Patent ID: 8065210

Claim:
A system for analyzing the financial performance of a business unit of a company, the system comprising: a database operable to receive, store and retrieve financial data about a first business unit and a second business unit; a processor; a memory coupled to the processor, the memory storing logic that when executed by the processor, cause the processor to: determine Net Operating Profit Less Adjusted Taxes (NOPLAT), revenue, capital charge, spread percentage, and invested capital values for each of the first business unit and the second business unit at least at a first time and a second time from the financial data; determine at least two data points for the first business unit and the second business unit, respectively, based on the NOPLAT, revenue, capital charge, spread percentage, and invested capital values, each data point including a first component indicative of NOPLAT divided by revenue, a second component indicative of revenue divided by capital charge, and a third component indicative of invested capital, the at least two data points indicative of values determined at one of the first time and the second time, for the first business unit and the second business unit, respectively; forecast the NOPLAT, revenue, capital charge, and invested capital values for the first business unit for a third time, said third time being subsequent to said first time and said second time; and determine a third data point for the first business unit based on the forecasted values, the third data point including a first component indicative of NOPLAT divided by revenue, a second component indicative of revenue divided by capital charge, and a third component indicative of invested capital, the third data point indicative of determined values forecasted for the third time; at least one display area comprising: a graphical display area for graphically displaying the financial performance based on said determined data points of the first business unit and the second business unit comprising: edges that define the graphical display area; a plot within the graphical display area comprising a first and a second axis, the first axis with a first end and a second end corresponding to a low to a high percentage of profitability values, the profitability values represented by NOPLAT divided by revenue; and the second axis with a first end and a second end corresponding to a low to a high capital utilization values, the capital utilization values represented by revenue divided by capital charge.