After completing Part A of this assignment, your instructor may ask you to complete Part B. Do not proceed to Part B unless requested to do so by your instructor.

BACKGROUND
Congratulations!!! You were recently promoted to audit manager. Your strong work ethic and, of course, your excellent college training have propelled your career to new heights.
One of the challenges of your new role is that you are now held accountable (i.e., raises, bonuses, the partnership!) for bringing in new business. You have been regularly reading the financial business press (i.e., newspapers, business magazines) to see if you can identify new service opportunities.
The managing partner came to you today and asked if you know of any companies that recently introduced new IT that could lead to consulting or assurance services opportunities. He is particularly interested in identifying opportunities to provide some form of assurance about risks related to newly implemented IT. After you indicated you are actually working on a couple of ideas, he was excited to hear more. He asked you to prepare a memorandum outlining your answers to address the following issues:

REQUIRED

1. Please describe a situation in which a company recently introduced new IT into their business operations. You should look for a real world example from the business press. Look for a business that recently increased its reliance on IT. The Spot Card technology used at the Jacksonville Jaguars stadium is a good example. Please attach a copy of the article you use to prepare your memorandum.
2. Please describe the new technology and how it is used. Provide enough information for the partner to understand the technology without having to go back to the attached article.
3. Explain why the company introduced the technology. Highlight the benefits to various constituents affected by the technology. The benefits related to the technology are probably easily identified and may even be discussed in the related article. However, the article does not likely address risks that are introduced.
Please provide a thorough discussion of the risks to all parties affected by the new technology.

4. Given the risks identified, describe whether there are any related assurance services and discuss who would likely buy these services. Describe information risks about which your firm intends to provide assurance. Your memo will serve as the basis for the formal business proposal that will be sent to the potential client. Please be sure to briefly outline in your memo what assurance services are because the potential client may not have heard the terms. Make sure you explain the term “assurance services” in your own words so that the potential client has a better idea of exactly what services you propose to provide.
5. In describing the nature of the assurance services that you plan to provide, please highlight the types of evidence you would want to gather as a basis for providing the assurance. For example, you might consider evaluating the contingency plan describing how the company would deal with breakdowns in technology hardware or software or the communication infrastructure. In this example, you would want to specifically describe what types of information you would look for in that plan.