Wade Watts has won control of the OASIS - a futuristic, immersive virtual reality game world. He must decide on rules, rights, and marketplace design, balancing the founding principles of the OASIS with the platform's potentially negative externalities.
Francesco Cavarero, chief information officer of Miroglio Fashion, Italy's third-largest retailer of women's apparel, was trying to bring analytical rigor to the company's forecasting and inventory management decisions. But fashion is inherently hard to predict. Can artificial intelligence and machine learning replace human intuition in this industry?
Nobel Ilac was a Turkish generic pharmaceutical company marketing more than 100 drugs in 20 countries and, as of 2017, had over 2,500 employees worldwide. Nobel had implemented a transformation strategy-more specifically, a customer segmentation plan-whereby the sales force had begun to use data to determine their call plans. As a result, it had improved sales performance, and its previously negative EBITDA had reached double-digit positive figures. Two key issues remained: 1) growth was not as high as desired; and 2) the sales force's voluntary turnover was very high. Given that the sales force was the only go-to-market channel, Nobel needed to do something to reduce employee turnover without affecting the positive trend in sales and profits. For many industries, personal selling is the primary and sometimes the only way that a firm can go to market. Hence, properly managing the sales force is a key to a firm's success. The case outlines the challenges of managing a sales force-in particular, how to decrease salespeople's attrition while also increasing growth.
Zhejiang Geely Holding Company's acquisition of Volvo cars was widely viewed with skepticism because of the poor track record of cross-border auto industry acquisitons. This case looks at the acquisition and post-acquisition integration from the point of view of Chinese managers at Geely. A companion case, 613-042 Volvo Cars: Acquisition by Geely looks at the acquisition from the point of view of Swedish managers at Volvo.
Dr. Brad Worthington, surgeon and anesthesiologist, has created BKK, a nonopioid surgical pain reliever. A combination of three FDA-approved drugs, BKK has beneficial properties beyond those of the individual medications of which it is made. Having obtained a patent for BKK, Worthington and his business partner, Thurman Ballard, are evaluating three paths to market, each with its own risks, costs, timelines, and possible outcomes: 1) seek venture capital investment to fund a New Drug Application for FDA approval; 2) partner with a compounding pharmacy that can manufacture and distribute the drug wholesale; or 3) develop a relationship with a manufacturer that can produce convenience kits containing all three drugs, bottled separately, with directions for mixing and administering them. This case provides a close look into the barriers to entry for new drug commercialization for an individual or small business. Innovations in healthcare delivery, medical technology, and even new drug development or new uses for existing drugs are often generated by those closest to patient care-nurses, doctors, and other medical personnel. But without significant resources, even the most ingenious new ideas require entrepreneurial thinking to bring them to market. Students have the opportunity to build a decision tree and explore the qualitative and quantitative data presented to justify all three options. Which should Worthington and Ballard choose?
Francesco Cavarero, chief information officer of Miroglio Fashion, Italy's third-largest retailer of women's apparel, was trying to bring analytical rigor to the company's forecasting and inventory management decisions. But fashion is inherently hard to predict. Can artificial intelligence and machine learning replace human intuition in this industry?
Mitch Lowe, the CEO of MoviePass, was having trouble convincing people of the viability of the company's business model. The company was building a multi-sided platform, and was planning to extract value from increasing traffic to movie theaters through a number of mechanisms. It also appeared to making assumptions around its flat-rate pricing model. By making some assumptions, this case affords an opportunity for students to practice with discovery-driven planning.
Vertu Corporation Limited (Vertu), a manufacturer and retailer of luxury mobile phones, was founded as a subsidiary of Nokia in 2000. It was later acquired by a Swedish private equity firm in 2012, and then sold to Godin Holdings in 2015. Despite these multiple corporate ownership transitions, Vertu had remained uniquely positioned, differentiated by its phones' bejewelled embellishments and a worldwide concierge service available at the touch of a button. The luxury phones were sought after by ultra-high net worth individuals as instantly recognizable status symbols akin to luxury watches. However, in the early 2000s, the introduction of luxury-priced, full-featured iPhones; the decline of conspicuous consumption among ultra-high net worth individuals after the financial crisis; and the anticorruption movement in Asia rendered Vertu's business model unsustainable. Or was it? In July 2017, Vertu's new owner faced a critical decision upon the liquidation of Vertu. Should he sell or license the remaining brand assets to a luxury brand owner or retrench in China to focus on existing customers without taking into consideration the ethical and reputational implications to the brand in the rest of the world?
