The chief executive officer of Les Moulins de la Brague (LMB), a seven-generation French olive oil miller, was worried about the future of the business. LMB was trying to find a profitable niche in a market that was filled with multinational companies, whose products came in a variety of quality and price ranges, and filled the shelves of French grocery stores. Although LMB had achieved critical acclaim for its blended olive oils made with spices and flavours, the business was unstable for a number of reasons. First, weather conditions had caused a decrease in the number of olives harvested. Second, on the consumer front, shoppers' interest in the health benefits of olive oil, promoted by the popularity of the "Mediterranean diet" seemed to have peaked. Finally, the market was flooded with various levels of quality: low-quality brands with low prices; medium-quality brands that dominated consumer markets; and many high-end premium brands that were produced by olive mills just like LMB. With a market environment pressured in so many ways, how could LMB keep its 200-year-old millstones turning?
Lieshout (NL), October 2015. Bavaria N.V., founded well before 1680 and based in Lieshout (Netherlands), was the second largest brewery in the Netherlands. It symbolized fierce independence and a high degree of entrepreneurship, always balancing legacy with innovation. Five cousins from the Swinkels family were at the helm of the operative business; the company's shared leadership model was one of its many ingredients for success, as was the family's unquenchable ambition for the company. But the path to global enjoyment was anything but smooth. Western beer markets had been stagnating for years, some even declining, and competition was fierce. To generate growth, brewers had to rely mostly on acquisitions. The challenge for the seventh generation of Swinkels' family owners had clearly been to leverage the company's exceptional brewing skills. To stay relevant and continue to thrive for the next generations, Bavaria needed to identify new growth niches and maintain excellence in product quality while optimizing its manufacturing and entire value chain. Should it continue to rely on technology to create new products and brands addressing ever finer niche markets? Should it reach out for new frontier markets where beer consumption was still on the uptrend? Could it really do both effectively with its original governance and management structure, keeping the family connection and values? Learning objectives: Family governance, culture, growth management, expansion strategy, sustainability, Ethiopia, affinity financing, emerging markets, product portfolio management, venturing, entrepreneurship.
In June 2009, the online gaming company Zynga launched the free social game Farmville on Facebook, which set a new record by reaching one million Daily Active Users four days after launch, skyrocketing to 30 million in six months. The case takes an inside look at how Zynga created FarmVille in just six weeks, including the important strategic and technical decisions Zynga made, the sometimes tense team dynamics, and the challenges Zynga's founder and CEO Mark Pincus faced within Zynga. The company's experienced game developers had strongly resisted his idea to develop a farm game because farm games performed poorly on traditional game consoles and were considered an inferior gaming category. But Pincus believed they afforded access to new audiences and wanted to seize the strategic opportunity offered by the convergence of advances in technology and the meteoric rise of Facebook. These combined well with Zynga's advanced data analytics capabilities, which allowed the company to aggressively advance a new business model "Games as a Service," in which developers continuously added features to make a social game consistently compelling. Post launch, FarmVille was continually evolving and adding new features. But after a few months, the quality of the code and the ideas for new features were getting worse, more bugs and quality assurance problems arose, and users were complaining that new features were late and the game was getting rote. This case is set in late December 2009 as user numbers started to drop, and Pincus and the FarmVille team tried to figure out how to turn this trend around. Zynga's leadership team had to figure out how to reinvigorate FarmVille so that it would continue to be the goose that laid the golden eggs.
In 2016, Santa Clara County was launching a six-year project aimed at reducing the enormous costs of treating its most acute mental health care patients − $45 million a year − while improving their treatment and quality of life. For the project, the county chose a new model called "Pay for Success" (PFS), in which governments only pay service providers if their efforts are successful. By contrast, in the traditional payment model, providers bill the government on a regular basis for activities and outputs, such as the number of hours spent counseling clients. To provide service providers with working capital during multi-year projects, Pay for Success programs may be paired with Social Innovation Financing, under which commercial investors, foundations and high net worth philanthropists fund the organization's ongoing operations. They are then repaid to the extent that service providers meet their promised outcomes. The PFS model was growing, with $200 million in play in 45 projects around the world. But its detractors raised questions about issues such as 1) using private funds for services for vulnerable people being served, 2) the high government transaction costs of the projects, and 3) potential incentives for service providers to game the system by cherry picking clients or providing inferior services to reduce government costs. Santa Clara County was doing the first PFS project in the mental healthcare space, and had chosen the for-profit service provider Telecare. Butmany decisions still had to be made: How could the county attract Social Innovation Financing partners and negotiate a repayment structure that worked for all parties − while making sure that incentives and motivations were aligned? How should the county measure the success of this project? Which were the right metrics to assess - and which should be linked to payment?
