measure the benefits of intensive glycemic control in cut downing complications of diabetes. Though a nexus is established between hyperglycaemia and cardiovascular hazard, there is less grounds back uping the decrease in hazard with glucose lowering. Randomized controlled tests ( DCCT and UKPDS ) have once and for all demonstrated the decrease of hazard of microvascular complications by intensive glycemic control in patients with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes.6 Although DCCT was conducted on patients with type 1 diabetes, the survey demonstrated that hyperglycaemia is associated with presence or patterned advance of complications. Consequences demonstrated that every bit compared to the standard glycemic control group ( Mean HbA1c achieved – 9 % ) there was about 60 % decrease in the development or patterned advance of microvascular complications in the intensive glycemic control group ( Mean HbA1c achieved – 9 % ) over an norm of 6.5 years.6 In the UKPDS survey, participants with freshly diagnosed type 2 diabetes were followed for 10 old ages. The consequences demonstrated that every bit compared to the standard glycemic control group ( Mean HbA1c achieved – 7.9 % ) there was an overall decrease of 25 % in the intensive glycemic control group ( Mean HbA1c achieved – 7.0 % ) .6,7 For every per centum lessening in HbA1c, there was 35 % decrease in the hazard of complications. 7 On the footing of the informations from these big controlled tests and assorted epidemiologic studies the ADA recommends an HbA1c end of & lt ; 7 % for most of the grownups with diabetes. Whereas these surveies established a relationship between hyperglycaemia and CVD, the potency of intensive glycemic control was yet to be indentified. Merely a subgroup of patients treated with Glucophage had a lower hazard of cardiovascular events in the ( UKPDS ) , therefore informations did non once and for all exhibit a decrease in cardiovascular events with intensive therapy.7Patients with type 1 diabetes in the DCCT survey demonstrated that glucose lowering was associated with a long-run benefit with respect to cardiovascular complications that became evident merely old ages after recruitment.7 Tests were so conducted to find the consequence of the lowering of glucose to near-normal or below degrees on cardiovascular hazard.ADVANCE ( Action in Diabetes and Vascular Disease )The primary result of ADVANCE was a combination of microvascular events ( nephropathy and retinopathy ) and major inauspicious cardiovascular events ( MI, shot, and cardiovascular decease ) .A important decrease in the microvascular result with no important decrease in the macrovascular result was seen with intensive glycemic control. But with intensive glycemic control there was no difference in overall or cardiovascular mortality as compared with the standard glycemic control arms.6However significantly more episodes of terrible hypoglycaemia were found in the intensive-control group.8ACCORD ( Action to Control Cardiovascular Risk in Diabetes )Increased human death rate in the intensive glycemic control group resulted in the survey being halted in February 2008. A 35 % higher rate of decease due to CV causes was seen in the intensive glycemic control group. More episodes of serious hypoglycaemia were found among patients following intensive glycemic control group than among those following the standard glycemic control group.6 Deaths due to CV disease in this test may hold been related to severe hypoglycemia.9VADT ( Veterans Affairs Diabetes Trial )In VADT, the primary result was a complex of CVD events ( MI, shot, cardiovascular decease, revascularization, hospitalization for bosom failure, and amputation for ischaemia ) . More deceases due to CV causes were seen in the intensive glycemic control group as compared to the standard glycemic control group. More episodes of hypoglycaemia were found in the intensive glycemic control group than in the standard glycemic control group.8, 9OUTCOME – ADVANCE, ACCORD, VADTADVANCE, ACCORD, VADT tests were big, well-conducted randomized tests with meaningful clinical results to assist reply major inquiries. As compared to DCCT and the UKPDS they were of shorter continuance and enrolled older patients with either known CVD or multiple hazard factors, proposing the presence of established coronary artery disease and higher hazard of CV events.6The recent study of 10 old ages of followup of the UKPDS cohort by Rury R. Holman et.al. supports the hypothesis that glycemic control early in the class of type 2 diabetes may hold CVD benefit.6Counter-balancing effects for CVD such as hypoglycaemia, weight addition, or other metabolic alterations may besides propose the inability of ACCORD, ADVANCE, and VADT to show important decrease of CVD with intensive glycemic control.6 The intervention schemes in these surveies might hold had effects other than the intended effects on CV hazard factors.9MULTIPLE RISK FACTOR INTERVENTIONIn the last 10 old ages, many modifiable hazard factors for vascular complications have been identified by a figure of prospective surveies. These hazard factors include hyperglycemia, high blood press ure, dyslipidaemia and smoke.STENO – 2Steno – 2 test evaluated