In April 2017, BMW AG (BMW) faced a big decision regarding which plant should receive the mandate to produce the first electric version of BMW's iconic Mini car. The leadership team of BMW's UK operations was determined to keep the Mini at its historical home base in the United Kingdom. However, given the uncertainty arising from the United Kingdom's decision to leave the European Union-a move commonly known as "Brexit" -how would the team be able to convince corporate headquarters?
In early January 2018, a leading non-governmental organization in the Indian state of Rajasthan was considering an alliance with Airtel Payments Bank Limited (Airtel Payments), the first "payments bank" in India. Although India showed economic growth in key areas, financially inclusive growth was poor. Airtel Payments and its competitors were expected to strengthen financial inclusion with technological expertise, wide distribution networks, and substantial revenue to sustain losses during initial start-up phases of the payments banking Industry in India. Airtel Payments paid a 7.25 per cent interest rate for customer deposits, the highest among the payments banks. However, the non-governmental organization needed to address several questions before initiating an alliance with Airtel Payments for financial inclusion: Could Airtel Payments play a significant role in financial inclusion and help solve India's persistent age-old issue of last-mile connectivity? Was it viable to offer higher interest rates than competitors? Did the environmental factors favour Airtel Payments? Was the payments bank industry competitive? What would be the impact of Airtel Payments's previous unethical practice of opening bank accounts without informed consent?
In early January 2018, a leading non-governmental organization in the Indian state of Rajasthan was considering an alliance with Airtel Payments Bank Limited (Airtel Payments), the first “payments bank” in India. Although India showed economic growth in key areas, financially inclusive growth was poor. Airtel Payments and its competitors were expected to strengthen financial inclusion with technological expertise, wide distribution networks, and substantial revenue to sustain losses during initial start-up phases of the payments banking Industry in India. Airtel Payments paid a 7.25 per cent interest rate for customer deposits, the highest among the payments banks. However, the non-governmental organization needed to address several questions before initiating an alliance with Airtel Payments for financial inclusion: Could Airtel Payments play a significant role in financial inclusion and help solve India’s persistent age-old issue of last-mile connectivity? Was it viable to offer higher interest rates than competitors? Did the environmental factors favour Airtel Payments? Was the payments bank industry competitive? What would be the impact of Airtel Payments's previous unethical practice of opening bank accounts without informed consent?
In April 2017, BMW AG (BMW) faced a big decision regarding which plant should receive the mandate to produce the first electric version of BMW’s iconic Mini car. The leadership team of BMW’s UK operations was determined to keep the Mini at its historical home base in the United Kingdom. However, given the uncertainty arising from the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union—a move commonly known as “Brexit” —how would the team be able to convince corporate headquarters?
Vertu Corporation Limited (Vertu), a manufacturer and retailer of luxury mobile phones, was founded as a subsidiary of Nokia in 2000. It was later acquired by a Swedish private equity firm in 2012, and then sold to Godin Holdings in 2015. Despite these multiple corporate ownership transitions, Vertu had remained uniquely positioned, differentiated by its phones’ bejewelled embellishments and a worldwide concierge service available at the touch of a button. The luxury phones were sought after by ultra-high net worth individuals as instantly recognizable status symbols akin to luxury watches. However, in the early 2000s, the introduction of luxury-priced, full-featured iPhones; the decline of conspicuous consumption among ultra-high net worth individuals after the financial crisis; and the anticorruption movement in Asia rendered Vertu’s business model unsustainable. Or was it? In July 2017, Vertu’s new owner faced a critical decision upon the liquidation of Vertu. Should he sell or license the remaining brand assets to a luxury brand owner or retrench in China to focus on existing customers without taking into consideration the ethical and reputational implications to the brand in the rest of the world?
Outfit7 is a digital entertainment firm that develops and publishes animated video games for mobile phones, tablets and desktops. It's flagship product is a series of mobile apps called "Talking Tom and Friends", with close to 10 billion downloads globally. Outfit7 is one of only 46 European unicorns, i.e., privately held companies valued above $1 billion, topping the global ranks of most downloaded mobile games. In 2017, according to App Annie, a leading app-ranking platform, Outfit7 was the sixth most downloaded mobile publisher, and My Talking Tom was the second most downloaded mobile game globally, putting it in the company of tech giants like Facebook, Google, Tencent and Alibaba. Part A describes the growth stage from 2009 to 2014, along with the story of founders Samo and Iza Login. The focus is on setting up the startup and developing a unique organizational culture, leaving the hiring decision (fit or misfit) to students. In Part B, from 2014 to 2017, the start-up moves into scale-up phase after the founders' exit/appointment of a new management team, the focus is on entrepreneurial leadership. In Part C, as tensions emerge from scaling up a unicorn, students must decide what to keep and what to change (how to balance continuity and renewal) as expectations for growth soar.