In September 2008, Todd Bradley, executive vice president of Hewlett-Packard Company's Personal Systems Group (PSG) gathered his thoughts before a meeting with his top executives and managers for product design and marketing. On the agenda was a discussion of strategic next steps for the group. Hewlett-Packard (HP), a technology company providing a wide range of products and services including computers, handheld devices, servers and digital entertainment, employed 172,000 people and posted $104 billion in sales in 2007. PSG, one of HP's three major divisions, offered notebook and desktop personal computers, handheld mobile computing devices, monitors, workstations, and related support services. Bradley's PSG had played an important role in HP's financial success over the previous three years.

In his role as Senior Vice President and Director of Research at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (Minneapolis Fed), Art Rolnick and his colleague, Rob Grunewald, had written "Early Childhood Development: Economic Development with a High Public Return." The thesis was fairly straightforward; early childhood development (ECD) had the highest returns so states and local governments should invest in it. But the idea of investing in ECD for economic development was new and had never been tested on a large scale, particularly in the way that Rolnick and Grunewald recommended in a later paper - using market forces to drive demand for high-quality ECD programs. The Minnesota Early Learning Foundation (MELF), formed in 2005, invested in two projects designed to test the economists' recommendations. The St. Paul Early Childhood Scholarship Program (SPECSP) provided up to $13,000 a year per child for parents in two St. Paul neighborhoods to select a high-quality ECD program of their choice. MELF had also invested in Five Hundred Under 5 (FHU5), a Minneapolis program formed to improve the capacity and quality of providers. Comparing SPECSP to FHU5 would offer insights on the potential impact of supply-side versus demand-side ECD initiatives. Rolnick reflected on the two MELF experiments. Which would be more effective? Would parents in St. Paul really drive up the quality of providers through the choices they made or was it better to work with providers directly to improve quality?

Allison Watkins, senior director of Merck's Vaccines Division, needed to decide on the pricing of Gardasil, Merck's newest vaccine and one of the company's most important product launches of the year. The outside consulting firm she had hired to recommend a price for Gardasil had suggested a price of $120 per dose (or $360 per person, as each person required three doses over six months to achieve adequate immunity). The Gardasil marketing team disagreed about this recommended price; some thought it was clearly too high, whereas others said it was too low. The latter group argued that Merck would be missing a major opportunity by setting the price at such a low level. Watkins now needed to decide whether to follow the consulting firm's recommendation or to set a different price.

This note reviews a variety of shorter-term consumer credit products in the U.S. with an emphasis on the types of products that low and moderate-income consumers use. Included here are the following: credit cards, bank overdraft products, payday lending, personal loans and peer-to-peer lending, home-equity lending, rent-to-own contracts, auto-title lending, pawnbroking, refund-anticipation loans, informal lending.

This case, along with Dubai: Global Economy (709-043) provides an opportunity to discuss Saudi Arabia's efforts to modernize, without really Westernizing, in sharp contrast to Dubai, a nearby Arab Emirate. As Saudi Arabia's development strategy unfolds in the past six years, it is contrasted to social and political pressures within the country, volatility in global oil markets and severe political problems in the Middle East.

This case, along with Saudi Arabia: Modern Reform, Enduring Stability (709-042), provides an opportunity to discuss Saudi Arabia's efforts to modernize, without really Westernizing, in sharp contrast to Dubai, a nearby Arab Emirate. As Saudi Arabia's development strategy unfolds in the past six years, it is contrasted to social and political pressures within the country, volatility in global oil markets and severe political problems in the Middle East.

"Is this the right time or is it still too early?" Dick Costolo wondered as he reflected on the latest acquisition offer. He had been building FeedBurner with his three co-founders for almost four years and was staring at the details of an acquisition offer from Google. He and his co-founders had founded three prior ventures together, each of which had had increasingly attractive outcomes, but none of which had reached their full potential. The number on the table from Google was a big one. Should the deal be completed, it would be the biggest win the founding team had ever had. However, was this the right time to exit? If Costolo didn't think so, would he be able to convince his co-founders who all had different personal risk profiles? This was going to be the biggest decision in the life of FeedBurner and its co-founders.

