The famous magician--half of the magic act Penn & Teller--talks about how he and his partner develop their ideas, what kind of relationship they have, and the secret to connecting with an audience.
Tela, a Lima-based company that uses local, sustainable materials to make fashionable ponchos, has a formidable competitor--a large U.S. firm with a globally recognized brand that markets its ponchos as "of Peruvian design" (although they are made in Bangladesh). Alejandra Chirinos, Tela's founder, has gathered her team to decide how Tela can best position itself against the U.S. company. She believes in Tela's social mission of employing and teaching weaving skills to underprivileged women, but her competitor has a simpler story to tell: Like TOMS with shoes and Warby Parker with glasses, it has a "buy one, give one" model whereby purchases support donations to people in need. In this context, can Tela successfully market its social mission? Or should it emphasize the authenticity of its products or its lower prices? Mark Rampolla (founder and former CEO of Zico coconut water) and Tomas Pando (cofounder and president of the Argentine footwear company Paez) offer expert commentary on Chirinos's dilemma.
Tela, a Lima-based company that uses local, sustainable materials to make fashionable ponchos, has a formidable competitor--a large U.S. firm with a globally recognized brand that markets its ponchos as "of Peruvian design" (although they are made in Bangladesh). Alejandra Chirinos, Tela's founder, has gathered her team to decide how Tela can best position itself against the U.S. company. She believes in Tela's social mission of employing and teaching weaving skills to underprivileged women, but her competitor has a simpler story to tell: Like TOMS with shoes and Warby Parker with glasses, it has a "buy one, give one" model whereby purchases support donations to people in need. In this context, can Tela successfully market its social mission? Or should it emphasize the authenticity of its products or its lower prices? Mark Rampolla (founder and former CEO of Zico coconut water) and Tomas Pando (cofounder and president of the Argentine footwear company Paez) offer expert commentary on Chirinos's dilemma.
This case presents an instance of the challenges faced by a firm that has adopted a rapidly evolving technology that is novel, yet non-proprietary. The case focuses on a small, pioneering firm (Imaginarium) in a developing country (India) which has evolved using 3D printing technology extensively. The case views Imaginarium in three phases. Imaginarium 1.0, the first phase relates to the period when jewelry prototyping services was the primary offering of the company; Imaginarium 2.0 refers to the current phase of the firm in which the firm has diversified its offerings and clients from jewelry to industrial prototyping and even small-batch manufacturing in various, often unrelated, verticals. In this phase, Imaginarium has also been involved in advising its clients in the design and development of their parts towards adopting 3D printing. Imaginarium 3.0 represents the next phase that needs to be decided. The case takes the perspective of Ankit Mehta, the promoter of Imaginarium. Mehta has various options: (a) sell-off the firm, (b) maintain status quo and grow along some more verticals with the same level of client engagement, and (c) grow more capabilities towards becoming an integrated service bureau. The case dwells on (1) What are the opportunities and benefits that 3D printing technology has brought forward? (2) How do firms that have evolved around 3D printing remain sustainable? (3) How do firms that have probably not adopted 3D printing but are now part of the 3D printing ecosystem, remain sustainable?
Aravind Eye Care Systems (Aravind) had started setting up vision centers (VC) in 2006 and 51 VCs were operational by March 2015. The location for each VC was chosen to ensure easy access for about 50,000 people across 15 to 20 villages within a 5-7 km radial distance. Each VC had a target of reaching at least 10% of the population, that is, around 5,000 patients, which served as a benchmark for penetration. Consultations related to eye care were provided at the VC. They also dispensed medicines and spectacles. The VC would facilitate arrangements for patients requiring surgeries at the base hospital, including their transport, food and any other reimbursement. Each VC had three key personnel - coordinator, ophthalmic technician, and field worker. The VC was equipped with basic ophthalmic equipment and internet connectivity. The presence of a permanent establishment, in the form of a VC, motivated people in rural areas to seek earlier treatment for vision problems. This helped in eliminating vision care problems and enabled them to get back to earning their livelihoods. The permanent setup also positively influenced the healthcare seeking behavior of the people. Most VCs had performed well, however some VCs were not attracting enough patients, thus not enabling Aravind's classic, volume-driven model, to work and support self-sustainable operations. Thulsiraj, Director of Aravind, was analyzing the performance of all VCs. How should he analyze the performance of VCs from a marketing perspective? Should he change the marketing strategies for those VCs which had attracted a very low number of patients and if yes, how will it be be designed, considering the unique market in which VC operates? Were the VCs innovative in their approach to reach out to patients? Were the VCs self-sustainable? What parameters should he use to evaluate the performance of VCs? How should he increase the number of patients at VCs?
