In early 2017, after launching its successful "Greenhouse-in-a-Box" pilot project in India with fifteen smallholder farmers, Kheyti, a non-profit agricultural technology (AgTech) social enterprise, was struggling with several decisions in developing and growing its business. Kheyti was launched in 2015 to help smallholder farmers battle poverty and income variability by providing affordable technologies bundled with services. Over eighteen months, the team had developed a low-cost and modular greenhouse product to which it added financing, inputs, training, and market linkages to create a comprehensive "full-stack" solution for small farmers. The pilot project was a success in many ways, but Saumya, Kheyti's co-founder and head of product, was concerned that it revealed shortcomings that could severely affect the viability and scalability of Kheyti's solution. Saumya had some important decisions to make. Should Kheyti redesign the product from scratch, or find other ways to reduce the cost for early adopters? Should it rely on upfront revenues from sales of the greenhouse, or consider developing an innovative financing or contract farming model? Kheyti's dwindling cash reserves meant that these decisions were urgent and critical. The path chosen now would determine whether the startup would move beyond the pilot stage and achieve its vision of serving 1 million farmers by 2025.

In October 2015, two senior California officials: Marybel Batjer, Secretary for Government Operations, and Michael Wilkening, Undersecretary for the Health and Human Services Agency seized on an idea that had the potential to turn the state's long dysfunctional technology procurement process on its head. After years of planning, California was about to request bids for a new child welfare management system to replace a twenty-year-old technology that, as part of the country's largest child welfare program, was accessed by approximately 25,000 state and county employees, to serve millions of California's children. The request for bids called for a "waterfall" approach to software development, where all aspects of the project would follow a pre-ordained sequence and likely cost the state nearly half a billion dollars. Just weeks before the request was to be released Batjer and Wilkening met with former U.S. Chief Technology Officer Todd Park and members of a tech nonprofit, Code for America, who warned that both the waterfall approach and the large size of the project posed significant risks. First, they proposed an alternative "architecture" that would break up the "monolith" proposal into its component parts. Rather than build and replace one giant system with another, why not replace the system in parts-or in modules? Second, for each of these modules, teams of programmers and social workers could work together to build a prototype and iterate till the final product satisfied the needs of the state-in a process known as "agile" development. But could California's bureaucracy, with its stringent procurement rules pivot to a modular approach? And could Batjer and Wilkening convince state staff and county partners to experiment with agile development, a methodology never attempted in California government before? Case number 2101.0

Supplement to case KS1235. In October 2015, two senior California officials: Marybel Batjer, Secretary for Government Operations, and Michael Wilkening, Undersecretary for the Health and Human Services Agency seized on an idea that had the potential to turn the state's long dysfunctional technology procurement process on its head. After years of planning, California was about to request bids for a new child welfare management system to replace a twenty-year-old technology that, as part of the country's largest child welfare program, was accessed by approximately 25,000 state and county employees, to serve millions of California's children. The request for bids called for a "waterfall" approach to software development, where all aspects of the project would follow a pre-ordained sequence and likely cost the state nearly half a billion dollars. Just weeks before the request was to be released Batjer and Wilkening met with former U.S. Chief Technology Officer Todd Park and members of a tech nonprofit, Code for America, who warned that both the waterfall approach and the large size of the project posed significant risks. First, they proposed an alternative "architecture" that would break up the "monolith" proposal into its component parts. Rather than build and replace one giant system with another, why not replace the system in parts-or in modules? Second, for each of these modules, teams of programmers and social workers could work together to build a prototype and iterate till the final product satisfied the needs of the state-in a process known as "agile" development. But could California's bureaucracy, with its stringent procurement rules pivot to a modular approach? And could Batjer and Wilkening convince state staff and county partners to experiment with agile development, a methodology never attempted in California government before?

This case chronicles Go-Jek's journey as Indonesia's first unicorn tech startup, which has been named by Fortune Magazine as one of the top 50 companies that "change the world". It highlights how Go-Jek leveraged on its on-demand mobile platform - arguably, the most complete ecosystem in South East Asia to create significant social and economic value for Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country. It also reveals how Go-Jek capitalized on its local business understanding and data analytics to outmanoeuvre bigger competitors such Uber and Grab in Indonesia. Go-Jek has a saying: money can't buy time, but Go-Jek can buy you time. In particular, Go-Jek's motorbike delivery and ride-sharing app has enabled businesses and individuals to circumvent Jakarta's gridlock and achieve desired outcomes of increased sales and higher productivity. This has led to the positive effect of spurring the growth of Jakarta's informal economy.

