Customer Reviews

Real Options: A Practitioner's Guide

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This book has WAY TOO MANY errors. The amount of errors and the types of errors this book contains is unacceptable. If the quantity and quality of the errors weren't bad enough, the explanations (if you can call them that) are confusing or incomplete. This book also has many omissions (parts that the authors promise will be included in parts of the book are MISSING!!!). It would be extremely difficult to use this book as a practical guide to real options with all of its errors, omissions, and confusions.

I can safely say that I have NEVER read any book with this MANY errors and omissions ... and I have read quite a lot of books on finance, economics, and math.

By the way, I and other readers do NOT pay full price so that they can get a "rough draft." Readers pay for the final product and readers can reasonably expect a product of higher quality.

This book, a worthy sequel to 'Valuation' by the The McKinsey & Company, Copeland, Koller, and Morrin, provide a solid backgound on the state of the art in the practice of real options analysis. This book is not a intended to be a "teaser," which tries to tell you enough to whet your appetite so if you want to know more you will have to hire the authors as your consultants. The book is comprehensive in its treatment of the subject. The authors honestly want to teach readers how to implement real options analysis. It has detailed case studies on applying real options analysis, one about an IT-based firm, another about a pharmaceutical company. To top it off, the book even has mind expanding end of chapter exercises with answers that can be downloaded from the text web site. This will be a standard reference for practitioners. This text will be the leading MBA text on real options.

I read an article on this book before publication and was excited about getting a copy. Past works on real options analysis(ROA) have been heavy on theory, but low on application. However, as I read through this book I was disappointed in how the content was presented.

First, the good points. The book is more application-oriented than other books on the subject thus far. The book is thorough in its discussion of real options analysis, and demonstrates how to estimate volatility, which has been poorly explained by other authors. The book provides lots of case studies and examples. Finally, the methodology is simple to follow.

Now, the bad points. Enough has been written about the book's errors in other reviews. Also, the solutions should have been provided for free. The most disappointing part is the authors' claim that this is a "practitioners" guide and that ROA will eventually replace NPV in corporate valuation. If you are a financial engineer or quant-jock for an I-Bank, Consultancy or Treasury group, then it is a practitioner's guide. Otherwise, the book is written above the level of the industry financial analyst, particularly beginners. The authors' use Everett Roger's five attributes of innovation that determine its rate of adoption. One attribute is low complexity for easy understanding and implementation. This book is very complex and it's no wonder why ROA has a slow adoption rate among corporations.

Bottomline, the book needs to be rewritten properly from an editorial standpoint. More importantly, Mr. Copeland needs to decide whether he truly wants to bring ROA to the corporate masses or keep it in the hands of a few who can sell their expertise to companies

What a pity. The first practical guide to the implementation of real options - that I have found at least. Copeland and Antikarov are to be congratulated on finding the gap in the market. But, alas, this book has been so badly spoiled by the endless number of errors: reflects badly on the authors and publishers and also on all those acknowledged at the front of the book who had an opportunity to comment, but obviously did not read it properly. On the positive, there are many useful ideas in this book and it has greatly increased my knowledge of the subject.

This book has some good moments, but for beginners to real options it assumes too much knowledge. The writing style is inconsistent (e.g. you can definitely tell that two authors wrote it) and the examples are not presented in a user-friendly step-by-step fashion. Many of the examples (for example, I'm trying to follow their instructions to create an option valuation spreadsheet) have errors in them.

The organization, writing style, and content of this book are all good, providing the moderately mathematical practitioner with the material needed to understand the concepts. The book is marred however, with a number of typographical errors that is in my experience unprecedented. While it is difficult to ensure that every formula and number in a work of this sort is correct, this book looks like nobody copyread it. My copy has marks on half the pages, ranging from minor stuff to things that left me scratching my head in an attempt to figure out what the authors meant.

I am pleased that some other readers believe they can spot all the errors in this book - but are they sure?

If you are thinking about buying this book first have a read the particulars in the forums listing the many errors in the book. My advice - recognise the value of the real option you have to delay purchasing this book and wait for the next edition.listing the many errors

They should give me credit, there are a lot of wrong numbers in the book sould not be seen in a financial book.

I got this book to assist me in building a real options analysis for a new product launch--and it was quite helpful in providing a methodology, as well as some techniques for using Crystal Ball (a Five-Star software package, I must say).

But, the book presented its four-step approach toward the end of the book, which requires skipping around. The middle chapters should have been placed at the end, and the final chapters in the middle. It seems to have been structured to provide some useful information without revealing the techniques they use in their consulting work.

Decent, but I'm having to shop for a different book for more practical information.

Content : A
The book enables the reader to understand the world of real options without having to take a course on stochastic calculus, which is good because otherwise Real Options would be too hard to sell to management. The book is rich on examples and presents the building blocks of almost every combination imaginable. More case studies though would have been a big plus.

Presentation : F
You absolutely should not read the book without first [knowing] the corrections.... There are so many errors everywhere - in formulas, calculations and text (a total of 177 for 350 pages of relevant content !!) - that I could only shake my head in disbelief. Quite obviously, nobody has made even a half-baked attempt to proof-read the book.