Program Experience

Highlights and Key Outcomes

In Corporate Valuation, you will:

  • Calculate corporate valuations across a range of situations and for multiple purposes
  • Evaluate the financial implications of strategic decisions in different settings, including merger and acquisition targets, and leveraged buyout opportunities
  • Analyze financial statements to better understand opportunities and risks
  • Recognize the limitations of different valuation techniques
  • Learn how to communicate to colleagues, investors, lenders, and others a clear financial strategy that will generate sustained, superior financial performance

Experience & Impact

Academic Director Michael R. Roberts says Corporate Valuation will help participants understand the cost of capital.

In Corporate Valuation, you will learn how to analyze and evaluate the financial implications of strategic and operating decisions. You will learn the correct way to do financial modeling and how to identify and avoid potential pitfalls and common mistakes. The result will be better decision-making and a better understanding of your organization.

By exploring the drivers behind value creation, you will acquire the requisite knowledge and tools to understand the impact of strategic, operational, and financial decisions on your organization’s ability to create value. You will gain increased clarity around the potential consequences of these decisions and leave this program equipped to apply this knowledge immediately to the business challenges facing your organization today.

Having such financial insight can be particularly crucial if your organization is seeking a new infusion of investment capital or is at the crossroads of a major business decision such as a merger, an acquisition, a business restructuring, or a buyout. The tools in this program will help you develop a better understanding of the opportunities and risks inherent to some business decisions.

Additionally, this program will help you become more effective at articulating to key stakeholders the implications of these decisions for your organization’s performance, competitive position, and opportunities for growth. As a result, you will be better able to communicate with chief financial officers, investment bankers, accountants, and other corporate finance professionals.

Corporate Valuation blends Wharton’s world-class academic rigor and quantitative analysis with practical, real-world applications. The program employs a host of instructional modalities to enhance the learning experience: in-class discussions, case work, small group breakout sessions, and role-playing.

Overall, this program will provide you with a structured and highly engaging learning environment in which you will apply to real-world scenarios the concepts and tools presented by Wharton’s renowned finance faculty and distinguished speakers.

Session topics include:

  • Valuation Framework
  • Discounted Cash Flow Analysis
  • Capital Structure, Risk, and Estimating the Cost of Capital
  • Market Multiples and Comps
  • Strategic Acquisitions
  • Private Equity and Leveraged Buyout Transactions
  • Valuing Start-Ups and High-Tech Companies

Convince Your Supervisor

Here’s a justification letter you can edit and send to your supervisor to help you make the case for attending this Wharton program.


Due to our application review period, applications submitted after 12:00 p.m. ET on Friday for programs beginning the following Monday may not be processed in time to grant admission. Applicants will be contacted by a member of our Client Relations Team to discuss options for future programs and dates.

Who Should Attend

Professor Michael Roberts on who should attend Corporate Valuation.

Corporate Valuation is an advanced finance program designed for senior leaders already familiar with such concepts as net present value (NPV), internal rate of return (IRR), free cash flow, discounted cash flow analysis, return on investment, and cost of capital. Familiarity with Microsoft Excel is expected.

Participants include senior-level executives, as well as those executives moving into roles with greater responsibility who need to strengthen their financial acumen and improve their ability to make strategic, operational, and financial decisions that generate value. Executives who are responsible for acquisitions, mergers, buyouts, divestitures, restructuring, budgeting, and planning will find this program curriculum particularly relevant and beneficial.

Job titles or roles may include:

  • Strategic planning and/or business development executive
  • CEO, COO, or president of an entrepreneurial or fast-growing company
  • Controller or other corporate finance position
  • General manager, vice president, executive director
  • Investment analyst or investment manager
  • Leader of a privately owned business, especially one that is negotiating with lenders or investors
  • Lawyer or accountant

Fluency in English, written and spoken, is required for participation in Wharton executive education programs unless otherwise indicated.


Participant Profile

Participants by Industry

Corporate Valuation by Industry

Participants by Job Function

Corporate Valuation participants by job function

Participants by Region

Corporate Valuation participants by region


Plan your stay in Philadelphia

Plan Your Stay

This program is held at the Steinberg Conference Center located on the University of Pennsylvania campus in Philadelphia. Meals and accommodations are included in the program fees. Learn more about planning your stay at Wharton’s Philadelphia campus.


Group Enrollment

To further leverage the value and impact of this program, we encourage companies to send cross-functional teams of executives to Wharton. We offer group-enrollment benefits to companies sending four or more participants.

Faculty


Michael Roberts

Michael Roberts, PhDSee Faculty Bio

Academic Director

William H. Lawrence Professor; Professor of Finance, The Wharton School

Research Interests: Applied econometrics, corporate investment, capital structure


Robert Holthausen

Robert Holthausen, PhDSee Faculty Bio

The Nomura Securities Co. Professor; Professor of Accounting; Professor of Finance, The Wharton School

Research Interests: Effects of organizational structure on financial performance, management compensation issues, valuation


Vincent Glode

Vincent Glode, PhDSee Faculty Bio

Pasi M. Hamalainen Professor; Professor of Finance, The Wharton School

Research Interests: Financial intermediation, information economics

Testimonials


I have a degree in finance and economics and recently joined the business development team at my company. The Corporate Valuation course helped me to refresh my finance and modeling (NPV, DCF) knowledge. I really loved the course as it provided practical tools and approaches that I can actually use in my everyday work.

