A professor has decided to build an equity portfolio made up of common shares from major companies. He has to decide what fraction of the portfolio should be devoted to each of the four issues by determining the best method of calculating risk. Excel files are available, products 7B01E009A and 7B01E009B.
Lucent Technologies is a worldwide company that delivers systems and software for next-generation communication networks. The company is restructuring to try to improve its stock value after significant losses. A key component of the company's restructuring is the retention of their information technology employees. There is an industry wide shortage of IT workers, causing a large number of these workers to job-hop for better pay. The chief executive officer needs to decide what employee compensation programs should be in place, determine if workplace conditions and rules need to be changed and if the company's recruiting program is attracting the best talent.
Vicinity uses its Internet and m-commerce technology to help drive traffic into its customers' physical distribution outlets. The company has terrific technology and is seemingly successful in getting more consumers into its customers' stores, yet it is in a precarious position. To date, Vicinity has not been able to identify which consumers it has influenced to go to the retail outlets. Without this ability, Vicinity can continue to get subscription-based fees from its customers but cannot get the much needed transaction-based fees. At the time of the case, Vicinity is in an unstable financial position and is facing the difficult dilemma of "closing the loop" and positively identifying consumers at the point of sale.
eBay, the popular Internet-based consumer-to-consumer marketplace, has recently become attractive to corporate customers. According to a vocal subset of eBay customers, the company has lost its way and is set to forsake its traditional business. Told from the perspectives of two eBay customers--a buyer and a seller--the case presents the challenges and opportunities posed by increased corporate involvement.
This case examines the growth and development of Fogdog, an online sporting goods retailer, from its founding through multiple rounds of venture capital financing to an IPO and, ultimately, to its sale to Global Sports--one of its publicly traded competitors. The Fogdog story is set in the late 1990s, when the Internet economy was virtually exploding with new opportunities. Built to capitalize on the new Internet medium, Fogdog faced a number of issues specific to the unique economic climate surrounding the company at the time. However, the company also faced a number of timeless issues that many emerging companies experience, such as board composition and development, communication between a company and its board, and the respective positions and responsibilities of both management and a company's investors when tough company decisions have to be made. Woven throughout the case are additional themes of hiring management, raising capital, and forming strategic alliances. It ends with the "forced" sale of Fogdog by the company's board at a time when the near-term outlook for Internet-related companies was uncertain. This sale took place despite management's stated desire to continue running the company.
Doral Costa is a proposed 277,803 square foot Class A office park development in Miami, FL. Trammell Crow Co. would like to develop this office park in joint venture with a partner. Celia Cabrera, the acquisitions partner at Titan Associates, a large real estate institutional advisory firm, must decide whether to recommend participation in this development to her client, QRS, a public pension fund. Celia must evaluate this location, the Southern Florida office market, the proposed building design, the lease-up and financial projections, the economic terms of the deal, and the potential partner to make a decision.
Discusses real estate valuation. Reviews "back of the envelope" valuation; real estate appraisal methods, including the income method; market comparables and replacement costs; and more complex computer modeling. Also discusses other variables that could influence valuation.
This technical note outlines the core skills needed to give and receive feedback effectively. It is most appropriate for helping managers practice ways of dealing with feedback. These solutions minimize defensiveness and increase the probability that the feedback, whether positive or negative, will be acted upon.
In an unprecedented move in mid-1998, Blue Cross of California, a unit of WellPoint Health Networks, Inc., filed a Citizen Petition with the FDA to switch Claritin, manufactured by Schering-Plough, and two other second-generation antihistamines from prescription-only to over-the-counter (OTC) status. Prescription pharmaceuticals like Claritin were covered by insurance programs, whereas OTC drugs were not. In the late 1990s, U.S. spending on prescription pharmaceuticals had increased significantly, in part as a result of direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs, and posed a substantial burden on insurance companies. Blue Cross argued that the switch would make the drugs more widely available to consumers and would benefit consumers because the second-generation antihistamines were non sedating, unlike the 100 antihistamines sold on the OTC market. Manufacturers opposed the switch because it would put the second-generation antihistamines under considerable price pressure and would disrupt their product planning. Moreover, a switch initiated by an insurance company could lead to future petitions for switches of other prescription drugs. Just under three years later, on May 11, 2001, an FDA advisory committee voted overwhelmingly that the three second-generation antihistamines could safely be marketed over the counter. Although the vote was not binding, the FDA usually acted in accord with the judgements of its advisory committees. The pharmaceutical companies strongly objected to the committee's vote and faced the challenge of developing a strategy for dealing with the threat.
