Credit Valley Golf and Country Club (Credit Valley), a private golf course, would be having their annual general meeting very soon. The general manager of Credit Valley and the superintendent felt that the most pressing issue was a change to the method of irrigation being used by the golf course. This change was made necessary by newly passed government regulations. The general manager and superintendent had to prepare a proposal for the annual general meeting to convince the board of directors and the club members that a new pump house was the most viable option.

The chief financial officer (CFO) of North Billington Golf and Country Club was reviewing the financial statements prepared by the auditors. At the upcoming annual general meeting, Parkinson was expected to address the membership on the future financial health of the golf club. In addition to having the financial statements ready, he wanted to compare the financial results with those of other golf courses.

The director of client services at henderson bas, an interactive advertising company, was trying to decide how to set a price for the newly proposed campaign for Halpernia Industries, one of her clients. Though the strategic direction of the campaign had been agreed upon, Halpernia had rejected the two creative proposals already presented to it. The director was unsure how to set a price for the campaign. She needed to balance the need for the company to be profitable with the importance of maintaining the client relationship with Halpernia by deciding whether or not to charge Halpernia for the significant amount of work that had gone into the rejected proposals.

A member of the integration leadership team must help plan and execute the integration of Delta's information technology (IT) operations into those of Unity. He has been given a time limit of three years and has been charged with removing $60 million of expenses during the process. Half of the savings will come from reducing the number of staff whose roles have been duplicated as a result of the merger. The remaining savings will be achieved through the reduction of associated assets such as hardware, software and property. Irving has many hurdles to overcome, including motivating soon-to-be-made-redundant staff, finding and keeping Delta's star performers, designing the new organizational structure for the technology group, choosing the target IT platform and performing the infrastructure consolidation. This case takes a student through the important decisions in integration projects in order to ensure success in a merger or acquisition, bringing awareness to the execution aspects of these transactions.

Mexico had a history of repeated financial crises, with high inflation leading to current account deficits with volatile capital inflows, culminating in significant devaluations. Concerns persisted that this pattern might repeat itself in the future. In the years prior to 1980, the government of Mexico had put in place a command and control economy with an extensive array of regulations through which it intervened in the economy on an ongoing basis and with discretionary powers. Governments created barriers to entry for foreign investment and imports and put in place price controls that protected existing Mexican firms. After 1980, a series of trade and investment reforms opened the economy. Nevertheless, many expressed the view that Mexico's reform movement stalled under President Fox (2000-2006) and that extensive government intervention continued to stifle competition. Exhibits present macroeconomic data as well as World Bank Investment Climate Indicators. A series of challenges now confronted Mexico, including the U.S. financial crisis and recession, competition with China, appropriate monetary policy, opening oil production to foreign companies and a rise in corruption and violent crime.

This note covers the basics of real estate from a portfolio manager's perspective. It examines how money is made in real estate, how real estate is valued, the differences among various types of real estate, and how to do basic financial modelling such as net present value (NPV) and internal rate of return (IRR).

Biovail was a large international pharmaceutical company with reported revenues of $788 million. Banc of America has issued a research report which indicates that Biovail Corporation's financial statements raised a number of issues that warrant caution for investors, and as a result, Biovail's stock was given a sell rating by Banc of America. A member of Biovail's audit committee is preparing for an upcoming audit meeting and considers the implications of this report for the company and for the audit committee.

In April 2008, the owners of the Cambridge, Ontario-based Cerny Hospitality Group (CHG) were considering the purchase and implementation of OpenTable's reservation management software in three of their restaurants, including the Blackshop Restaurant. It was thought that the software could aid in more effectively managing customer demand due to its ability to allow on-line reservations and its data-gathering capability, an improvement over its current manual reservation system. CHG was a family-owned and operated business and had achieved considerable success with its personal touch with clients. When considering the purchase of the software, CHG had concerns about the potential cost and return on investment, in addition to the strategic fit for this company that placed much emphasis on the human-touch and personal interaction with customers.

In February 2008, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Fly Open Sky Ltd. was finalizing a business plan for Etrip, a proposed online travel startup in the European travel market. He wanted to use the plan to convince investors to commit $100,000, which would provide the first round of financing in a lead up to a further investment of $500,000. The CEO had a vision of developing Etrip as a superior online travel reservation system and desired to implement higher value propositions over other companies' products in this crowded and competitive market. Prior to launching a bid for capital the CEO had to make concrete decisions about an appropriate marketing plan, devising an accurate revenue model, and satisfying intellectual property rights with regards to Etrip's domain name.

The Turkish financial sector has been developing rapidly and often unpredictably, offering an ideal backdrop to carry out an industry analysis in the dynamic environment of an emerging market. Akbank, one of the leading private Turkish banks, has been successful in taking advantage of the new opportunities that appeared in the credit card sector as a result of post-crisis restructuring of the financial services industry in the early 2000s. Launched in late 2001, Akbank's Axess credit card quickly gained a significant market share of 15 per cent and was popular with both customers and merchants. At the same time, the attractive margins in this sector have sparked many local and foreign competitor entries. Setting a sustainable strategy for the next few years is complicated by the change in the political, macro-economic and competitive environment. The new government leading the country since 2002 has improved overall stability in Turkey, which created both opportunities and threats for Akbank's business. The opportunities included an improved banking system and increasing customer disposable income, while the market for credit cards was not yet saturated. However, threats may come from unpredictable actions that banking authorities could implement and increasing competition from both local and international players. The dynamic nature of the banking industry in an emerging market provides a comprehensive case to anchor a discussion about developing flexible strategy in a changing environment. The purpose of the Akbank case is to help students develop environmental analysis skills. It is designed to be used in a strategy course (e.g. to accompany Chapters 4 and 5 of Crossan, Fry and Killing (2006) Strategic Analysis and Action) at an undergraduate or graduate level. Additionally, it may be used in a marketing course to illustrate issues related to loyalty programs or in an international business course to illustrate the impact of environmental uncertainty on managerial decision-making.