Amul Dairy, the market leader in the Indian milk industry, held its market position by pioneering several progressive initiatives and responding to consumer trends with continuous product development. Camel milk, a relatively new health-oriented dairy product, was being hailed as “white gold” and touted as a superfood in Australia and in some Western countries. Amul Dairy had an opportunity in 2015 to take advantage of changing consumer preferences and move ahead in the growing dairy market by launching the sale of camel milk in India. Should Amul Dairy enter the promising camel milk market? Given that Indian consumers were unaware of camel milk as a market product, how should Amul Dairy promote this unique product? How should the company leverage its substantial brand presence to overcome the challenges faced in the launch and distribution of camel milk?
Paytm enjoyed a position as the leader in India’s market for mobile wallets, a digital service that enabled payments to be made through mobile devices. Paytm’s major client, Uber, which developed and operated a smartphone-based, ride-hailing app as a way to compete with traditional taxi companies, had initially used Paytm’s mobile wallet as the sole payment mode for Uber rides in India. However, in 2015 Uber revised its payment policy by adding a variety of payment options, such as debit cards, credit cards, and the addition of several other mobile wallet providers. Did Uber’s strategies and plans represent a major concern for Paytm? Amid such changes in the highly competitive digital payment industry, what strategies should Paytm adopt to expand its own offerings and maintain its position as the market leader? What other options could the company pursue to ensure its sustainability and continuous growth?
<p style="color: rgb(197, 183, 131);"><strong> AWARD WINNER - Euro-Mediterranean Managerial Practices and Issues category at the EFMD Case Writing Competition</strong></p><br> The chief executive officer of Les Moulins de la Brague (LMB), a seven-generation French olive oil miller, was worried about the future of the business. LMB was trying to find a profitable niche in a market that was filled with multinational companies, whose products came in a variety of quality and price ranges, and filled the shelves of French grocery stores. Although LMB had achieved critical acclaim for its blended olive oils made with spices and flavours, the business was unstable for a number of reasons. First, weather conditions had caused a decrease in the number of olives harvested. Second, on the consumer front, shoppers’ interest in the health benefits of olive oil, promoted by the popularity of the “Mediterranean diet” seemed to have peaked. Finally, the market was flooded with various levels of quality: low-quality brands with low prices; medium-quality brands that dominated consumer markets; and many high-end premium brands that were produced by olive mills just like LMB. With a market environment pressured in so many ways, how could LMB keep its 200-year-old millstones turning?
In August 2014, La Société Energies Nouvelles & Environnement (ENOVE), a subdivision of Groupe Bismuth, was developing an expansion strategy in the unstable political and economic environment of Tunisia, the company’s home country. Tunisia was the birthplace of the Arab Spring, a series of political revolutions that started in 2010 and swept the Mediterranean region for five years. Tunisia was also quickly moving toward a democratically elected government, but the transition was not an easy one; the country experienced a setback of about 10 to 15 years, in regards to economic development. Years of functional corruption under the long-time president, Ben Ali, were followed by sustained economic growth in manufacturing, tourism, and education. This led the economy into a governmental vacuum. For the first time, workers began exercising their rights to demand better conditions. There was little governmental oversight on customs, labour, or taxation. The threat of terrorism, whether real or perceived, was always present. Under these conditions, ENOVE's president had to make a decision: Should ENOVE expand within Tunisia, or move their manufacturing operations to a more stable country, perhaps nearby Morocco?
Chinese automobile manufacturer Geely Automotive (Geely) bought the manufacturer of the iconic London taxi cab from its bankrupt British parent company. The manufacturer’s sole product, the TX4, was a highly specialized taxi vehicle ideally suited for taxi work. It included many features for disabled passengers such as a power-operated wheelchair ramp and a wide rear passenger door. However, the vehicle cost more than twice as much as its competitors and demand was not enough for successful mass production. On the one hand, increasing awareness of disability rights in most developed nations suggested that Geely would have an opportunity to take the TX4 worldwide with an aggressive promotional campaign, and would benefit from cheap production costs in China. On the other hand, transportation network companies such as Uber and Lyft seemed to be pushing the entire taxi industry towards extinction.
Etsy was an online craft bazaar founded in 2005 in a loft in Brooklyn, New York. The company was known for its emphasis on social responsibility, transparency, authenticity, and its somewhat nontraditional approach to business. In January 2015, Etsy converted its Irish subsidiary to an unlimited liability company, a move it described as implementation of an "updated global corporate structure." In a subsequent U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing, it stated that this changed structure might "result in a reduction in our overall effective tax rate." In August 2015, the company came under fire for this move. Bloomberg ran an article headlined "Etsy Taps Secret Irish Tax Haven and Brags About Transparency at Home." Americans for Tax Fairness charged that Etsy had "changed its behavior and [was] now using unethical business practices." John Montgomery of Startworks declared, "Etsy sold its soul for a lower corporate tax rate." The Wall Street Journal summarized the reaction with the headline "Etsy Faces Pressure to Abandon Irish Tax Strategy." This case explores Etsy's initial decision, the critical public response to it, and Etsy' choice to ignore the fallout and stay the course.
