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Statistical analysis is the procedure of gathering, transforming, and organizing data in order to retrieve useful information for making a well-informed decision. The statistical analysis feeds the researchers with real-time data about complicated situations and conditions in order to help them in making decisions based on real facts rather than assumptions. Bitzenis and Vlachos applied statistical analysis in F.Y.R.O.M in order to examine the determinants of FDI in this country by processing a questionnaire survey of foreign business that operated there (Bitzenis et al., 2012).
In desk analysis, the data are collected from existing available resources. This method is considered as a low budget analysis. The main role of the researcher is to review all collected research findings in order to have a clear understanding of the topic. The research data are easily accessible for further processing from the researcher in order to help him to evaluate the research problem and generating hypotheses. The main purpose of this analysis is to retrieve knowledge from previous sources and statistics. The procedure that leads the researcher to investigate again the existing data may generate new discoveries (Smith, 2008).
Questionnaire analysis is a research tool that including a series of questions with the purpose of collecting information from a target group. Questionnaire research is cheap and it doesn't demand much effort from the researcher as other surveys. It has many standardized answers that make the whole procedure easy to collect data. However, many times the respondents giving answers which not represent their real desires. The sample of the research and the representativeness of the specimen are very important in order to have a successful research (Wikipedia survey, 2018).
In observation analysis, the researcher should observe the behavior of a selected target group in order to retrieve useful information about the behavior of the participants in a situation. This method requires the researcher to become an effective observer in order to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the behavior of a target group. The researcher must be a good analyst and an effective observer in order to be able to evaluate the performance of the participants.
40 In the case study analysis that we are selected in order to approach our issue in this dissertation, the researcher make an in-depth analysis of a situation or a phenomenon. A case study is an attempt by the researcher to make an investigation in order to evaluate the whole subject and extract useful information from his research. Cope (2015) describes the case study analysis as a pliant but promising methodology that is mainly used in social science research. In the case study analysis, we can collect a lot of details for a specific subject in contrast with other methods. The collected information is a lot richer and more detailed than other design methods. Case studies help the researchers to implement complicated experiments in order to generate ideas that can be used for further proceeding from society.
On the other hand, case studies are implemented from one person or a group of people with specific characteristics and opinions. This reality leads in many times in distorted assumptions and it can be influence the final results of the research.
3.2 The purpose of this study and the selected analysis
The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the impact of information systems in companies, by studying the procedure of merge and acquisition of Ergo Insurance Group. We examined thoroughly both Greek and foreign literature on the structure of insurance undertakings, financial analysis, mergers and acquisitions, as well as information systems which are the main subject of the analysis, as well as various useful web pages were reviewed. We are trying to investigate and find answers to the question of whether the usage of information systems from companies have a positive or negative effect on their performance. We focused on the Greek insurance sector, where due to the country’s debt crisis and the market rearrangement, many mergers have been observed.
In this thesis, we select the case study as the research methodology. We study and present the acquisition case study of the firms: “ERGO-Property” and “Casualty”, “ERGO-Life” and
“ATE Insurance”, as the most recent and most important merger in the insurance sector. We conduct a qualitative analysis on the financial figures for each of the aforementioned entities separately, as well as for the final entity (“Ergo – ATE Insurance”) that resulted from the merger of the above companies. We also studied the information systems of the company
after the merger in order to prove their contribution and their impact on the success of the company.
We collected data mainly from the balance sheets of the merged companies (Ergo Insurance - Ergo Life - ATE Insurance) in order to conduct a qualitative analysis of the financial figures for each of the aforementioned entities separately. In addition, we gathered data from national institutes and organizations: Hellenic Bank, Hellenic Statistical Authority, and Bank of Greece.
3.3 Advantages and Limitations of the case study analysis
A case study always has advantages, disadvantages, and limitations. A case study is one of the best approaches in order to simulate a new research issue. Case Studies contribute to the collection of detailed data in relation to other research methods. The gathered data are usually more detailed and documented compared to other methods. Also, case studies can allow researchers to adopt new models and produce hypotheses that can be used for further research. The cost of case studies is usually lower than other methods of research. In addition, case studies focus on rare cases in which we do not have the ability to collect large samples of data. In the end, a case study method puts data into a usable format for those who read the data and note its outcome.
On the other hand, a case study can have influence factors within the data. Every person has their own unconscious bias. The main criticism is that researchers do not have the opportunity to generalize the results of the research to the general population. Zeev Maoz (2002) claims that “the use of the case study absolves the author from any kind of methodological considerations. Case studies have become in many cases a synonym for freeform research where anything goes”. This leads to the collection of data that is not always relevant or particularly useful. In addition, it is also difficult to extract a definite result from case studies.
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