The 2008 annual reports of Pearson Plc and The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. , two publishing and information services companies, included the following selected data as at December 31, 2008, and 2007:

Required:
a. Do you notice anything unusual about the data presented for Pearson? Comment specifically about some of the difficulties you would expect to encounter when comparing financial statement data of a U.S.-based company to data of a non–U.S.-based company.
b. Review the current asset data presented for each company. Comment briefly about your first impressions concerning the relative composition of current assets within each company.
c. Pearson's revenues are derived from educational publishing (65%) including Prentice Hall and Addison-Wesley, consumer publishing (19%) including Penguin Books, newsprint (8%) such as Financial Times , and information and media services (8%). McGraw-Hill's revenues are derived from educational publishing (42%), financial services such as Standard & Poor's (42%), and information and media services (16%) such as J.D. Power and Associates and Business-Week. How can these data help you make sense of your observations in partb?

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PEARSON PLC (Amounts in millions) Cash and cash equivalents Trade and other receivablas, net of provisions for bad and doubtful 2008 2007 E 685 £ 560 debts, and sales returns of 2 444 in 2008 and 333 in 2007 1,342 946 368 501 Financial assets-marketable securitias and derivative financial 57 68 Noncurrent assats classified as held for sale. Total current assets 92,585 £2,059 THE McGRAW-HILL COMPANIES, INC (Amounts in thousands) Cash and cash equivalents Accounts receivable net of allowances for doubtful accounts and 2008 2007 471,671 396,096 sales returns of $268,685 in 2008 and $267,681 in 2007). Total inventories Deferred income Prepaid and other current assets Total current assets 1,060,858 189,205 369,679 350,668 285,364 280,525 127,172 $2,302,723 $2,343,666 115,151