A biotechnology and drug research company has an anti-cancer compound that is ready for further development. The company faces two options. It can form a licensing agreement with a large pharmaceutical partner that would fund the necessary clinical studies and bear much of the risk. The pharmaceutical company would assume an equity position within the drug research company and would also receive licensing rights to any compounds that successfully result from the research. The other option is to create a spin-off company with venture capitalists. The stand-alone company would be able to focus on realizing the potential of the new compound, but the drug research company would lose majority control. The vice-president of business development must decide how to proceed in order to maximize value to his company and to the investors.
This case summarizes how American courts measure damages in wrongful death suits. Various standards are compared, as are their implications for business management.
Provides a description of the rise and decline of Napster, the free Internet music-swapping service. Also describes second-generation peer-to-peer services (e.g., Gnutella) as well as paid subscription services (e.g., MusicNet, pressplay).
This case highlights an application of current thoughts in complexity science to negotiation theory. It emphasizes a provocative approach that questions much of traditional negotiation research thus far. The case explains the roots of complexity science and some broad ideas and definitions, such as linearity versus nonlinearity, feedback loops, and chaos. It turns to a subset of complexity science--the study of complex adaptive systems. These systems have interactive feedback loops and critical junctures that affect the future course of the system. Also, they are highly adaptive and creative. Negotiations are complex, adaptive systems and should be studied at the micro, interactional scale. Five key lessons are drawn: 1) seemingly simple negotiations can take surprisingly different paths; 2) situations that appear complex may be driven by only a few key factors; 3) large patterns are often reflected in small ones; 4) complex adaptive systems, like negotiation, are not utterly random, yet neither do they have a fixed equilibrium; and 5) creativity is spawned at the chaotic edge.
In the final years of the 20th century, the world was hit by a plague of epidemic proportions--AIDS, a life-threatening disease that remained stubbornly immune to any cure or vaccine. In the developed nations of the West, AIDS was slowly brought under control through a combination of education, prevention, and cutting-edge medicines. But in the developing world, where health care expenditures were often paltry, AIDS continued to rampage. By the year 2000, 25 million people in Africa alone were infected with the disease. Millions had already died. Nearly all of the medicines that treated AIDS had been developed--at great expense--by the major western pharmaceutical firms. These medicines were expensive to produce and often difficult to administer. They demanded levels of income and structures of distribution that often were sorely lacking in the developing world. Increasingly, activist groups were demanding that the pharmaceutical companies respond to the AIDS epidemic with drastic measures, giving their drugs away for free or abandoning the patent rights that had long protected their intellectual property. The pharmaceutical firms needed to respond to their critics. The question was, how?
Describes the economic stabilization program implemented by the Bolivian government in 1985 to 1986 and its impact on the development process in Bolivia.
The German economy has long been seen as the locomotive of European (and, on occasion, global) growth. Germany appeared to weather the stagflation of the 1970s more successfully than many other economies, and reunification in 1990 appeared to present opportunities for further growth. However, by the time Gerhard Schroeder was elected chancellor in 1998, many saw Germany as the new "sick man of Europe"--a title assigned to Britain during the 1970s. Burdened by the unanticipated high costs of integrating the former East Germany into the Federal Republic and choked by labor market regulations and dormant financial markets, German business was no longer seen as a world-beater. In this context, many argued for fundamental reform of German institutions, although many of these institutions seemed to have served Germany well during most of the post-World War II period.
Helen Priano, manufacturing manager at General Grain's Michigan Cereal Facility, had 2 critical decisions to make in early February 2002: whether to fire a 30-year veteran employee and whether to drop charges against an employee caught stealing company property. Priano wanted to be known as a fair leader, and she realized that how she handled these issues and upcoming union contract negotiations would establish her reputation as a leader within the plant. Priano, at age 27, had been promoted to her new position after spending 2 years as a production manager in the neighboring powdered drink mix factory.
The case examines a decision concerning whether or not to close a municipal landfill. Economic, ethical and environmental issues are relevant to the decision. The case includes a spreadsheet for students to use to calculate a break-even analysis.
The case by utilizing the example of the Gujarat earthquake, illustrates the role of The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent (IFRC) as a choreographer of disaster management and the nature of the supply chain - multiple, global, dynamic, and temporary - it coordinates. It describes the challenging context - high degree of uncertainty and limited authority, human and financial resources - in which it extends assistance to afflicted populations. The case reviews the organization's efforts to put in place a flexible and efficient logistics system that maximizes the contribution of each party.
Gold Seal Engineering Products Pvt. Ltd is an Indian, 44-year old second generation family firm, manufacturer of rubber and polymer extruded and moulded seals for the automobile industry. For more than three decades, the company grows undisturbed in a protected environment with limited foreign competition. In the early 1990s, with the liberalization of the automobile market and the passenger cars segment in particular, the company faces new market opportunities and challenges. The company views the arrival of a horde of automobile manufacturers and automotive component suppliers as a growth opportunity as well as a menace to its survival. The case describes the company's situation and reactions to the radical shift that takes place in its external environment.
The two companies started in 1995 to develop a new breakthrough technology for converting iron ore into pure iron. The project was extremely challenging because of complexity (a three-way joint venture involving three countries) and uncertainty (new technology posing unforeseeable complications). The case describes the difficulties to make the technology work.
The two companies started in 1995 to develop a new breakthrough technology for converting iron ore into pure iron. The project was extremely challenging because of complexity (a three-way joint venture involving three countries) and uncertainty (new technology posing unforeseeable complications). The case describes the difficulties to make the technology work.
Describes the evolution of the Mexican economy and its relation to the international capital markets in the period leading up to the Peso crisis of December 1994. Emphasizes the role of "Washington consensus" policies in stimulating the inflows and the inability of the Mexican banking system to intermediate them efficiently.