This case sequel is a shorter, more focused, "decision-forcing" version of The Turnaround Artist: Craig Coy Tackles Political Influence at Massport (Case Program, 1896.0). Like its more comprehensive counterpart, it addresses a set of decisions facing Craig Coy, a business executive, retired Coast Guard officer, and former White House security adviser, when he was named executive director of the Massachusetts Port Authority, or "Massport," on April 11, 2002. The appointment came at a time of significant turmoil at Massport, the state authority responsible for managing Boston's Logan International Airport and several other regional transportation resources. The two airline jets hijacked in the attack on the World Trade Center in New York City on September 11, 2001 had departed from Logan. Massport had not been responsible for the security practices that had allowed the terrorists to board the jetliners with weapons, but the authority had, in recent years, repeatedly come under fire for political excesses and patronage. These long-tolerated vagaries-when vaulted into the national spotlight-suddenly appeared tawdry and intolerable to state officials and lawmakers. Coy's mandate, when hired a few months later, was to stop to the excesses of the past, to improve safety and security, to run the Authority in businesslike fashion-in sum, to effect a "cultural turnaround." This case describes a string of choices Coy had to make early in his tenure that pertained to the people-management side of his challenge. For example, Coy had to decide the extent to which he wanted to fire top managers at the authority and bring in his own team. He had to find a way to signal the shift to new priorities. And he had to decide what to do when elected officials-whose support was crucial to Massport in a number of respects-called up and asked the authority to hire their constituents. HKS Case Number 1901.1

By 2009, China's exports had increased dramatically from $250 billion in 2000 to a projected $1,500 billion in 2009. This enormous growth of exports severely damaged competing businesses in the advanced nations, particularly the United States and Europe. China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 guaranteed China's right to export to these nations, but at the same time the WTO required China to adhere to certain rules that sought to support fair trade and create a level playing field. Several broad subjects each gave rise to a series of trade disputes: the protection of intellectual property, health and safety concerns about China's products, labour and environmental standards, China's manipulation of their currency, and costs and prices determined by the government rather than free markets. This case examines each set of trade disputes and China's attempts to resolve them. Many disputes were embedded in cultural practices and ideological positions and so they might not disappear quickly. Shortcomings in China's legal and judicial system hampered enforcement. In addition, many rested on the government's desire to protect the interestsof Chinese businesses and their employees, and so China might alter its practices only if confronted with credible retalitory threats. China's central government experienced the "principal-agent" problem where its wishes and decisions could be ignored by local governments and firms. Meanwhile, changes in industry structure within the advanced nations were altering the negotiation positions of Western governments. The case examines the WTO dispute resolution procedures and enforcement mechanisms that have been directed at China's trade disputes.

The director of a research coalition and the founder/coordinator of an NGO consortium meet to discuss the possibility of jointly drafting a proposal for an integrated research and development project in the Congo River basin. Approved projects will receive an annual operating budget of $2 million. Together they must develop a joint plan for how the money should be spent.

The director of a research coalition and the founder/coordinator of an NGO consortium meet to discuss the possibility of jointly drafting a proposal for an integrated research and development project in the Congo River basin. Approved projects will receive an annual operating budget of $2 million. Together they must develop a joint plan for how the money should be spent.

The owner of a vending operation located in Windsor, Ontario, must record all financial activities for the fiscal year to determine the company's financial success. The business sold a healthy energy product through more than 300 vending machines located in gyms, malls and educational campuses across Canada. Students are required to record transactions associated with cash, accounts receivable (including write offs, recoveries and bad debts), retail inventory (purchases, returns, discounts, FOB terms, valuation and the lower-of-cost-or-market rule) and fixed assets (purchase, amortization, repairs, trade-ins and sales).

Leading technology companies from around the world are entering China to establish research centres, leverage China's unique situation of rapid growth and large manufacturing base, and scooping up talent from China's leading universities. SAP, the world's largest application software company, recently entered China to establish one of its exclusive technology research centres, SAP Research. While this division has been successful at its headquarters in Germany, the Chinese labor market and business environment remain difficult for foreign multinationals to navigate. Foreign companies often experience challenges ranging from difficulty finding innovators in a competitive talent pool to dealing with turnover of employees that have an aggressive focus on compensation. There is concern that locating in Shanghai, far away from the innovative hotbed of universities and other technology research centres that have set up shop in Beijing, was the wrong choice for SAP in China. What would be necessary to win the war for high-profile PhDs in the competitive Chinese labor market? What would be required for SAP Research China to be an integral contributor in SAP's worldwide innovation network? This case illustrates the opportunities and challenges of research and development ("R&D") globalization and familiarizes students with the unique challenges of R&D strategy, new-market entry strategies, human resource management, innovation, clustering and intellectual property protection in rapidly developing countries. In particular, this case is relevant to studies in R&D globalization, business in China and talent management.

