MK7050: Principles and Practices of International Business Group Assessment Brief 2026 | University of Leicester

MK7050: Principles and Practices of International Business 

Assessment Type: Group Assessment

Weighting: 30%

Deadline: March 3, 2026 at 15:00 via Turnitin on Blackboard

Wordcount: 400 words per member; 2000 words per team (may vary depending on

the number of members) (+/-10%) excluding references, appendices, charts, diagrams, etc.

Penalty There will be a penalty of a deduction of 10% of the total marks available for this assessment for work exceeding the word limit. Assessments which are significantly below the word count are unlikely to answer the assignment criteria fully.

Academic Year: 2025-2026

Assignment Brief

This assignment requires you to work collaboratively in assigned groups, focusing on a specific new venture in a chosen foreign market. While the preparation and research are collective efforts, each student must submit an individual report.

• Group Formation: You will be assigned to groups. Each student will also be assigned to one of Porter’s five forces (threat of new entrants, bargaining power of suppliers, bargaining power of buyers, threat of substitutes and industry rivalry). Please see Porter’s five forces allocation on the module Blackboard under the section Assessment and Feedback.
• Company selection: Each group will choose one new venture. Following Fernhaber and Li (2013) and Carpenter et al. (2003), a venture is considered a new venture if the company is less than 10 years old from its founding date.
• Country Market Selection: Your team must select a country market. This must be a country where your new venture has not yet entered.
• The selected market must not be the home country of the new venture.
  Each student will conduct the industry analysis of the new venture in the chosen target country using one of Porter’s Five Forces assigned to each student and submit an individual 400-word report, contributing to a comprehensive group-level industry analysis.

Transferable Skills

Transferable skills are skills that are developed in one scenario and can be transferred to another, such as communication, teamwork or analytical skills.

The main transferable skill covered in this assessment is Choose an item. The following skills are also covered in this assignment

Communicating ☐    Team working ☒    Leadership & Supervising ☐

Generative Artificial Intelligenc

The use of Generative AI is allowed within this assessment, but any use must be cited in your work where appropriate and the integrity form attached to this assessment must be submitted with your work.

This assessment tests your ability to critically reflect upon information, or to apply theory or knowledge to a range of situations. In this assessment Generative AI can be used as a tool to support the development and research phase of the assessment process but not the final submission. Remember there are limitations of AI generated content and therefore you need to use the skills developed through your degree programme to engage with the assessment.

For this assessment, you may use Generative AI to support your preparation and research, but not to create your final 400-word report. Suitable uses include: asking AI to explain your assigned Porter’s Five Forces element (e.g., “Explain the bargaining power of buyers with examples from the food retail industry”), gathering information (e.g., “What is the market size of the renewable energy industry in Brazil in 2024?” and “Who are the main competitors in the renewable energy industry in Brazil”), or suggesting keywords and phrases to use when searching academic databases. You could also use AI to help identify potential gaps in your outline. These AI outputs are starting points
— you must verify all information with credible sources and apply your own critical thinking. AI use that is not allowed includes: pasting your task into AI and asking it to “Write my 400-word Porter’s Five Forces analysis, focusing on the bargaining power of suppliers in the automotive industry in Germany” or submitting AI-generated paragraphs directly into your final report. Every instance of AI use should be clearly cited in your work, and you must submit the required integrity form with your report.

Using AI tools when they are specifically not allowed is considered an academic offence in accordance with senate regulation 11.

Further Guidance

For the group component, all students will be required to work with other students to prepare, research and present their findings to assessment questions. Assessment grades will be awarded to each individual participant considering their contribution to the process and quality of work submitted.

Each member of the team needs to focus on only one of Porter’s five forces (threat of new entrants, bargaining power of suppliers, bargaining power of buyers, threat of substitutes and industry rivalry) and analyse industry attractiveness of the target country for the chosen new venture based on that specific force.
Please consider the following factors for each force. This is not an exhaustive list, but should help you get started on the analysis.

Suggested Essay Structure

The main structure of this report is as follows.

Group work

Group work refers to learning experiences in which students work together to submit a single task.
Group work plays a key role in your assessment portfolio, enabling you to develop essential skills such as teamwork, communication, and problem-solving. This mirrors real-world environments where collaboration is crucial, allowing you to work effectively with others, divide tasks efficiently, and leverage individual strengths.

While group work can be highly rewarding, it also presents challenges. Differences in work styles, communication, or expectations may arise, offering an opportunity to build problem-solving skills and prepare for real-world collaboration, which is not always seamless.

To promote successful teamwork, it is important to establish clear expectations and responsibilities from the start. A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) is available in the "Assessment and Feedback" section of the module Blackboard site, serving as an agreement between group members. This will help outline key tasks and roles, ensuring effective collaboration and contributing to a successful final project. Complete the MoU as a group and submit it via Blackboard portal under ‘Assessment and Feedback’ section.
In this assessment students are marked on the process of working as a group as well as on the output generated.

Students who submit work as individuals, without formally written permission, will be penalised in line with the penalties noted on this assessment.

Use of appendices

You are advised to be cautious when including appendices in this assignment. There are no specific criteria for marking or mark allocation available for appendices, so the assessment process focuses on the appropriate use of appendices. When deciding whether or not to include other appendices, consider the following points:

• Appendices should add value or detail to the discussion and analysis undertaken in the main body of the assignment.
• They offer students the opportunity to give greater relevant and appropriate detail to support the main analysis and discussion.
• Models, theory and discussion that demonstrate critical evaluation and analysis of issues related to the module being assessed should always be presented within the main body of the text. This discussion should make sense without referring to the appendices.
• Using bullet points in the text (which does not constitute analysis) and putting the detailed analysis in the appendices is not acceptable practice and could result in failure.
• The inclusion of appendices should not be viewed as an opportunity to include anything that cannot fit in the word count.
• Assignments that make excessive use of appendices suggest inappropriate use. As a guide, we would not normally expect appendices to exceed one third of the length of the assignment.
• Appendices should always be referenced at the appropriate point within the discussion in the main body of the tex

MK7050 Marking criteria

This assignment will be step marked/ assessed based on the following criteria: