Makoye Safaris, a jungle safari tour company based in Tanzania founded by Vicent Makoye, offered fully guided, safe, and environmentally friendly tours largely to international tourists. The tours were private, custom designed, and flexible and included airport pick-up and drop-off, accommodation, transportation, and three meals daily. Makoye wanted the company to grow and acquire a larger market share. However, in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic spread worldwide, and Tanzania's tourism sector went into a downturn. Although the number of tourists started to increase in 2021, Makoye Safaris needed a good marketing plan to achieve its target of doubling the number of international tourists it served by 2025.
On March 24, 2015, the chief executive officer of SVB Financial Group Inc., the parent company of Silicon Valley Bank, was testifying to a US Senate committee. His goal was to provide evidence in support of raising the threshold of US$50 billion in assets, for Silicon Valley Bank's application for enhanced prudential standards under the Dodd-Frank Act. Silicon Valley Bank was above the threshold of $10 billion for some enhanced prudential standards, and close to the $50 billion cut-off for the full array of enhanced prudential standards. By the end of 2021, Silicon Valley Bank still fell below strict scrutiny from the enhanced prudential standards, despite having experienced rapid growth since the US Senate testimony. With the rapid growth of its deposits, the bank was facing a dilemma. Given the nearly zero rates on short-term bonds as of the end of 2021, should Silicon Valley Bank chase the higher yields provided by longer-term bonds and accept higher interest rate risk? What risk management practices should the bank follow? With its deposit base largely uninsured, would the bank's risk exposure become an issue?
In 2022, Adani Cement was in conflict with transport unions due to a dispute over freight costs. The company had recently acquired two new cement manufacturing plants in the state of Himachal Pradesh, India, but abruptly closed their operations in December 2022 due to rising freight costs. The plant closures, aimed at seeking lower freight charges, surprised and angered thousands of truck drivers. It was imperative to resolve the deadlock between Adani Cement and the transport unions over freight rates.
In 2022, ToyBox Education Project sought to empower families to grow literacy, numeracy, and wellness starting at home. Based in Winnipeg, Canada, ToyBox Education Project provided an opportunity for students at the undergraduate and graduate level to complete several strategic assessments of a social enterprise within a post-secondary institution. The Faculty of Education at the University of Winnipeg had developed a number of tools to assist caregivers of children between ages two and eight to support their academic (i.e., literacy and numeracy) and social (i.e., wellness) development. The faculty received operational and research funding for three years. However, ToyBox Education Project had to find a financial model for long-term sustainability as well as develop its own capabilities to deliver its products and services.
The bindi brand Pearl Eyeflax was marketed by micro organization Payal Novelty Private Limited (PNPL), based in Bhubaneshwar, India. A bindi had rich traditional importance and was historically a critical part of the attire worn by women in India. However, over time the bindi had evolved to become more of a fashion accessory. With the rise of fusion fashion and growing international popularity of the bindi as a fashion accessory, the director of PNPL had to consider how best to showcase the bindi and devise possible branding and segmentation strategies to help the company reach an ambitious sales target of ₹25 million by 2023. What new segments and positioning strategies could PNPL focus on? What kind of branding strategies would spur growth? And should PNPL position the bindi as a cultural product or a fashion accessory?
In the throes of a global pandemic, on May 3, 2021, Exide Industries Limited (EIL) faced a critical juncture. The managing director (MD) and chief executive officer (CEO) convened the executive committee in Kolkata, India, to grapple with the choice between human capital and robotic process automation, specifically in the realm of accounts payable (AP) processes. Balancing tangible benefits and intangible costs, the executives debated the impact on employee morale and company culture. Amidst the complexities, the MD and CEO aimed to chart a course that harmonized innovation with tradition, ensuring automation fortified rather than undermined EIL's core strengths. Focused on the vital AP processes, the senior vice president (SVP) of corporate accounts and the IT team initiated an exploration, recognizing the need to navigate a delicate equilibrium between human insight and technological advancement. The narrative unfolds in a bustling city, against the backdrop of a pandemic-altered economic landscape, as EIL seeks a path forward that preserves its unique human capital while embracing the transformative potential of automation.
