| This Research Guide is designed to provide students with a convenient and efficient means of sourcing and researching company information. It is not intended to be a comprehensive guide of resource materials for career development, but only to provide a quick reference point to assist with your search process. (See the Careers topic pages for more in-depth information related to career development.) 
Researching by Industry
Top Companies Listings
Hoover's: List of Lists - Hoover's has links to Best, Biggest and Emerging company lists available on the web. Hoover's Industry Sector reports provide a brief analysis of industries with lists of companies within each sector. For lists of initial public offerings by industry, consult Hoover's IPO Central.
Boston Business Journal: Book of Lists. HF3161.M37 B66 (Information Desk 1)- BBJ regularly posts Boston lists in its biweekly newspaper and compiles them annually in this volume. The rankings cover developers, banks, accounting firms, venture capital, consulting and more.
Forbes - Consult Forbes' databases of the 200 Best Small Companies, 500 Largest Private Companies, International 800, the Dynamic 100 fastest moving companies and Forbes 500 Annual Directory of America's Leading Companies.
Inc 500 - Annual list of the fastest-growing private companies in America.
Entrepreneur Magazine lists - Several top listing from franchises to home-based businesses.
Top New England Companies - Dun's Million Dollar Databasecan be used to create such lists as the top 100 New England Companies ranked by sales or employment. Finding Companies by Industry and Geography
CareerSearch - CareerSearch allows you to specify industries and regions, and create a list of target companies. The database contains many directories gathered from a wide range of sources. Data can be downloaded into Excel format.
Babson Alumni Directory - This web-based directory allows you to search the Babson alumni community by name, class, region, and industry. Entries will indicate whether an alumnus has volunteered to provide informational interviews to Babson students about career paths and opportunities. - Dun's Million Dollar Database - The Library's Premier subscription covers American companies with $1 million or more in sales, OR 20 or more employees, OR branches with 50 or more employees. Use
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- QuickSearch #1 to search for Companies by Size, Geography and/or Industry (using SIC codes or Industry Description Keywords).
- Advanced Search allows screening by even more criteria such as radius from a zipcode, and type of company (public, private, headquarters, branch) with options for sorting results. Company records may include biographical information on officers.
- Tips: For multiple SIC codes, put commas in between. Also sometimes it helps to find a company you know of already that matches your needs and use the text description and other factors to screen for similar companies. Data can be downloaded into Excel format.
Dun's Principal International Businesses - Dun's PIB disc covers 500,000 leading companies outside the U.S. Screen companies by industry segments, geographic areas, and other criteria and then sort by sales or employment.
One Source CorpTech Explore- Use CorpTech to identify private and public high tech companies, large and small, which provide a specific product or service. For each company, start year, executives, financing, sales and employment are provided.
Tips: To screen for companies, choose and double-click any criteria to move it down to the search box. Note the Total Found number in blue on the bottom left as this will change as you add criteria.
Compact D/SEC via Thomson Research Use Compact D/SEC to screen and sort American publicly held companies.
Tips: To screen by multiple critera, search by geography or type of business then choose Modify Search to narrow your search by additional criteria. Your results can then be sorted by various criteria. For example, you can search for all software companies, limit them by headquarters in Massachusetts and sort them by total assets, sales, etc. Data can be downloaded into Excel format.
Worldscope- Use Worldscope to screen and sort 15,000 of the world's largest publicly held companies. Steps are similar to Compact SEC and data can be downloaded into Excel format. 
Finding Information on a Specific Company
Company Profiles
Hoover's Online - Hoover's Research Employers section provides an alphabetical listing of public, privatea nd international companies with quick links to Hoover's Profiles, Vault.com andWet Feet Press CompanyQuick reports and a link to the Human Resources page of the company. Hoover's company profiles describes the company and its products and services with links to web sites, news wire stories, SEC filings and more. Gold star subscriber sections are available on-campus, or off-campus with password.