whether the attack of intensified multifactorial intercession with tight glucose ordinance, usage of renin-angiotensin system blockers, acetylsalicylic acid, and lipid-lowering agents to cut down the hazard of nonfatal cardiovascular disease among patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus and microalbuminuria.10Participants were assigned indiscriminately to have either a conventional ( behavioral ) or an intensive, multifactorial, goal-targeted therapy for a period of 7.8 years.11The consequences demonstrated an absolute hazard decrease of 20 % for decease from any cause in the intensive therapy group as compared with conventional therapy group. Results demonstrated a 50 % decrease in the hazard of microvascular events and a 13 % decrease in the absolute hazard of decease from cardiovascular causes in the intensive therapy group.10, 11 Deduction TO CLINICIANS 6, 8, 9 HbA1c mark of & lt ; 7 % should be the end for non-pregnant grownups. Lowering HbA1c to below or around 7 % has shown to cut down microvascular and neuropathic complications. Individualization of marks for patients with extra cardiovascular hazard factors. HbA1c marks a†°Ã‚ ¤ 7 % in the old ages shortly after the diagnosing of diabetes without established atherosclerotic diseases is associated with long-run decrease in hazard of macrovascular disease Lesser stringent HbA1c mark may be appropriate for patients with history of terrible hypoglycaemia, limited life anticipation, advanced micro and macrovascular complications, extended comorbid conditions or those with longstanding diabetes. Cardiovascular hazard decrease should be encouraged through smoking surcease, dietetic, reding for physical activity and behavioral alterations. Evidence-based recommendation should be followed for blood force per unit area control, dyslipidemia and acetylsalicylic acid prophylaxis An intensive, targeted and multifactorial attention attack is indispensable in people with diabetes at high hazardA §FOREMOST UpdatesLook AHEAD ( Action For Health in Diabetes ) is a multicenter randomized clinical test being presently conducted to analyze the effects of a lifestyle intercession over long term through decreased thermal consumption and exercising. The primary purpose is to analyze the effects on major cardiovascular events i.e. bosom onslaught, shot and cardiovascular-related decease. It besides aims to look into the impact of the intercessions on other cardiovascular disease-related results, cardiovascular hazard factors, and all-cause mortality. The consequences published at 1 twelvemonth resulted in clinically important weight loss in people with type 2 diabetes in the lifestyle intercession group.12

Working Capital Management of Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh

Working capital management of Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited (HCBL) Executive Summary: In this report we have presented the overall working capital management of Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited (HCBL). We have gather maximum information from the annual reports and by taking interview of Board of Director, M. Abul Hashem; Company Secretary. In this report we have tried to match the terms and conditions that we learned in FIN340 with HCBL’s working capital management. We have done financial analysis and gave recommendation.Company Overview: Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh is one the largest producers of quality cement in Bangladesh. Heidelberg Cement Group from Germany, one of the world’s leaders in construction and building material with operations in more than 50 countries, owns 61% shares of the company. In 1998 Heidelberg Cement Group established its presence in Bangladesh by setting up a floating terminal with on board bagging facilities in the port of Chitta gong and by distributing the cement to the key markets of Dhaka and Chittagong.In 1999 the group further strengthened its position in Bangladesh and built a greenfield manufacturing plant near Dhaka namely â€Å"Scancement International Limited† with an installed capacity of 0. 750 million tons per year. In 2000 Heidelberg Cement group also bought a minority position in Chittagong based company namely â€Å"Chittagong Cement Clinker Griding Co. Limited (CCCGCL)† quickly followed by the acquisition of a in controlling stake. The plant in Chittagong has an installed capacity of 0. 7 million ton per year. In 2003, the two companies were amalgamated and the company’s name was changed to Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited.Corporate Mission: The Corporate Image : Building worldwide growth by building a better world. Business Culture : Building on local responsibility for international success Employee Policy : Building our business on the knowledge of our people Mar ket Strategy : Building our growth on a solid base of earnings Customer Philosophy : Building customer satisfaction Quality Standard : Building on quality products to build reputation Commitment to Innovation : Building on new technologies determines our future successBrief History Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited meets 13% of the Bangladesh demand for cement from two plants located at Dhaka & Chittagong. Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited employs 260 people across the country. The company with 1. 5 million tones annual cement production has become a major force in the Bangladesh Cement industry over the last eight years. In Bangladesh, Heidelberg group is one of the largest foreign investors having an investment of 100 million US$ with more than 260 employees working round the clock to materialize the mission of this great global company.By satisfying the needs and aspirations of its customers, employees, shareholders and the wider community, the company is able to maintain i ts position of strength as a sustainable cement provider without compromising commitment to long term stability and environmental responsibility. Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited is a sister concern of Heidelberg Cement Group. Environmental Policy Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Limited Protection of the environment is an integral part of Heidelberg Cement Group’s strategy. As natural resources are the basis of cement, measures for sustainable environmental care are adopted in all our operations.In Bangladesh, our policy is to produce high quality cement, optimize operations to save on natural resources and prevent pollution in order to create a cleaner and safer environment. Products & Innovation Portland Composite Cement (PCC) As part of its relentless pursuit for innovation and constant drive to improve quality, HeidelbergCement has introduced Portland Composite Cement (PCC) during 2003. Absorbing European Norms in cement producing made HeidelbergCement Bangladesh Ltd. th e pioneer in this sector. Now-a-days all the cement factories of Bangladesh are producing cement as per European Norm.The category Portland Composite Cement (CEM II) is the market leader in Europe. Cement produced according to the BDS EN ScanCement and RubyCement are designed to achieve the best characteristics for its customers; this result is achieved by design using clinker and high quality other constituents. PCC has the optimum of: Durability, Long-term strength and workability. ScanCement and RubyCement are produced according to the European norms BDS EN 197-1:2003. Characteristics of ScanCement / RubyCement: Higher Strength ScanCement and RubyCement have higher long-term strength than a standard Portland Cement (OPC).The slag part in the design contributes that the gap in long-term strength with OPC is widening as time progresses. Higher Durability The design of ScanCement and RubyCement increases the density of concrete (lower permeability). Smaller voids are the effect of t he reaction between the clinker and the slag. This density contributes to the durability and lifetime of the construction. Better Workability To improve the quality of plaster and masonry work Limestone is added to the design of ScanCement and RubyCement. This improves strongly the workability of the concrete. Plastering will look smoother, better and more beautiful.The concrete is easier to use. Other Improvements On top of the above-mentioned improvements ScanCement and RubyCement reduces thermal cracking. Due to the slag in the design less heat is generated which reduces the risk of thermal cracks. Furthermore our brands use less water to achieve the required workability. This contributes to the strength and quality of the construction. Daily Cash Inflow and Cash Outflow: Here we have presented the daily cash inflow and outflow of HCBL. 200820072006 Cash received from customers6,332,191,0005,573,231,0004,963,425,000 Cash received from other operating income84,205,00049,963,00014, 630,000Cash Inflow throughout the year6,416,396,000. 00 5,623,194,000. 00 4,978,055,000. 00 Daily Cash Inflow17,579,167. 12 15,406,010. 96 13,638,506. 85 200820072006 Payment for financial expense(68,293,000)(55,096,000)(96,760,000) Income tax paid(206,802,000)(96,947,000)(35,495,000) Cash paid to suppliers(5,480,284,000)(3,835,873,000)(3,334,740,000) Cash paid for operating expenses(628,326,000)(507,571,000)(501,761,000) Cash outflow through out the year(6,383,702,992. 00)(4,495,484,993. 00)(3,968,753,994. 00) Daily Cash outflow(17,489,597. 24)(12,316,397. 24)(10,873,298. 1) Net Daily Cash Inflow89,569. 883,089,613. 722,765,208. 24 Cash inflows and outflows are not perfectly synchronized. Here we have net cash inflows in 3 years; it shows that HCBL had sufficient money supply to finance its operation efficiently. Changes in Short Term Loan Account: The HCBL don’t have any marketable securities account in balance sheet. In 2006 the company has a short term loan of 467884000 a nd in 2007 & 2008 the company has short term loans of 654441000 & 829715000. From 2006 to 2007 there is an increase in Short term loan account of tk. 186557000.And from 2007 to 2008 the short term loan has increase by Tk. 175274000. Over the period the short term loan has increased over the period. The loans were mainly taken from their sister concern Meghna Energy Limited. Seasonality impact in Cash Inflow and Cash Outflow: Seasonality Variations in Cash flows from sales: Highest sales: We have come to know from our interview that there is seasonality is present in Heidelberg cement. Their peak in sales and variation in cash flow is approximately