In late 2016, the executive director of Free Geek Toronto faced a challenge. Free Geek Toronto was a social enterprise based in Toronto, Ontario. It focused on recycling electronics waste and aimed to use its business profits to expand its scope of operations and deliver on its social mission of both reducing electronics waste going to landfill and employing at-risk and marginalized individuals. As a result, the executive director purposely hired individuals who had severe physical or mental disabilities, or both, and who had recently received, or were currently receiving, disability benefits, had poor health, or experienced general struggles with regular employment. The executive director’s challenges included juggling the financial and social goals of running a work integration social enterprise. In view of the constraints he faced, the executive director began considering whether to call on the assistance of volunteers—people who, despite their well-meaning intentions, might unwittingly disrupt the operation of the enterprise. Should he move forward with recruiting volunteers? If so, how could he ensure that doing so would not adversely affect the organization’s current culture or demoralize the current employees?

BY-HEALTH Co., Ltd. (BY-HEALTH), a Chinese dietary supplement company founded in 1995, had a first-mover advantage as a contemporary health supplement provider in Mainland China. It had successfully utilized this advantage to conquer a significant portion of the market. However, by early 2017, maintaining this leadership position in the market had become increasingly difficult, largely due to deteriorating public perception of consumables originating in China. BY-HEALTH had sought to differentiate itself by actively making its sourcing and production processes fully transparent to stakeholders, most notably by opening a transparent factory in Guangdong Province.<br><br>While BY-HEALTH’s transparent factory and corporate social responsibility activities developed consumer trust and positively contributed to the environment within which the company operated, they were also prohibitively expensive to maintain. It was also difficult to determine how they affected the company’s bottom line. As he prepared for a company shareholders’ meeting in January 2017, the company’s chief operating officer was faced with difficult questions. What programs should the company continue to invest in for the future? Should some of these initiatives have an end date? If they were ended, what effect would this have on the community? How could he communicate the value of the transparent factory to consumers and shareholders?

In late 2014, Dropbox, the San Francisco-based pioneering cloud-based file storage service, was at an important stage of its growth. Its user base had expanded into hundreds of millions of users globally, and the company was expanding its service offerings to organizations. At the heart of this expansion was the ever-increasing acquisition of customers in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model. As Dropbox targeted larger customers, it needed to carefully allocate its limited resources and continually evaluate the appropriate sales approach because of the highly competitive nature of the cloud storage market. The head of the Strategic Finance team needed to recommend how Dropbox could most effectively invest its limited resources. Should it invest in the self-serve, inbound approach, or opt for the more proactive and costlier outbound approach?

Excel spreadsheet for instructors.

Supplement to case PEL076.

In late 2014, Dropbox, the San Francisco-based pioneering cloud-based file storage service, was at an important stage of its growth. Its user base had expanded into hundreds of millions of users globally, and the company was expanding its service offerings to organizations. At the heart of this expansion was the ever-increasing acquisition of customers in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model. As Dropbox targeted larger customers, it needed to carefully allocate its limited resources and continually evaluate the appropriate sales approach because of the highly competitive nature of the cloud storage market. The head of the Strategic Finance team needed to recommend how Dropbox could most effectively invest its limited resources. Should it invest in the self-serve, inbound approach, or opt for the more proactive and costlier outbound approach?

Supplement to case W17424. It was 2017 and the KITKAT brand in Japan was at a critical juncture. The KITKAT marketing leaders sat down for a special meeting to review how Nestlé Japan had been able to create meaning and value for their brand. However, as they began to discuss their options for future growth, they faced difficult decisions: Should they look to export the flavor variations that had become such big hits in Japan to overseas markets such as China, the European Union, or the United States? Travelers from these countries regularly bought a wide range of KITKAT flavor varieties during their trips to Japan to bring home. Or should they focus on expanding the e-commerce sales of premium KITKAT flavors?

The case describes how Quantopian, a Python-based trading-algorithm development and backtesting platform, leverages its community of quantitative traders ("quants") to develop a novel crowdsourced hedge-fund model. The case provides an overview of the existing hedge-fund industry and illustrates a few potential issues to be addressed by startups. The case also introduces crowdsourcing as a novel business model and its applications in the emerging financial-technology ("Fintech") field. The instructor can connect the case to the fundamental design of organizations based on contractual arrangements and how exactly a crowdsourcing model challenges conventional wisdom about organizing business activities. The instructor can also stimulate a discussion on alternative growth models or strategies for Fintech startups, such as Quantopian, and practical solutions to challenges.

The case describes the service system design of Transmilenio, Bogotá's award-winning mass transit system, in the context of violent riots that erupted on March 9, 2012. From the inception of operations in December 2000, Transmilenio, designed as a bus rapid transit system (BRT), was perceived as a success story. While initially complementing the traditional multi-actor bus system on a few routes, Transmilenio is expected to become Bogotá's dominant mass transportation system in the future. Despite a successful record, on March 9, 2012, a fierce protest against the Transmilenio system shocked the city of Bogotá. This protest turned into violent actions of unprecedented magnitude in several parts of the city, causing approximately US$500,000 in damages, 11 injured and dozens arrested. In the afternoon of March 9, 2012, Mateo Rodríguez, a Transmilenio's member of the board of director, was cited to an extraordinary board meeting in the next morning. It would have the main objectives of analyzing the recent events and making the decisions that Transmilenio was demanding at that moment, to face the riots. Preparing the meeting and set a position imply for Mr. Rodriguez an in-depth analysis of Transmilenio system, Transmilenio SA, and also understand the nature of BRT systems and their expected paths to create value in a context such as Colombia. Whatever Mr. Rodríguez decides, his recommendations can affect not only the continuity of operations in the coming days but also the design of this award-winning service system.