Founded in 1983, China Nonferrous Metal Mining (Group) Co., Ltd. ("CNMC") is one of the earliest and largest global Chinese nonferrous metal industrial enterprises. It has investments and projects in 27 countries and trade networks in nearly 100 countries with a particular focus in Africa. CNMC has been exploiting mineral resources in Zambia since 1998, becoming one of the most important copper industry enterprises in the country. In 2013, CNMC was included in the Fortune Global 500 for the first time, ranking 482nd with operating revenues of 24 billion USD. In 2015, CNMC ranked 390th among the Fortune Global 500. CNMC has been actively committed to becoming a bellwether of "going global" among Chinese enterprises, making great contribution to Africa by promoting mutually beneficial cooperation. Confronted with intensifying competition in China and overseas, CNMC leaders look to the future and endeavor to further develop African businesses, to strengthen CNMC's overall competitiveness, and to fulfill sustainable development, on the basis of its international expansion strategy.
UFO Moviez is an Indian technology services provider that enables low-cost, digital delivery of films to cinemas. UFO's satellite-based technology enables a significantly wider release of films compared to traditional analog prints and standard, higher-resolution digital prints that must be transported physically. By 2015, 54% of all cinemas in India were using UFO's digital cinema system. UFO has achieved this without upsetting the industry's value chain of producer-traditional distributor-cinema-owner. The company earns revenue through three main streams: fees charged to the producer/distributor for converting films to digital format and distributing them over satellite, fees charged to the cinema owner for leasing the projection systems, and advertising revenue from ads shown during the screening of films. With cinemas in India mostly digitized, however, UFO faces challenges to continual growth. Should UFO focus on increasing its advertising revenue, leveraging UFO's core technology in other areas, or entering the business of film distribution?
Advertising Experiments at RestaurantGrades is an exercise in which students are asked to analyze and make a recommendation on the basis of simulated experimental data. The setting is a hypothetical restaurant review company called RestaurantGrades (RG), which shows advertisements above the organic search results when someone searches on the page. RG is trying to understand whether the current advertising package it sells to restaurants is effective at driving traffic-and whether an alternative advertising package might be better. To do this, RG has run an experiment with two treatment groups and a control group-with random assignment done at the restaurant level. Restaurants in the control group are provided with no advertising; restaurants in the first treatment group are given RG's current advertising package, and restaurants in the second treatment group are given an alternative advertising package. Students are provided with the resulting data-which includes an indicator for which arm a business was in, as well as outcomes at the monthly level for each business-and asked to assess which advertising package is more effective. The exercise provides students with an opportunity for experiential learning around the use of experiments to guide business decisions.
This case explores the relationship between Tenet Healthcare, the third largest for-profit hospital chain, and its subsidiary Conifer Health Solutions, a health services company. Conifer's IT programs help health care providers with revenue cycle management and population health management; the case provides an overview of both sectors. Conifer has been growing rapidly, leading some to question what the best relationship is for Tenet and Conifer going forward. The current parent-subsidiary arrangement presents synergies as well as potential conflicts.
This case revisits the events in late 2013 that gave rise to what was at the time the largest breach of confidential data in history. Indeed, on December 19, 2013, Target announced that its computer network had been infiltrated by cybercriminals who stole 40 million debit and credit card numbers as well as the personal information of some 70 million additional customers. The case presents the cybercriminals' activities leading up to the breach, details of the commission of the theft, the measures that Target had put in place to deter such attacks, its ill-fated response during the attack and, finally, the impact of the breach on Target as well as on the retail industry as a whole.
The National Football League (NFL) is one of the most lucrative professional sports leagues in the world. A multi-billion dollar enterprise with millions of fans filling stadiums or riveted to their screens on game day, the NFL and its teams have, over the years, been led by strong personalities who have built up an empire that is the envy of managers in every other professional sport. The result of a merger between two leagues, the NFL has experienced phenomenal growth since its founding in 1920. Its business model has evolved significantly over the years. One of its distinguishing features is its revenue-sharing model, which favours parity by distributing revenue generated by the League evenly among its teams. Despite its commercial and financial success, however, the NFL has had to pay particular attention to its brand image, which has often been tarnished by incidents related to player conduct off the field, as well as to issues related to the protection and health of players. The encounter between a successful business model and the management of the various crises that have marked the contemporary history of the NFL makes this organization a fascinating subject of study for anyone interested in management.
For any service company that bills on a recurring basis, a key variable is the rate of churn: How many customers cancel? Firms with high churn spend a lot trying to replace defectors with new customers. New research by Georgia State University's V. Kumar shows that they might be better served by smart strategies aimed at getting the right former customers to come back. Working with data on more than 53,000 customers who left a telecom company, Kumar and his colleagues found that companies can benefit by answering four questions on the basis of customers' prior behavior and their reasons for leaving. How likely is a given customer to come back? How long will a reacquired customer stay, and how much will he or she spend? Which people should get which incentives to return? And which win-back strategy is the most profitable and will be best for the company overall? By targeting their offers accordingly, companies can significantly increase their win-back rates.