I am not a finance major but as an investor I wouldn't really invest on MSFT because they have pretty much reached their growth period. But if you want a safe and secure investment, MSFT is one of them as the company has a solid history and is the industry leader in the business it is in. For the purpose of your paper, some data you can use to back your points would be the dividned it pays on it's common stocks and it's 5 years expected growth is higher than any of its competitors. I am not sure how your paper will be graded and what are the criteria but I would focus on how and why MSFT is a better investment compare to its competitors. Because if you were really investing too, first you would find an industry you think has a future for positive return on your investment and then you find the industry leader in that business or choose the company that is not the industry leader right now but will be 5 years from now. In the case of MSFT I don't see why anyone would argue they won't still be the industry leader 5 years from today. Well....hope it helped. Good luck.