Wet Feet Press - Company profiles, Careers & Industries section and Insider Guides, which give you a complete picture available on specific industries and companies. Selected Insider Guides are available via the online CCD Career Resource Center, Horn Library and for sale at the bookstore. To find all the titles that the Horn Library owns, try a search in our library catalog on wet feet press.
Vault.com - Ugrad: This site provides excellent industries and the types of jobs within the sector plus company profiles. Much information is free and more is available if you sign-up for their free membership. Vault.com - Grad: This site provides excellent industries and the types of jobs within the sector plus company profiles. Much information is free and more is available if you sign-up for their free membership.
Thomson Research - Use Thomson Research for corporate annual reports for public companies in Adobe PDF format.
Searching Small or Private Companies
Finding information on small private companies often requires more systematic research, checking multiple databases and directories and trying different search strategies. See the Creative Strategies for Overcoming Problems. If the company is really small or new, you may not find much information at all.
Web Sites - First try locating the company's web site. If not in Hoover's, try internet directories and search engines: Google, Yahoo, or Altavista
Directories - Sales, employment, officers and products and services information may be in the electronic directories Dun's and CorpTech.
Initial Public Offerings - Growing companies may be on their way to going public. The process includes filing statements with the SEC before actually being listed. Check IPO sites below to see if your company has filed. Prospectuses and registration statements (S-1 filings) include information similar to an annual 10-K report.
Newspaper and Trade Journal Articles - The most informative sources for small, hard-to-find companies can be articles in newspapers, magazines and trade journals. Finding Initial Public Offerings (IPOs)
Hoover's IPO Central - The IPO Directory is a list of all companies that have filed for an initial public offering of common stock since May 6, 1996. To see companies that have filed, but have not yet started trading, visit Companies in Registration. For companies that have started trading, see Aftermarket Performance. Companies about to be listed are under listed under Scheduled Pricings. Use the Advanced IPO Search to search by Metropolitan area, state, industry, underwriter, sales range, price range, etc.
Edgar Online IPOExpress - IPOExpress also allows you to easily view information on IPOs at various stages including IPO withdrawals.
EDGAR Database at the SEC Web Site
LexisNexis Academic - Go to the Business...SEC Filings section and choose the source type SEC Filings - Prospectuses or - Registration Statements. Records go back to April 1993.
Company News
While there are various newswire sources on the web, subscription services provide more comprehensive access to thousands of local, national and international papers and journals.
Factiva - Search the Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Boston Herald and 6000 newspapers and trade publications. Use the Intelligent Indexing to search all publications or just regional or industry publications. Tips: Click Examples for ideas on focusing your search. Be sure to choose All Content and All dates to search for small companies. For branches of large companies, use Intelligent Indexing function to search newspapers in a specific state or country.
General Business File ASAP via InfoTracWeb
- Company Profiles from Ward's Directory of public and private companies and their subsidiaries,
- investment analysts reports from INVESTEXT, and
- summaries and full text of newspaper and magazine journals.
If the full text of an article is not there, look in our Full Text Finder.
LexisNexis - Try this service if others are not fruitful. Search the various source types for General News and Business. The keyword box usually searches only the headline and lead paragraphs so keep searches simple here using synonyms (IBM or International business machines) and if needed, add more complete phrases or tother more limiting term in the second box.
RDS Bizsuite - Another useful source, particularly for focusing on specific aspects of a company.
Creative Strategies for Overcoming Problems
- Avoid common abbreviations: Search key phrases in the company name omitting common words and abbreviations such as inc, co, company or corp.
- Search variant names: Some companies have names which may be entered in databases as both one and two-word names. Search both versions, such as wearguard or wear guard, Wal Mart or walmart. Other companies may have acquired prefixes or suffixes with mergers and acquisitions, such as Energy Capital and then ABB Energy Capital.
- Common company names: If a company name is made up of common words or phrases, combine the company name with a key factor such as its geographic area or industry.
- Omit punctuation: Use Wal Mart instead of Wal-Mart, or try both versions.
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