Due to the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya and its Economic and Business Studies, three professors in the field of Finance from the institute perform an analysis of the evolution of the financial function and a projection of future scenarios in order to identify challenges and opportunities. Joan Llobet introduces the topic based on an academic vision that has adapted to the substantial changes that have occurred and which takes on the challenge of facing the changes still to come. On the other hand is the article by Jorge M. Uribe, a compilation of the most important events of the past 25 years in order to understand how the financial field is currently structured. Through his experience, we will see how concrete aspects evolve (valuation of assets, quantitative risk management, etc.) in order to profile what they are like today. Finally, Àngels Fitó describes the current context of the financial field, establishing its conditioning factors and future direction.

In the last twenty-five years – from 1996 to 2021 – a series of actions have marked the evolution of the economy: from transformations linked to new information and communication technologies to the Covid-19 pandemic, among other things, through to the financial and economic crisis of the second half of the first decade of the 21st century. In this article, we look at the impact of events in the last twenty-five years on economics teaching, whether this is evolving alongside the economic reality or not, what has given rise to a mismatch between economics and the social and economic reality. To analyze this, in the first section, we will tackle the social mission of the “economist” in the sense of being teachers of highly diverse collectives, and in the second section, we will reflect on the evolution of economics teaching at University. The analysis leads us to conclude that, although economics teaching has varied over time, it has not undergone substantial change in recent decades. The lack of diversity of thinking in economics curricula joins forces with a lack of diversity among prominent thinkers and professionals to often translate into an incomplete view explaining the complex economic reality and an interaction with other disciplines, particularly social sciences.

This article analyses the connection that scientific economics has made between economic development and social sustainability. Starting from the classical idea of value in capitalism, the article reviews the main contributions that classical, neoclassical, heterodox and modern economic syntheses have made on the possibility of a socially sustainable economic development. From this review, the need to build a new sustainable value economy is identified and its main dimensions are analysed, especially the role that firms, markets and government should play. In our research on the fit between new sustainable ways of generating value and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the results obtained are unfavourable. The SDGs must substantially modify their approach and methodology to move towards a more socially sustainable economic value.

The value of a company is usually measured with data included in the firm’s accounting records and other financial information, such as financial forecasts. This type of valuation provides an incomplete value, since it does not take into account other economic, social and environmental aspects. For this reason, the objective of this article is to discuss how companies can quantify the costs and benefits that their activities generate for society and the environment (externalities). Therefore, the article describes how to reach an estimate of the company’s real value (or total value) by adding the social and environmental value to the firm’s financial value, according to the «True Value» methodology (KPMG, 2014). Additionally, this methodology is applied to a business in order to estimate its real value. Once the estimate has been calculated, the study analyzes how externalities can end up affecting the value of the company. Finally, a strategy is proposed so that the business can minimize the negative impact of externalities on its results.

Companies increasingly tend to outsource any activities that do not form part of their core business, as well as any activities that do not enable them to generate added value, due to their lack of specialization or specific knowledge.

When making decisions in this respect, the variables that may most influence whether a service should be outsourced are the value that the activity generates for the company, the need to make management and structural costs variable, and operational flexibility.

It is essential to analyse outsourcing from all possible angles but, most importantly, we have to be objective when it comes to evaluating the pros and cons of the decision from an economic and production point of view. Moreover, the company’s general strategy must be taken into account to ensure that any outsourcing decisions are perfectly aligned to it, without any discrepancy.

Last but not least, we should take great care in terms of the kind of agreement that we reach with the companies offering logistics outsourcing services, as this will be the foundation for ensuring that we meet the financial and production objectives set.

In this article, we focus on logistics activities that may be suitable for outsourcing, the reasons for outsourcing these activities and the type of suppliers of this kind of services.

Additive manufacturing, performed by 3D printing processes, has gained great importance in certain industrial sectors. Now the subject of significant research and innovation plans, This technology can drastically reduce the current complexity involved in manufacturing processes, with additional advantages over conventional production techniques, as well as in the existing logistics operations at each stage of the supply chain.

This article analyses from a statistical and probabilistic point of view the mechanism and interpretation of games of chance involving the removal of balls from an urn. To do thats, the concepts of random variable, sample space, expectation and expected value are introduced. To illustrate these concepts, a simple example is developed, in which the expected value of the game is compared to the cost of taking part in it. Then, these theoretical concepts are applied to a real example: the Christmas Lottery. By analyzing statistically the various prizes and their associated probability, the article concludes that the expected value of the prize is approximately two thirds of the invested money. This means that, in the long term, for every euro invested only 0.66 € are recovered. A simulation carried out with these data graphically proves this result, showing also the fact that dividing the total expenditure into several numbers increases the likelihood of increasing the number of prizes won, although the asymptotic value is still two-thirds.