quarterly basis. It has peak of the sales during January to March. In this time they have to maintain large inventory.At these time their sales increase, as a result gross profit and revenue increase and cash inflow also increases in this 1st quarter. They have also good sales from October to April. Normal cash inflow comes during this tim e. From May to September their sales usually decrease because of rainy season. Cash Outflow: When sales increase marketing and transportation expenses increase. As a result, cash outflow increases at this time. As raw materials are mainly imported from there inter company trade that’s why they don’t have to pay immediately a huge money when they import RM. They get a flexible credit term.Geographical Spread and Customers: Heidelberg Cement has divided their business in 6 divisions in Bangladesh. They have two main branches in Dhaka and Chittagong. They have also sales agents in other four divisions. But most of the sales generate from Dhaka and Chittagong divisions. Then Sylhet and sales in other 3 divisions are approximately same. They do not have any physical export of goods. If they sell goods to EPZ area and if they get paid in dollars, this is termed as export. The over all market share of Heidelberg Cement is 13%. The industry saturated. Still they have chance to gather more market share in the industry.They are facing some restriction because they are multinational company. They have 3 types of customers: 1. Dealers 2. Corporate customers (e. g. developers, contractors) 3. Government projects (e. g. Mohakhali Flyover, Lalon Shah Bridge, Karnafuli Bridge, Banani Bridge) Except these they have also very few retailers who are very close to them. But usually they do not deal with retailers. Collection Procedure: Checks/pay order: Most of the time, they receive payments through checks. They also receive payments by pay order which is very limited. Generally, they do not allow any other ways of payments.They don’t have any cash transaction. Collection Points , Concentration Banks, Deposit banks, Lock Box: There are collection points. The customers pay through the local branches of Dhaka Bank, Dutch Bangla Bank and Marcentile Bank. These banks work as collection points. As these local banks have lots of branches in Bangladesh it helps a lo t in collection process. Through the online banking system the money from these local Banks are easily accessible from the principal branch. Then Heidelberg cement collects money from these banks and deposited in the Standard Charted Bank and Citi N.A bank. 95% of collected money is deposited in Standard Charted Bank and rest of the 5% is deposited in City N. A. bank are. Here Standard Charted Bank and Citi N. A. bank are used as concentration banks. They transfer the money from the collection bank at the end of the month whether the money is collected at 1st week of the month. Because they have ample money in hand they are lazy to transfer the money at concentration banks. But they are very efficient in collecting the money from customers in due date. Because of having no lockbox system in Bangladesh, they do not use lockbox system.As there group policy they have restriction on depositing money in local banks. The local banks are usually responsible for collecting payments. Cost: I n standard chartered and Citi N. A the service charge is little higher than the service charge taken by other banks. Banks are responsible for disbursing payments, handling LC, payment of salary etc. There is very low risk, because they follow some strict laws like: †¢They do not give dealership without bank guarantee. †¢They follow conservative credit policy. †¢They encourage cash sales. On an average their credit term is of 18-20 days.In government projects their credit term is usually flexible. Cash Disbursement Procedure: Suppliers: There are mainly two groups who receive money from the Heidelberg cement. One is the Raw material suppliers and then another is the suppliers of different utilities. The raw material suppliers are mainly the subsidiary of Heidelberg Group. Generally they take raw materials from Indo Cement; Indonesia, Heidelberg Cement; India and Heidelberg Cement; Japan. Payment Methods, Disbursement Banks: They are mainly importing raw materials. So they pay through LC. They do not have any cash payments.They pay through Standard Charted Bank. The Standard Charted Bank works as disbursement bank and processes all the formalities. Sometimes Citi N. A also works as a disbursement bank. Authorization: They follow centralized Disbursement policy. All checks are signed in the Head quarter. Payments are made through mainly finance department. If the payment is less than $6 million, it needs the joint signature of head of finance department and in group B consist of three directors from them any one have to sign. But if payments exceed $6 million it needs joint signature of finance department and Manager Director.Float: Although directly they do not take the help of floating, sometimes they try to write check on Wednesday/Thursday. As a result, payments can not be transferred to suppliers Banks before Sunday. In directly they are taking the advantage of inefficient banking system in Bangladesh. Credit Policy: Normally they have a cons ervative credit policy. They are not willing to flexible their credit policies to increase their sales & revenue. They cannot provide smooth credit policy, because as a MNC they cannot collect payments by pressure. Also they have to maintain some Government rules and regulations.They usually emphasize on quality, as a result they maintain premium price. They have to go by the law. That’s why they are not investing that much in A/R. They are not willing to increase the risk. When collecting payments, they give two warnings after exceeding the credit limit. If they fail to collect payment despite these, then they realize the bank guarantee. They provide up to 60 => days of credit limit to Government Projects, 30 days to corporate customers. But they maintain more strict credit policy to the dealers, because of reliability. They give credit to the dealers only if they can give bank guarantee.Only to the renowned developer’s they sale on credit. They have credit term on av erage of 18-20 days. Working Capital Needs: They are very efficient in cash management. That is why they have enough cash to finance working capital. Also they have huge idle money. They cannot deposit all portions of money in banks. As a result, they finance the working capital requirements by internal sources. Sometimes they also take loan from the subsidiaries of Heidelberg group. They took loan from Meghna Energy Limited which is the subsidiary of Heidelberg group too. But at resent (2009-2010) they are not taking any short term loan. As they are multinational company they can not remit money in parent company without the help of dividends. So every year they are having huge retained earnings in their account. With that money they are financing their short term needs. Also with the help of high tech softwares they had become more efficient in managing the business. They are remitting money as technical know how fees which is 3% of prior years net sales. Heidelberg group helps a lot to their subsidiary in terms of technology, experience etc.As they are more capable of internal financing in 2008 they don’t have any long-term loans. Collection Method (#9): HCBL has some Paper information flow attached to invoice. This attachment contains the Order size, order no, time of delivery and the date of payment. The payment is made to the Collection Bank and the dealers get the receipt from the bank. Because the checks are account payee checks, so they can easily track which customer paid the payment. The company by the time get knows about the payment by ERP software which is connected with Banks.The bank process the payment system and it takes a little time for the company to get notified and deposited because all party are connected through ERP software. Bank processing fees are the cost involved in this Process. If the payment is not made by the dealers they realized the bank guarantee after giving two warnings. Basically Credit policy for Government proje cts are flexible than the usual customers. Electronic Method for Managing HCBL: ERP: Heidelberg Cement Bangladesh Ltd. (HCBL) use an Enterprise application software named Enterprise Resource Planning(ERP) which has a market price of almost Tk. 0,000,000-Tk. 30,000,000 (2-3 crore TK. ). They have got this software in one sense free initially. But they are paying off these fees as â€Å"technical r knowhow fees† in every year which is 3% of prior years net sal . This software Provide a single information system for organization-wide coordination and integration of key business processes. This is a competitive advantage for Heidelberg cement. ERP connects all key business process (e. g. – manufacturing and production, accounting and finance, human resources, sales and marketing) and connects the suppliers & Dealers together in a single place.By this all department can share information which helps business increase efficiency or evaluates their output. 1. ERP also enables to Ordering equipment, preparing inventory, sending them to sites, activating them followed by routine maintenance is a chain of daunting tasks. If there is a missing link in this extremely complex process, they will be out of business in the fiercely competitive market. Earlier it took nearly thirty minutes to generate a purchase order but now it takes a few seconds. The entire process is flawless and tamperproof as a robust computer controls it centrally.Heidelberg Cement has deployed two such servers in different locations to ensure that one takes over in case the other computer fails. They can track every employee’s output and assess them accordingly. It perfects the evaluation process of the company’s human capital. By using ERP, Efficiency of Heidelberg’s employees increased 99 percent. ERP maximize profit and minimize costs, while providing superior service to its customers. Advantages of ERP: †¢ERP is software which integrates all functionalities o f the organization in a single database.It streamlines all the business processes and gives desired result on a click of a button. †¢ERP software incorporates a large amount of industry specific business functionalities which will ensure less customization or sometime no customization (except reports) to make the package