R-Pharm US is part of a larger pharmaceutical company, R-Pharm JSC, with headquarters in Moscow, Russia. Besides internally developed products, we also consider acquisition of assets from Big Pharma companies such as BMS, Pfizer, and Merck, either in late-stage development or commercial early stages. Our team locates those assets, does the evaluation, present it to the board, and then communicates and negotiates the contracts with the partners.

Everybody at Wharton was just amazing — the other students, the faculty, the staff. I enjoyed working in groups on actual cases. Being one of the youngest participants, it was beneficial to listen to more experienced colleagues. Professor Michael Roberts made it very easy to understand and digest all the materials even in the short period of time.

I would definitely recommend the program, and I am considering taking another Wharton Executive Education course in the future.”

Mariia Johnson Business Development Lead in Oncology/Immunology, R-Pharm US


I was interested in the Corporate Valuation course because I serve on the boards of several public companies and valuation is always an important subject in capital allocation considerations, M&A, capital raising, and strategy decisions. The course was excellent: very practical, discussion based, and hands-on. It was much less theoretical and much more about, ‘Here are the tools that you need, here's how to use them, and here's how to think about some of the issues as you use the tools.’ That is exactly what I was looking for in this program.

The professor, Michael Roberts, was excellent and very engaging and personable. He was also very good about engaging in extra dialogue during the breaks, and I’ve actually emailed with him about a few follow-up items since I finished the program.

This course equipped me with enhanced skills to better understand and evaluate the financial decisions we make at the board level. I am able to ask more informed questions and understand the technical nuances of various valuation methodologies.

The other participants in the course were a smart group and there was a lot of diversity in terms of experience, position, and approach. In the breakout sessions it was helpful to see how people approached different corporate valuation situations given their unique backgrounds and experiences.

I highly recommend Corporate Valuation. I enjoyed it, I learned a lot, and it was relevant and valuable. It was really an excellent experience for me.”

Craig Barbarosh Vice Chairman/Board Member, NextGen Healthcare, Inc.


Bill Fink Executive Vice President, Head of US Middle Market Banking, TD Bank


There were multiple reasons I attended Wharton’s Corporate Valuation program. I wanted to continue to grow my financial acumen while gaining a comprehensive understanding of opportunities and risks associated with strategic decisions. Mergers and acquisitions have been a part of my company’s business strategy, so the corporate valuation component will directly help position me for the next phase of my career. I learned from the discussions and interactions with the other students and Professor Michael Roberts while evaluating different business cases. Corporate Valuation also examined different investment strategies, including acquisitions, mergers, and buyouts, and how evaluation and analysis of financial statements can lead to a profitable decision.

For me, education is the foundation of success. The insights I gained from attending this program will help me get to the next level."

Pam Scheller Director of Engineering Operations, ASRC Federal Mission Solutions


Corporate Valuation is my third Wharton program and by far the most valuable. It’s extremely important to what I do day-to-day since I dedicate 80 percent of my time to growth through acquisitions. A top takeaway was learning a new way to assess the cost of capital — understanding both the operational and financial components. Cost of capital was something that I’ve always taken for granted over my entire professional life over the last 28 years. For Europe, we have been using a cost of capital of 8 percent for a while. It [the Wharton program] was an eye opener for me. I concluded that 8 percent was too much of an average. Now, I am applying what Professor Michael Roberts taught me for each one of the acquisition targets we are looking at, and am getting very different results.

For example, we had an automotive target recently where using this more accurate valuation method enabled us to get a sales price 20 percent lower than what we would have done otherwise. We concluded the deal at that price. In the first year [after attending Corporate Valuation], we already got a major return on investment.

I would recommend this course first to CEOs of medium to large corporations, and then to CFOs and COOs of extremely large corporations. Wharton is definitely worth the investment — I have found the faculty insights and the valuation tools shared invaluable.”

Rogério Gonçalves CEO, Automotive Business, Prevent Group, Germany


I work for a private equity firm in Lima, Peru, and several of my colleagues are Wharton alumni who encouraged me to attend this program. Corporate Valuation fit very well with my day-to-day activities at Nexus Group. My company’s focus is on buying attractive companies in the LATAM region — we need to pay the right price and we can only accomplish that through the right valuation methodology.

At Wharton, I was exposed to great professors, a guest speaker from Morgan Stanley who shared his company’s approach to negotiation, and a diverse mix of program participants. There were people from Finland, Mexico, Peru, and the U.S., and I still have contact with some of the program participants. Professor Michael Roberts not only taught us the theory, but he also applied it in case studies and shared his experiences advising real companies in the U.S. He was a great person for me to learn from and to go into deeper detail with about corporate valuation and business strategy.

Since returning from Wharton, I’ve used several of the program’s valuation and negotiation techniques, most recently while negotiating the buyout of a company with a presence in several countries in the region. In emerging markets, investors have a greater risk, so they expect a greater return than in a developed market like the U.S. This concept was proven out in the program when a fellow participant from Finland and I shared our experiences evaluating and buying companies."

Fernando Gallo Senior Investment Analyst, Nexus Group, Peru

Date, Location, & Fees

If you are unable to access the application form, please email Client Relations at execed@wharton.upenn.edu.

June 24 – 28, 2024Philadelphia, PA$12,000

January 27 – 31, 2025Philadelphia, PA$12,500


Download the program schedule, including session details and format.

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Hotel Information

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Prices are subject to change.

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