This note describes Socially Responsible Investing, providing a brief history, description of different socially responsible investing approaches, and overview of selected players and institutions involved in the socially responsible investing field. It has been written to provide background for the case study on Generation Investment Management.

How can a biotechnology start-up navigate a complex regulatory and stakeholder terrain to bring to market an innovative product with potentially significant public health benefits? This case focuses on the challenges facing Ventria Bioscience, a small biotechnology firm based in California. The company had developed an innovative technology for growing medical proteins useful in the treatment of childhood diarrhea in genetically modified rice. The company's efforts to obtain regulatory approval in California to commercialize its invention met with a firestorm of opposition from a wide range of stakeholders, including environmentalists, food safety activists, consumer advocates and rice farmers. The case presents the hurdles faced by Ventria as it has attempted to commercialize its invention in the context of the broader debate over the ethics of plant-based medicines. This case is suitable for an upper-division undergraduate or graduate course in entrepreneurship, small business, the management of technology or biotechnology. In such a course, it is best positioned in a discussion of the regulatory environment and stakeholder relations. Alternatively, the case may be used in a segment on technology or stakeholder relationships in a course in business and society.

Approximately 65% to 85% of mergers fail. That's a startling statistic. While there are myriad reasons why mergers are not successful, in many cases the reason is simple: a failure to develop and execute an appropriate postmerger integration (PMI) strategy. Clues to successful PMIs can be gleaned from the 15% to 35% of mergers that do succeed; this note contains some tips and best practices distilled from those successes. Because every company and every merger is different, this collection of practices is by no means exhaustive. Instead, its purpose is to serve as a starting point for the creation of a well-tailored strategy for a firm planning to undertake the assimilation of an acquisition into a new, combined entity.

In 2001, Allianz Capital Partners and Goldman Sachs acquired a majority stake in Messer Griesheim, a European industrial gas concern held by Hoechst. The dealmakers faced several challenges, including delicate corporate governance issues due to partial family ownership and a consolidating market for industrial gases. Aiming to make Messer Griesheim a more attractive potential acquisition, Messer Griesheim management had drawn up a restructuring plan as early as 2000. By late 2003 the private equity players were ready to exit and the Messer family agitated for further control. Several factors were in play: the family had a buy-back option, the window of which was quickly closing; there were few possible strategic buyers, given the anti-trust issues facing a European player interested in buying the firm; and the family made no secret of its desire to retain a piece of the firm, at the very least, and some measure of control. The case explores the steps taken by the private equity investors to restructure the firm, and the relationship the partners forged with the family owners, to bring about a favorable exit for the private equity partners and ownership for the Messer family.

In 2001, Allianz Capital Partners and Godlman Sachs acquired a majority stake in Messer Greisheim, a European industrial gas concern held by Hoeschst. The dealmakers faced several challenges, including delicate corporate governance issues due to partial family ownership and a consolidating sector. By late 2003 the private equity players were ready to exit and the Messer family agitated for further control. Several factors were in play: the family had a buy-back option, the window of which was quickly closing; there were few possible strategic buyers, given the anti-trust issues facing a European player interested in buying the firm; and the family made no secret of its desire to retain a piece of the firm at the very least and some measure of control. The case provides an update post-exit.

In May 2007, the chief operating officer at TSC Stores in London, Ontario, asked the director of distribution to evaluate the company's supply chain strategy and make recommendations to the board of directors. The chief operating officer was concerned about the ability of the company's supply chain to support the corporate business plan, which called for 20 per cent annual growth over the next three years. Preliminary analysis indicated that TSC would need more distribution capacity by first quarter 2008, which gave the director of distribution only six to eight months to evaluate options and implement a plan. The chief operating officer and the board would want to know the process and schedule that the director of distribution intended to follow to deal with the evolving capacity demands in distribution.