suitable to your business operations. †¢Most important advantage of ERP software is integration of all the business solution in a single platform, which reduces unnecessary paper work, documentation, repeated entry, cycle time etc. The software also comes with its framework of upgrades to changing technologies. In the ERP software business functionalities and operating processes are built into standard software codes, thus it require lesser time to understand process related issue of implementation and gives industry specific best practices. †¢ERP can be useful is order tracking. When a company receives orders for a product, being able to properly tra ck the orders can allow the company to get detailed information on their customers and marketing strategies. If different software packages are being used, this data may not be consistent. †¢ERP software automates the business processes and also forces its own logic (industry specific) on the business. Accounting applications is another advantage of ERP. It can integrate the costing, profit, and revenue information of sales that are made etc. Other Advantages : †¢Speeding up the whole manufacturing process †¢Better and systematic inventory handling with ABC analysis †¢WIP (work in progress) control †¢Easy project management †¢Accessing the status of the goods on a click of a button †¢Fast transmit commodities through online transactions †¢Fastens the creation of reports †¢Reduce paper works and repeated entry †¢Quick processing of information †¢Serving the customer efficiently in time †¢Solve the customer problem quickly In formation based decision †¢Better finance reports †¢Better supply chain management †¢Better vendor management †¢Reduce process cycle time Disadvantages of ERP: †¢Perhaps one of the biggest disadvantages to this technology is the cost. As the company is an MNC they get this software for free. They are paying off this cost as â€Å"Technical Knowhow Fees† throughout the years. †¢Expert needed to run the ERP system. The employees must be continually trained on how to use it, and it is also important for companies to make sure the integrity of the data is protected. The success of the system is fully dependent on how the workers utilize it. Even if a company has enough money to implement ERP, they may not be able to successfully use it if they do not have enough money to train their workers on the process of using it. †¢One of the biggest problems with ERP is that it is hard to customize. Very few companies can effectively use ERP right out of t he box. It must be modified to suit their needs, and this process can be both expensive and tedious. †¢Most ERP vendors will not allow the structure of the software to be altered. ERP vendors may charge additional license fees, putting a strain on companies that do not have enough resources to pay for them.The technical support of ERP departments has been questioned, and a number of problems could arise due to security, since corporate representatives must give sensitive information to the tech support department. ERP inventory management: ERP inventory management handles everything from ordering, physical inventory count, scheduling, shipping, receiving, purchasing, and supply chain planning. Changes in inventory are automatically updated. It no longer takes hours (sometimes up to 24) before the changes are recorded. This helps inventory management employees of HCBL to be able to see if an item is currently in stock.Faster service means better customer service. HCBL ERP manage ment uses bar codes to keep up with inventory items. This makes tracking stock much easier. As the bar-coded items leave inventory, they get scanned and their product information is entered into the ERP inventory management system. Placing bar code labels on stock helps HCBL save money because it keeps the list of stock updated. Employees can easily see when certain quantities are low and need to be re-stocked. Customer service also benefits from this because businesses and customers can see what products are immediately available.Advantages : ERP inventory management has many advantages. The main advantage for a company is that the ERP system is company-wide and involves only one software system. Some other advantages include: †¢Proper communication between different areas. †¢Tracking of orders from the time the order was received to its delivery. †¢Keeping up with the revenue cycle from when the invoice is issue through when the payment is received. †¢Provides a ‘top down’ overview of the workings of a company. †¢Reduces the risk of loss of information †¢Sets up a form of security to protect against theft from outside or within a company.Disadvantages : Despite the advantages HCBL receive from using ERP inventory management, there are also some problems with it. Most of these disadvantages stem from inadequately trained employees as well as compromised data. But there are other concerns that can arise from this type of system. †¢Reformatting a business to make it more compatible with an ERP system and thus conform it to industry standards may cause a loss of advantage over the competition. †¢By creating a company-wide system that connects all areas, it makes it hard to figure out accountability. Problems that may arise in one area could mistakenly be blamed on a different area. Not all departments in a company are willing to share information. This withholding of sensitive data can interrupt the workflow. †¢ERP inventory management systems may to too complex for the needs of a company. Cash Flow Timeline: Here we have showed the cash flow timeline of HCBL of 2006,2007,2008 Financial Analysis: Financial analysis of Heidelberg Cement Ltd. Liquidity Ratio200620072008 NWC to assets-0. 