Describes a start-up in the field of nano technology--very small physical structures measured in the billionths of a meter. The company, Surface Logix, has assembled a portfolio of intellectual property and completed some of the R&D work required to develop actual products. Now the company must decide what specific product applications to focus on and what resources are required for that effort.
NerveWire, a management consulting and systems integration provider based in Newton, MA, was closing in on its second anniversary. In the beginning days of NerveWire, the major challenge was recruiting--finding the right people who embodied its values and business mission. Traditional business enterprises were thirsty for a new type of consulting organization, a partner that would help them utilize the Internet not as a marketing tool, but as a tool to re-design their business models, their internal value chains, and their extended industry value chains to drive significant ROI. NerveWire was created for just that purpose. The year 2001 brought some very new and different challenges. In the fall of 2000, the economy in the United States fell off a cliff, and by the beginning of 2001, NerveWire's Fortune 500 clients, by and large, had frozen all spending in major new technology-centric business initiatives. A Day in the Life of Kirk Arnold, Video and A Day in the Life of Malcolm Frank, Video are required with this case.
This note outlines a simple but powerful model, in managerial language, for understanding why people behave the way they do. The model builds a set of relationships among perceptions, beliefs, conclusions, defense mechanisms, and behavior. The note provides a framework that has been useful in a variety of settings for practicing managers.
Nathaniel Gatewood and Sean Daugherty were MBA students at the University of Virginia Darden Graduate School of Business Administration. They each held strong entrepreneurial desires and headed back to school with that in mind. Gatewood knew he wanted to purchase a manufacturing company but was not clear on how he should go about doing so. Daugherty just wanted to work for himself. The pair met in their neighborhood and quickly became friends. Within a short period of time, Gatewood and Daugherty tossed around the idea of becoming partners and exploring a joint venture to purchase a company. Once school started they met another classmate and partner, Eric Anderson, who acted as a catalyst for modeling their purchase plan into a Darden Business Project. In time, Anderson was offered a position in the private equity group where he had interned the previous summer, and he backed out of the partnership. After some soul-searching, Gatewood and Daugherty decided to proceed without him. The pair took many steps in the due diligence process. They assessed their personal skills and interviewed faculty, entrepreneurs, and alumni. Along the way, they explored the concept of a search fund. As they got closer to graduating, Daugherty and Gatewood were forced to decide between securing a search fund and continuing to look for an acquisition or applying for lucrative jobs, like their classmates, and looking for a business to buy later. The case illustrates the development process of two entrepreneurs and serves as an excellent introduction to the search fund concept. It also promotes a discussion of how to plan, manage, and make decisions in an uncertain environment.
The Sony AIBO is the world's first "entertainment" robot. Positioned as a household "companion," the $1,500 AIBO has become a smash hit in Japan, appealing to both the young and the old, including those with little technical expertise. In the United States, the AIBO is in hot demand among "techies" infatuated with high-tech gadgets; however, it has yet to catch on with the mainstream. The task for Takeshi Yazawa, VP and general manager of Sony Entertainment Robot America, is to figure out how to market the AIBO to the American masses. Includes color exhibits.
Describes the variety of health insurance plans that Medtronic offers, including a high-deductible, consumer-driven health plan with a health reimbursement account that also enables health care providers to quote their own prices. Asks students to consider the choices facing the firm's human resources manager and its employees and the viability of the new consumer-driven models.
This case describes a "do good and do well" firm that enables individuals to buy health care services at discounted prices. It delineates the characteristics of the uninsured and others who are the primary targets for the firm. "HealthAllies (B)" provides information about subsequent events.
Looks into the success factors in implementing a continuous quality improvement (CQI) initiative in a project called Pre-Operative Skin Preparation: Shaving and Pre-Operative Baths at Queen Mary Hospital (QMH) in Hong Kong. Using focus, analyze, develop, and execute (FADE) as a CQI model, the CQI unit's skin preparation project achieved the CQI objectives. The CQI unit's intention is to administer the same CQI model in other areas, one of which is the Food Wastage Minimization project. A critical factor in the implementation is how should the CQI unit move forward with other changes using CQI? How should the CQI unit respond to organizational resistance and managing professionals through change? The unit also has to consider where and how to collect data in determining areas for CQI application. What are the key elements to be considered to achieve the cooperation of everyone at QMH, or at least of critical decision makers?
A major corporate investment decision faces CITIC Pacific Ltd. The company has to decide whether to purchase newly reclaimed land at the waterfront of Victoria Harbor, Hong Kong, and develop a grade A office building for investment purposes.