Eli Lilly and Company is a leading U.S. pharmaceutical company. The new president of intercontinental operations is re-evaluating all of the company's divisions, including the joint venture with Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited, one of India's largest pharmaceutical companies. This joint venture has run smoothly for a number of years despite their differences in focus, but recently Ranbaxy was experiencing cash flow difficulties due to its network of international sales. In addition, the Indian government was changing regulations for businesses in India, and joining the World Trade Organization would have an effect on India's chemical and drug regulations. The president must determine if this international joint venture still fits Eli Lilly's strategic objectives.
Bombardier Transportation, one of the world's largest manufacturers of passenger rail cars, has successfully negotiated the purchase of Adtranz, a large European manufacturer of rail equipment. The newly appointed chief executive officer has been brought in to manage the acquisition. The new CEO faces many challenges including decisions about the pace of integration, location of headquarters, organization structure, personnel retention and personal management style. Students may use this case to discuss post-acquisition strategy and how fast companies should move to integrate acquisitions.
Jinjian Garment Factory is a large clothing manufacturer based in Shenzhen with distribution to Hong Kong and overseas. Although Shenzhen had become one of the most advanced garment manufacturing centres in the world, managers in this industry still had few effective ways of dealing with the collective and deliberate slow pace of work by the employees, of motivating workers, and of resolving the problem between seasonal production requirements and retention of skilled workers. However, the owner and managing director of the company must determine the reasons behind the deliberately slow pace of the workers, the pros and cons of the piecework system and the methods he could adopt to motivate the workers effectively.
This case examines the use of an American Depositary Receipt (ADR) program in the context of an overall restructuring plan that students are asked to evaluate. A New Zealand-based conglomerate's stock in recent months has underperformed in the New Zealand market. Analysts have begun to speculate that the company suffers from the well-known "conglomerate discount." In June 2000, in an attempt to improve the situation, Deutsche Bank Alex Brown (DBAB) is asked to conduct a strategic review of the company.
This note reviews the fundamental terminology and pricing techniques for a simple risk-free bond contract. The note is intended to introduce students to the concept of the time value of money and the basic language of bond markets.
China's economic rise became one of the most important stories in the world economy once the Chinese economy began to open to the rest of the world in 1979. However, this rise was not evenly distributed across all of China's regions. By 2003, some regions had emerged as clear leaders in the economic development process, while others lagged far behind. A variety of forces also prevented the People's Republic of China from being a single national market of 1.3 billion people, and the national economy was perhaps better described as a set of coupled regional markets. Politically, China was not a monolith either. Competition between regions and between individual jurisdictions had been played out in the corridors of power in Beijing as well as in the regions themselves, as locations vied for investment and positions in the market. Understanding China's regional economies became virtually a prerequisite for success for economic policy and firms' strategies in China.
Slingshot Technology Inc. (STI) is a privately held software start-up founded in 1995 focused on identifying emerging spaces in the IT services industry and partnering with vendors selling promising but unproven technologies in those spaces. The vendors used STI to extend their system development and integration capabilities to deliver on aggressive deadlines, STI gained a steady stream of consulting and engineering work plus opportunities to identify and meet follow-on needs of the vendors' Fortune 1000 customers. Four years after the company was founded with $1,000, revenue had exploded to $1.9 million on the basis of partnerships with enterprise applications development and enterprise application integration vendors. In late 1998, the founder was pondering how to set up an innovative "software factory" to complement the consulting side of the business while ensuring that STI's knowledge assets and intellectual property were protected.
An insurance company claim manager is deciding how to negotiate a large liability claim and reviewing the company's approach to settling large claims. This case provides background on the claim and the 4-1/2-year history of negotiations to date. It also gives profiles of people who might be chosen to do the final negotiations. The case provides background that can be used to debate how to conclude negotiations, critique how large claims have been handled, and discuss how to manage them better in the future.
Following the dot-com bubble burst in August 2001, Libby Sartain, new chief of people and senior vice-president of human resources at Yahoo!, must determine the direction of human resources management at the traumatized media company. Suffering revenues, a collapsed stock price, several executive resignations, and recent layoffs have created anxiety and fear among employees. Furthermore, new CEO Terry Semel, former co-CEO of Warner Brothers, had arrived in May but had not yet provided his new plan for the company. Considers how Sartain, previously VP of people at Southwest Airlines, understands the problems facing Yahoo! and the role of human resources in facilitating organizational renewal.