050. 010. 11 current ratio0. 871. 031. 27 quick ratio0. 480. 710. 66 cash ratio0. 060. 400. 32 interval measure851. 401637. 281499. 92 CCC-1. 26-17. 9936. 53 Days Inventory held57. 5256. 03103. 14 DSO37. 8037. 5635. 02 Operating Cycle95. 293. 59138. 16 DPO96. 59111. 57101. 63 NWC-208822000. 0064703000. 00638679000. 00 NLB46997000. 00800973000. 00768453000. 00 CLI27. 5639. 40 Efficiency Ratio Total asset turnover1. 211. 091. 08 NWC turnover-23. 9686. 889. 97 Inventory turnover6. 356. 513. 54 Day’s sales in inventory57. 5256. 03103. 14 AVG collection period37. 837. 5635. 02 Profitability ratio net profit margin0. 10. 110. 09 ROA0. 130. 120. 1 ROE0. 220. 220. 18 payout ratio0. 170. 230. 31 Market V alue Ratio price earning ratio6. 6810. 9511. 58 Earning per share96. 92110104. 86 From 2006 to 2007 their operating cycle decreased and DPO increased significantly.When their DPO was increasing it does not create any problem in relation with the suppliers. Because the suppliers are mainly the subsidiary of the hiedelberg group. So they got advantage in those years. And that is why the company’s CCC decreased in 2007. In 2006 and 2007 the company’s CCC were negative and it was -1. 26 and -17. 99 days respectively, that means the company doesn’t need any external financing. They were very efficient in managing the cash. So that without investing in Inventories and A/R they were efficiently running the operation. Although they had sufficient cash in their hand.From2007-2008 the company’s Operating cycle increased significantly and DPO decreased slightly. As a result in 2008 the company’s CCC increased to 36. 53 days. This increase was a result of a hi gh Days inventory Held (103. 14 days). In 2008 they brought a very high amount of inventory from their sister concern company from Indonesia named Indocement. so the company need financing from somewhere. They have sufficient amount of cash and from that liquid cash the company was financing their operation. They don’t need any external financing for that time lag. They mostly depend on internal financing.As they are subsidiary of Heidelberg group they get lots of facilities in many areas. This is their competitive advantage. By net liquid balance we can cover the working capital requirements. As past years shows that the company’s NLB is growing, so it is a good sign for the company to run its day to day business. For many years they were not facing any kind of liquidity problem. In 2007-2008 the CLI was increasing. And it is positive number. CLI represents the Cash against to cover it’s the current liabilities. The CLI for past year shows that the company has high CLI; this means the company has ample cash to cover its current debts.The company has a positive and a high amount of net working capital. This means some of Company’s Current assets were financed by the long term sources of fund. Here the company has not that much long term loan in 2006-2007 period compared to its short term loan and there were no long term loan in 2008, they paid off all of their long term loans in 2008. The Excess liquidity of the company was financing their day to day business. From the time period of 2006 to 2008 the company’s current ratio has improved over the period And the company’s quick ratio improved from 2006 to 2007.Total asset turnover, NWC turnover and inventory turnover is on average much better and Day’s sales in inventory is acceptable. Average collection period is lower which is a good indicator for the company. Therefore, the efficiency level of the company is really good. Profit margin, ROA and ROE tells that, t his is a dream company at cement sector. All these three ratios are high over the period. Payout ratio tells that the company does give regular dividend. For this company, P/E ratio is very much high compare to its industry. It has also a high EPS.Overall, the company has a good market book ratios and it indicates that investors are very much interested to invest to this firm. It is the highest valued share than any other company in the cement industry. We take sales growth rate as the growth rate. Company’s growth rate, 13% is much lowers the industry growth rate, 47. 84%. It proves that other companies are capturing the growing market. Free cash flow of the company is getting higher and higher day by day, so they have enough free cash to invest and meeting current liability. HCBL’s cash flow from operation is also impressive.Problems and Recommendation: This problems and recommendations are based on the statements of year ended 2006, 2007 and 2008. At present 2009 th ey have done some improvements. Too much idle cash : They have too much idle cash because of their efficiency and working capital management, conservative collection procedure and mainly they are remitting less money in parent company through dividends. They were keeping lots of retained earnings in Bangladesh and not investing in new project. Also in 2008 they had decrease in net cash flow but because of opening balance in cash the closing balance showed a huge number.This proves that they had huge idle cash. The analysis will show the more clear picture. 