This case provides an introduction to the concept of a search fund. A search fund is an investment vehicle through which a group of investors provide financial support to an entrepreneur or a small team of entrepreneurs for the purpose of finding and acquiring a privately held company in which the entrepreneurs would ultimately perform senior management roles. This case deals with the process of setting up the fund, defining its terms and examining the economics. Search funds are new to the Canadian market.

This case points to the challenges that Canada faces in regards to its ongoing productivity gap with the United States and its ongoing failure in regard to international competitiveness. This case also discusses the regional differences within Canada in regard to international competitiveness. This case also discusses the regional differences within Canada in regard to economic structure and public policy issues. Finally, the case indicates a series of strategies that Canadian businesses and governments might pursue in order to deal more effectively with Canada's economic challenge.

These spreadsheets will allow students to analyze financials for Kinecta Federal Credit Union and Nix Check Cashing. They also provide insight into the banking and AFS markets in which both organizations operate.

Argentine confectionery manufacturer, Arcor Group, seeks to implement an international strategy but in 2003, while recovering from the Argentine financial crisis, globalization plans are thwarted. Already Latin America's leading candy producer and an exporter to over 100 countries, Arcor analyzes how it can become truly global with production facilities and distribution networks in various regions, such as North America, Europe, and Asia. First, however, Arcor must stabilize its operations at home, where a devalued peso, economic uncertainty, and political instability still linger from the devastating financial crisis.

Pharmaceutical company Genzyme has created a new drug, Renvela, which is a phosphate binder designed to be used primarily by patients with kidney failure. Renvela is a slightly different version of Genzyme's highly successful Renagel. Company executives must now decide how best to launch Renvela. Should it replace Renagel? Should it be a premium version of Renagel? Is it worth launching the product at all? The case appears rather simple on the surface, but the questions are challenging to work through.

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. At some point, every manager has had to tell someone to wait. In the factory, this can lead to stockpiles of goods or bottlenecks. When people are involved, it can lead to inefficiency and anger. But the psychological impact of waits can be managed, and studies in design show us how. In places where waits are required, some basic principles can not only make waiting more pleasant but also can make them not feel like waits at all. Sometimes inducing a wait can improve customer experience. When waits are inevitable, the research shows, the goal should be to optimize the experience for both customers and employees, thereby enhancing customer satisfaction and reducing employee stress and turnover. This research can help managers in many situations, even those not involving lines. There are three main lessons managers can take from how designers manage lines: Manage understanding with fair practices and open communication, manage perceived fairness by reframing what waiting is, and manage memories, because they last much longer than the event itself.

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Edward R. Tufte, author of The Visual Display of Quantitative Information and other classics of information visualization, says that businesses would think better, make better decisions and present themselves more powerfully if they would only learn to talk -both among themselves and externally -in facts. To present themselves and their products better and more honestly, Tufte recommends that companies concentrate on delivering facts (rather than pitches), deliver as many of those facts as they can, not count on the marketing department to make it happen, and look to news sites and scientific publications for models of success. In particular, he argues that Google Inc. is where most companies should turn for design inspiration, and Tufte continues his examination of the corrosive influence that he says presentation software has on thought. Following his big ideas about information presentation, he says, will help companies differentiate themselves.

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Nancy Duarte and Garr Reynolds help world-renowned executives, politicians and thought leaders deliver stronger presentations. In a talk with MIT Sloan Management Review, they consider not how to make better presentations -their books handle that -but how to become a better manager by thinking more like a designer. They argue that managers and designers have to do many of the same things: embrace restraints, take risks, question everything and make sure that tools don't get in the way of ideas. And they reveal how design concepts such as hierarchy, balance, contrast, clear space and harmony are just as relevant to managers as they are to designers.

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article.

This is an MIT Sloan Management Review article. Companies are aware of the potential benefits of "open innovation"-relying on outsiders both as a source of ideas and as a means to commercialize them -but they have struggled with precisely how to open up their product development to the external world. For starters, many executives have little idea how to motivate and manage outside innovation. Specifically, should external innovators be organized as a collaborative community or as a competitive market? Collaborative communities are perhaps best known through Linux and other open-source software efforts that are governed loosely by social norms and "soft" rules to encourage open access to information, transparency, joint development and the sharing of intellectual property. Competitive markets are strikingly different. Rather than collaborating, external innovators in a market will develop multiple competing varieties of complementary goods, components or services. Customers then choose from among the different offerings, and this often results in fierce competition -and little cooperation -among the innovators. Because the dynamics of communities and markets are so dramatically different, companies need to consider carefully which approach makes the best sense for their objectives. From their research, the authors have identified three critical issues that managers should take into account when making that decision: 1) the type of innovation that will be shifted to external innovators, 2) the motivations of those individuals, and 3) the nature of the platform business model. An in-depth analysis of those issues reveals that the choice between communities and markets is not as obvious -nor as clear-cut -as it might first appear.