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In today's global economy, having access to the latest business and industry information is all important. Databases that contain information about business, industries, markets and products are key to understanding world economies that are changing minute by minute. A company known for its focus on business information is Gale, a part of CENGAGE Learning™. In the following overview you will learn much about the PROMT database, what types of information it contains and how it can help you in your business research no matter what industry you are searching.
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Let's take a look at this database produced by Gale. PROMT is a "one-stop" database whose versatility and size enables you to research a product, the materials used to produce it, competitive products, its markets, regulatory issues and other factors that impact a company, industry or business.
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A bit of history describes how PROMT got its start. PROMT was developed by Predicast in the 1970s. In the 1980s Informational Access Company (IAC) acquired the database from Predicast, and in 1998 IAC merged with Gale. Gale, now a part of Cengage Learning, a world leader in e-research and educational publishing for libraries, schools and businesses, continues to maintain its high standards for this database on Dialog.
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The database offers expert opinion and insider perspective. The information in PROMT is very specific: it provides records, such as company announcements, containing statistical information and useful, current facts and figures about companies. General articles are not picked up (such as those on general management strategies); only those that mention a company specifically are included. PROMT is action-oriented; that is, it culls articles specifically related to events and activities of companies from around the globe.
A few statistics about PROMT will show you the size and diversity of this database. PROMT contains more than 1,000 active international trade and business publications, plus archive sources. All documents from non-English sources have the bibliographic details translated into English. PROMT covers 1972 to the present. Shorter date-ranges are presented in some cases, based on subscription. The database is updated daily.
This file uses special indexing to identify articles based on the action of the article and the company or companies involved. More about the indexing a bit later.
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PROMT offers comprehensive coverage of more than 60 manufacturing and services industries as shown here ranging from advertising, computers, electronics and telecommunications to chemicals, food, pharmaceuticals, marketing and finance; public relations; aerospace, defense and commercial aviation. Additional coverage includes agriculture; apparel; automotive, biotechnology, chemicals, communications, computers, defense products and systems, electronics, financial services, food and beverages, medical and health services and many others.
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PROMT meets the needs of the business searcher in a wide range of business and industry applications. It is ideal for precisely locating information about market size and share, industry trends, emerging technologies and competitive opportunities, to name a few.
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PROMT currently contains approximately 15.7 million records. It retrieves content from a variety of different sources, among them: trade and business journals, local, national and international newspapers, industry newsletters, research studies, investment analysts' reports, corporate news releases, annual reports and market information. The breakdown of the content by source is shown in the pie chart at the right. These percentages are a rough estimate based on the current publication list from which articles are selected. This content makeup changes as different types of publications are added to the database.
Although most publications are in English, ProQuest Dialog can translate the text into 12 languages.
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The following example illustrates the type of information you can find in PROMT. Take a large company like Adobe and find some competitive information, for example, what is their latest acquisition. This record, dated July 18, indicates they have acquired EchoSign, a leading Web-based provider of electronic signatures and signature automation. EchoSign's technology will be a key component for Adobe's document exchange services.
This record from ProQuest Dialog shows the title, source Business Wire and date at the top of the record. The record contains the full text and in ProQuest Dialog you can preview the record before displaying the full text. Notice the translate link—click it and you can translate the text into any of 12 languages—in this case Japanese.
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The bottom of the record shows the indexing: Company names, product names and codes, industry names and Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) code. Notice that the subjects tell you what the main focus of the article is. Click the subject terms or SIC code to retrieve more records on this subject. If you want articles from Business Wire, just click the link. More on indexing next.
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What value does PROMT have for you, the business researcher? First of all, different kinds of specific indexing is added to each article so PROMT is especially useful to find targeted information. Indexing lets the searcher retrieve a selective collection of articles based on specific criteria. Moreover, each of the following codes enables the searcher to target a topic of interest:
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As you can see, Gale Group Promt provides unique, comprehensive information about business and industry worldwide. To learn more about PROMT:
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This completes our overview of Gale Group PROMT. We know you will find this comprehensive database helpful in any business and industry searches you conduct. Make it a priority to use when you need authoritative business information.