200620072008Average Net cash (decrease) / increase during th eyear71,339,000759,976,000(82,749,000) Opening Balance19,888,00091,227,000851,203,000 Closing Balance91,227,000851,203,000768,454,000 Number of shares5,381,2955,650,3605,650,360 EPS97110105 TOTAL CASH AVAILABLE PER SHARE16. 95150. 65136. 00 Cash Dividend per share162533 Average Net Cash Remain After Dividend per share0. 95125. 65103. 0077 Cash Remain After Dividend512627 6709944000581992120432354132 Net cash remain per share after EPS81857279 Cash remain after EPS435884914. 480280600406825920440997145 This analysis clearly shows that on an average this company retained 77 taka per share per year in this 3 years. On an average they have sufficient cash per year 432354132 Taka. They should invest this huge idle fund in any value added project or if there is no any scope they can remit this money by giving more cash dividends. By giving cash dividend more they can add more value to their parent company. In 2010 they have declared that they are using their own fund of Tk. 1260 million to expand their production by double in chittagong factory. Aggressive Marketing and Market share :The market is saturated and still HCBL has chance to increase their market share. Because local cement companies are growing day by day because of low pricing. HCBL stands on high quality and price leadership. They can do more aggressive marketing to increase their sales and increase market share. Conservative Credit Policy : HCBL’s credit policy is not very flexible. They don’t encourage credit sales to increase their sales. They don’t want to increase the risk of credit. As they are MNC and face legal bindings in collecting if customers don’t pay. They have huge idle fund to finance their A/R but they are not doing this.In this saturated market they have the scope to increase sales but they are not attempting for it. They are not willing to take risk. But in business you have to take risk and HIGH RISK means HIGH CHANCE OF RETURN. They should make more flexible credit policy to increase their sales and to gain more market share. By increasing sales they can also remit more money by â€Å"Tech know how fee† Other Recommendations: †¢They can give more focus on Ruby cement. They are giving mainly focus on Scan cement. †¢They can do more CSR activities as they have ample money. This CSR activities will increase their goodwill. They can train more their maximum employees to operate the ERP software to smoothing the process more. †¢They can give all the employees the option of PROFIT SHARING this will motivate the employees to work hard. Secrecy of Price Sensitive Information: When we took the interview at April 12, 2010 from one of their employees we came to know that their EPS of 2009 is Tk. 151. 00 and cash dividend would be 38%. Although board meeting held at April 13, 2010 and the price sensitive information published in DSE website at April 15, 2010. If the employees declared this kind of information before Board meeting it’s illegal and unethical.The employees should not publish price sensitive information privately before it published publicly. Why Not Recommendation About High Inventory In 2008 : In normal view one will recommend at 2008 that why they stocked huge inventory and which in turn cost them less CFFO and net decrease in cash . They had huge idle balance thatà ¢â‚¬â„¢s why they stocked inventory. But the real reason is opened at 2010. Cement industry was in recession in 2008. Also Heidelberg Group faced Recession in 2008. But HCBL did not face any recession in 2008. where in this industry other firms showed a huge decrease in EPS.But they maintained EPS of 105, which is extraordinary. They import RM from their sister concern at a cheap rate. That’s why they maintained a high EPS . The Cement industry at 2008 perfectly anticipated that the price of RM will go up in 2009. that’s why many company stocked inventory in 2008 also HCBL did this. We can prove our argument by that in 2009 most cement producers EPS has increased by almost 400% and HCBL’s EPS also increased in 2009. In this saturated market wvery company can not make huge profit than previous year only by selling more cement. This EPS also the result of stocked inventory in 2008.That’s why we did not recommend to reduce inventory in 2008. Conclusion: HCBL is doing well in working capital management but they have huge idle money that’s why they are not giving that much of emphasis in managing their capital more efficiently. As they are the subsidiary of Heidelberg group they maintain maximum modern policy of collecting and disbursing cash. They get many competitive advantages as Heidelberg group helps them a lot with technology. They mainly trade with their sister concerns. HCBL is the leading company in the cement industry. But they have to think about managing the idle money to add value to HCBL.