This case follows the situation arising from the unprecedented circumstances of COVID-19, which forced the Eastern Mindfulness company to transition the business from physical to virtual interactions. Mr. Alok Taunk had successfully started Eastern Mindfulness, which offered interactive and engaging seminars, online courses, and mobile applications (MindFeed) that addressed holistic wellness, performance, and self-development. However, because of the unprecedented circumstances of COVID-19, Mr. Taunk had to cancel all his bookings and return to the clients any advances.
In 2001, the economies of Brazil, Russia, India, and China (BRICs) were predicted to grow faster than many others; this prediction turned out to be true. In this technical note, the challenge is to identify the new BRICs in 2023. Students will investigate the following questions: What are the economics behind BRICs? How do investors and managers identify the next BRIC countries (i.e., the next high-growth economies)? Could the economic frameworks underlying BRICs analysis provide some clarity after the fog of the COVID-19 pandemic and war in Europe? This note includes a short explanation of the Solow growth model, an exploration of growth factors not considered in that model, and data for emerging-market economies in 2000. Finally, it offers a range of perspectives on growth factors and suggests an updated analysis of growth prospects and possible new BRICs in 2023. At the Darden School of Business, this note is taught in the first-year core GEM course and used in the Global Financial Markets course.
Choosing to deliberately lose a customer might violate prevailing wisdom, but not all customers are good for your business. The authors suggest that business leaders should focus on customer needs, behavior, and value when deciding which customers to cull in order to improve profitability and better serve other customers. They also describe the pros and cons of different approaches to ending customer relationships.
Today’s fad-driven retail environment is volatile, making it challenging for companies to accurately predict product demand. The authors provide a framework that considers both product life cycle and demand volatility that can help organizations fine-tune their product demand forecasting, with human and AI agents working in concert.
DiDi Global Inc. (滴滴出行) (NYSE: DIDIY) was a mobile transportation platform that monopolized the Chinese ride-hailing and taxi-hailing market having a user base of 550 million worldwide. On 16 June 2021, China's State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) launched an investigation of DiDi for unfair competitive practices and controlling pricing. DiDi's prospectus disclosed this but did not fully disclose the warning from the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) to postpone the listing for cybersecurity review and the risk involved from this noncompliance with information security. DiDi was listed on the NYSE on 30 June 2021, raising around USD4.4bn. Within nine days after the listing, CAC had banned all of DiDi's 25 ride-hailing apps from app stores over the mishandling of customer data and to safeguard national security. This led to a significant drop in DiDi's share price. On 16 July 2021, seven Chinese government departments, including those responsible for national security and cybersecurity, visited DiDi's office. Reports suggested that heavy fines, suspension of operations, and even delisting. As the largest shareholder with a 20.1% stake, how would the Chief Investment Officer of SoftBank's Vision Fund recommend to decrease risk exposure of its investment in DiDi?
When the new chief executive officer joined MX Player, the video streaming business in India was undergoing a content boom and witnessing many changes due to shifting media consumption patterns and the penetration and exponential growth of Western video streaming platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. The structure of the Indian video-streaming content and consumer market was changing, with global streaming platforms inadvertently segmenting Indian consumers according to which platforms they could afford. Western streaming platforms had thus led to a category of aspirational consumers who desired distinct content but were not yet willing or able to pay for it. MX Player provided a solution to this audience by offering high-quality compressed video content for free. But could it address the needs of a growing number of digital customers and still be successful amidst the formidable competition in the OTT market?
In 2008, Goldwind bought 70 per cent of Vensys' shares through its German subsidiary to obtain a range of strategic assets, including a professional research and development team and associated design capabilities, intellectual property rights of permanent magnet direct drive (PMDD) technology, and corresponding wind turbine designs. Over the years, the post-merger integration (PMI) process of an emerging market multinational enterprise (EMNE) and a developed country multinational enterprise (DMNE) saw many conflicts. By the end of 2021, the general manager of Goldwind Germany needed to strengthen the integration process between the two companies to facilitate its growth in Europe and elsewhere.