This case uses Pacari, a medium-sized Ecuadorian company whose chocolate bars have won multiple international quality awards, to illustrate the global value chain of the chocolate industry, as well as to compare business models pursued in Ecuador in order to determine which ones create more economic, social and environmental well-being in an emerging country. It starts by describing its founders' concern about Pacari's contribution to changing Ecuador's cacao industry landscape, helping farmers escape poverty and overcoming the traditional hurdles that hindered exports of value-added products in a country largely reliant on commodity exports. Pacari principals wonder if it is convenient for the company to change its business model to have a stronger impact on its sector. The case begins with a dilemma regarding retail management: should Pacari open wholly-owned stores? A significant industry player has made this choice and seems to be reaping fruitful results. Pacari's maturity apparently justifies such a move, which might potentially help it to expand the market and rake in more resources to continue supporting farmers' development. However, this option might also endanger the company's financial health, forcing it to incur high fixed costs. This decision cannot be made without a thorough understanding of the global chocolate industry and the business models coexisting in Ecuador. The key goal of this case is to lead class participants to think about the purpose of private companies in today's society. In a world growingly aware of the need for environmental care and fair global value chains, business leaders must balance economic, environmental, and social demands. Pacari provides an example of a business approach that does not prioritize short-term financial results, focusing instead on improving the conditions of value chain players in Ecuador and the country's positioning as a world leader in the premium dark chocolate segment.

In 2016, Pepperfry.com (Pepperfry) was India’s leading online retailer of furniture and home products. As a pioneer in the online furniture and furnishings space, Pepperfry had a first-mover advantage that led to the achievement of significant milestones within a short period. Online marketing, however, involved distinct challenges compared with traditional marketing practices. Improving customer experience at the different stages of a consumer’s purchase could be the foundational strategy to resolve these challenges. How could Pepperfry’s service design further enhance the customer experience and achieve a competitive advantage?

In early 2017, the directors at Protospace, a makerspace in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, faced some challenges. The nine-year-old member-run organization operated as a “do-ocracy,” with a minimum of official oversight. However, the directors and some of the membership wondered whether Protospace could and should scale its growth by recruiting and accepting new members. Would a larger membership help or hinder the membership-driven makerspace? Should the organization hire a staff member so that members would have more time to work on their projects? What would be the implications of a having larger membership and a paid staff member?

Founders Vineet and Anupama Nayar had rapidly scaled their foundation to reach 3 million primary school children (grades 1 to 3) in two states with Math and English programs. Their goal was to reach 10 million children by 2025 and completely spend down the $100 million foundation corpus. A new opportunity presented itself in a third state with a potential to add another 4 million children. In grappling with this new opportunity they had to make certain strategic decisions on whether to go deeper (expand to grades 4 and 5) or go broader to more grade 1 to 3 children. They were wrestling with the question of which option would lead to more impact and leave their social innovation in a sustainable position after their exit.

MaryAnne Gilmartin, President and CEO of Forest City Ratner ("Forest City") was planning for yet another protracted discussion over the merits of a green roof for part of her $5 billion dollar new development in Brooklyn. While the low seven-figure cost overrun was to be "value-engineered" and in the scheme of things, this budgeted item was not going to impact the financial success of the project, it had become a heated source of contention. Was the debate symptomatic of something deeper that was amiss in the relationship?

Entrepreneurship for All (EforAll) is a Lowell, Massachusetts-based nonprofit that hosts business accelerators for entrepreneurs in underserved communities. By mid-2017, EforAll has five office locations in Massachusetts, and its leadership and the Board of Directors must decide whether EforAll is ready to open its first out-of-state office. Students are asked to consider a variety of factors - including funding, hiring, population demographics, and distance from Massachusetts - to determine whether EforAll has the capacity to expand, and if so, which new city it should expand to first.

In 2012, eHealth Centers (eHCs) digitally delivered affordable medical care and diagnostic support for patients in villages and remote areas of India where none was otherwise available. The solution was initially conceived and developed as a mandate from Hewlett Packard India's corporate social responsibility team under the leadership of the chief technology officer. The eHCs design incorporated a self-contained diagnostic centre in a container, operated by a staff of paramedics. Doctors located in urban health hubs provided consulting care through video conferencing, and patients could experience the feeling of being in a doctor's office in real-time. These eHCs slowly turned out to be a business opportunity for Hewlett Packard India. By early 2016, there were 55 centres in operation. The challenge before the company was to scale up exponentially.