Describes investment decision-making processes, based on interviews with 56% of the top 38 venture capital firms in the country. Discusses some implications for the future growth of the industry.
After three months of close collaboration, the Leo Burnett USA/Worldwide agency and partner Cartel and Images advertising/creative team were poised to unveil to senior Army officials at the Pentagon their replacement to the "Be All You Can Be" campaign to help increase lagging recruitment.
Prudential Insurance Co. attempted to diversify into financial services by building an investment banking franchise. Prudential's initial foray into the industry was its acquisition of The Bache Group in 1982. In 2000, the company decided to exit investment banking. The firm adopted various strategic positions and human resource management strategies during the 18 years it struggled to compete successfully against prestigious incumbents. Although Prudential's efforts to establish a top-tier investment bank ultimately failed, other firms did succeed in this endeavor.
There are many options for a country in the management of monetary policy. At the most basic level is the decision of whether to adopt a fixed or a floating exchange rate. Introduces the economics behind exchange rates and the debate between fixed vs. floating regimes.
Slingshot Technology Inc. (STI) is a privately held software start-up founded in 1995 focused on identifying emerging spaces in the IT services industry and partnering with vendors selling promising but unproven technologies in those spaces. The vendors used STI to extend their system development and integration capabilities to deliver on aggressive deadlines, STI gained a steady stream of consulting and engineering work plus opportunities to identify and meet follow-on needs of the vendors' Fortune 1000 customers. Four years after the company was founded with $1,000, revenue had exploded to $1.9 million on the basis of partnerships with enterprise applications development and enterprise application integration vendors. In late 1998, the founder was pondering how to set up an innovative "software factory" to complement the consulting side of the business while ensuring that STI's knowledge assets and intellectual property were protected.
Slingshot Technology Inc. (STI) is a privately held software start-up founded in 1995 focused on identifying emerging spaces in the IT services industry and partnering with vendors selling promising but unproven technologies in those spaces. The vendors used STI to extend their system development and integration capabilities to deliver on aggressive deadlines, STI gained a steady stream of consulting and engineering work plus opportunities to identify and meet follow-on needs of the vendors' Fortune 1000 customers. Four years after the company was founded with $1,000, revenue had exploded to $1.9 million on the basis of partnerships with enterprise applications development and enterprise application integration vendors. In late 1998, the founder was pondering how to set up an innovative "software factory" to complement the consulting side of the business while ensuring that STI's knowledge assets and intellectual property were protected.
The cofounder and CEO of AsiaInfo, a Chinese system integrator that built 70% of China's Internet backbone, must decide whether to list equity in the United States to fund future growth. Describes the company and the decision. A rewritten version of a previous case.
In less than six months, a telecommunications company has faced two incidents of alleged violations of the Canadian Human Rights Act. The general manager spent considerable time interviewing employees about the first incident. He then reported his findings, and the Canadian Human Rights Commission confirmed that no discrimination had occurred. Just a few months later, an employee approached her supervisor, alleging sexual harassment by a colleague. The company's general manager must not only deal with the second incident, he wonders whether he needs to draft a human resources policy to outline employee rights and responsibilities under the Canadian Human Rights Act.
A newspaper editor must decide how to deal with negative public reaction to items printed in the paper. He was concerned about the hurt to those involved, and about potential loss of readership and advertising dollars. He wondered what could be done to prevent future incidents.
The president of Wheels Group and the founder and major shareholder of the company, are evaluating alternatives with respect to pursuing the goal of doubling the company's revenues over the next five years. However, the alternatives presented to them reveal a tension between two competing growth strategies: 1) an asset based growth strategy and, 2) a non-asset based growth strategy. A decision is required with respect to which opportunity to pursue, recognizing that both strategies cannot be pursued simultaneously. Complicating the decision is the fact that approximately 75 per cent of the company's revenues are currently derived from non-asset-based activity. The opportunity is provided to explore issues associated with developing, evaluating and implementing business strategy within the third-party logistics industry.