Tony Rao, co-founder and director of Thorne Valley Meats (Thorne Valley), must decide whether to continue working with the family-run butcher shop that has been producing his high-quality grass-fed beef jerky, or to move to a new, but untested, facility. The butcher shop has been working with Thorne Valley for years and has produced jerky that is satisfactory, but recently it has been struggling to manage its own growth, employee turnover, and pandemic restrictions. These outside forces are causing a sharp decline in the quality of Thorne Valley's jerky. The butcher shop has asked Rao if he would be willing to purchase a new piece of equipment on its behalf to help resolve the quality issues. The new processing plant, meanwhile, is located in a long-standing butcher shop recently acquired by entrepreneur Julie Martin. While Martin is passionate and ambitious, it is unclear how successful the new venture will be. She has no entrepreneurial experience and is looking to make significant changes to her product offering.
29Blinco, a Perth, Australia-based marketing consultancy, found early success by specializing in the energy transition sector, supporting resource and engineering companies working toward de-carbonizing industrial practices and enabling a clean energy future. Two years after its inception, annual revenues had grown fast, but 29Blinco had also become a victim of its own success: the business model and principles that differentiated its brand promise seemed to be holding it back from meeting growing demand for its services. The founders and directors at 29Blinco faced critical decisions about whether to compromise on their business model and principles. Could they service more clients and work without undermining what they had built and what they stood for?
In May 2021, a recent MBA graduate and retail investor, read an announcement about Monde Nissin Corporation launching an initial public offering of 3.6 billion shares at ₱13.50 per share. The company expected to raise ₱48.6 billion in the largest common share offering ever in the Philippines, while the country was still in the middle of a COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. However, economic and stock market conditions were expected to improve after the availability of vaccines and anticipated end of the lockdown. The investor planned to run a discounted cash flow valuation and comparable multiples analysis of Monde Nissin Corporation to determine if he should invest in the initial public offering. He also wanted to assess the attractiveness of the food industry and the merits of investing in the company, which was the market leader in all of its product categories.
In 2021, the Irish whiskey segment was the fastest growing whiskey segment in the United States. US-based Brown-Forman Corporation had acquired the Slane brand in 2015 after purchasing all shares in the Slane Castle Irish Whiskey company and agreeing to invest in building a new Irish whiskey distillery and visitor centre on the historic Slane Castle Estate. Slane Distillery filled its first barrel of Irish whiskey in 2018, and the company then quickly began targeting key markets in Europe and North America.<br><br>The challenge now for Brown-Forman in the United States was building the Slane brand from scratch. The company's brand marketing team had to first identify overarching strategies that would accelerate awareness and trial for the Slane Irish Whiskey brand in the United States. Key goals included determining a point of differentiation for the Slane Irish Whiskey brand among the alternatives, and fostering a connection between the Slane Irish Whiskey brand and the North American consumer.
Yasir Qureshi, the proprietor of the Indian cooking gas agency Universal Indane (UI), has asked the company's operations manager, Shruti Bhargava, to review the financial statement for fiscal year 2021-22 and prepare a report on the functioning of the various divisions. Although both the manager of human resources and the marketing manager had presented their reports, Qureshi wanted Bhargava to holistically audit the current inventory system at UI in terms of customer satisfaction levels and cost perspectives. Qureshi wanted Bhargava to prepare a report based on the representative data available from the company's headquarters in Jahangirabad. UI's inventory turnover ratio was reportedly improving, but the increasing inventory costs, year-on-year, seemed to suggest that new standard inventory practices needed to be adopted. The total operational cost for holding the inventory was calculated based on all relevant cost elements, including ordering cost, inventory holding cost, cost of delivery, and material costs. Standard inventory management principles from operations management literature were used for investigating inventory systems in natural business settings.