This case provides an opportunity to perform value stream mapping for an assembly line and use the same to identify inefficiencies and areas of improvement in the operations processes using VSM. It features a manufacturer of machine tools who has recently doubled the throughput rate one of the assembly lines, through half-day indexing. Amid cut throat competition, the firm needs to reduce costs throughout the plant and therefore the case prods students to come up with further process improvements the firm could implement, before adopting the half-day indexing to other assembly lines in the plant.
MCA Technology Solutions Private Limited was established in 2015 in Bangalore with an objective to integrate analytics and technology with business. MCA Technology Solutions helped its clients in areas such as customer intelligence, forecasting, optimization, risk assessment, web analytics, and text mining and cloud solutions. Risk assessment vertical at MCA technology solutions focused on problems such as fraud detection and credit scoring. Sachin Kumar, Director at MCA Technology Solutions, Bangalore was approached by one his clients, a commercial bank, to assist them in detecting earnings manipulators among the bank's customers. The bank provided business loans to small and medium enterprises and the value of loan ranged from INR 10 million to 500 million. The bank suspected that its customers may be involved in earnings manipulations to increase their chance of securing a loan. Saurabh Rishi, the chief data scientist at MCA Technologies was assigned the task of developing a use case for predicting earnings manipulations. He was aware of models such as Benford's law and Beneish model used for predicting earnings manipulations; however, he was not sure of its performance, especially in the Indian context. Saurabh decided to develop his own model for predicting earnings manipulations using data downloaded from the Prowess database maintained by the Centre of Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). Daniel received information related to earning manipulators from Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) and the Lexis Nexis database. Data on more than 1200 companies was collected to develop the model. MCA Technology believed that machine learning algorithms may give better accuracy compared to other traditional models such as Beneish model used for predicting earnings manipulation.
Set in 2015, the case describes the evolution of the Indian software services industry from being a supplier of software professionals for onsite projects in the 1990s to becoming an innovation partner of enterprises embracing digital transformation in recent years. The $132 billion industry has become the preferred destination for Information Technology and Business Process Management outsourcing needs of global clients as also the largest private sector employer in India. In the mid-2000s, the widely acclaimed Global Delivery Model pioneered by the Indian software services firms not only enabled them to grow exponentially but also forced a change in strategy of global software services firms such as IBM and Accenture. To match the operating costs of Indian software services firms, the global firms were forced to adopt an offshore-centric operating model and set up large centers in India. The period ensuing the global financial crisis in 2008 saw two significant developments: a reordering of industry leadership among firms, and digital technologies gaining traction. This emergence and integration of digital technologies has implications for delivery cycles, pricing models, customer expectations, and the competitive scenario, among others. The case draws attention to a discussion of these issues. The case comprises three broad sections. The first section discusses the industry's evolution after India's economic liberalization in 1991 and the Y2K opportunity that provided a fillip to the industry's growth. The second section describes the global delivery model of Indian software services firms, its impact on global software majors, and evolution of the competitive landscape amid the global financial crisis in 2008. The third section describes the actions of various firms with the advent of digital technologies, and briefly discusses the opportunities and challenges for incumbent firms.
This case sets the context of a fast growing company; it is financing and working capital requirements and important aspects the banker should consider while extending the facilities and how the banker can structure working capital solutions. The case is intended to challenge the students and practising executives to understand the financial statements of a corporate entity from a banker's perspective, working capital loan decision process, and assessment of working capital requirements. It provides a comprehensive understanding about the types of financial products being extended by banks to a large corporate entity, especially in working capital finance. These include a demand loan of working capital, overdraft/cash credit pre- and post-sales finance against exports, and finance against instruments such as bills discounting and extending financial support on the basis of letter of credit (LC) mechanism. Students are expected to assume the position of the banker and raise various questions to the borrowing firm and utilize effectively the credit monitoring tools such as review of current account transactions, funds flow statement, financial statement analysis, and so on. This case helps in understanding the intriguing relationship between accounting profits, cash flows, operating cycle, and working capital of the company. Finally, the case concludes with structuring a working capital finance solution.
In the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008, Fullerton India Credit Company Limited, a non-banking finance company, faced a dismal future. Weak credit issuance standards had exposed the company to significant risk and led its parent Temasek to inject new capital into the company to keep it afloat. The new CEO, Shantanu Mitra, embarked on a major restructuring exercise. First, he initiated a new credit appraisal system that centralized the credit underwriting process and simultaneously implemented significant cost reduction policies. Second, he recognized that the highly competitive nature of the Indian consumer and commercial loan markets compelled Fullerton to identify under-served segments with acceptable risk-return characteristics. He targeted the niche market segment of newly-emerging middle-class consumers who were being neglected by the formal banking system (because they found it difficult to accurately assess their credit risk) and also by microfinance institutions that mainly focused on the poorer sections of society. To achieve his goals, Mitra embraced a risk analytics framework to ensure that the credit underwriting process was not only compliant with Basel regulations but also consistent with the risk appetite articulated by the governing board. The case requires the student to discuss how the risk analytics framework can be used to drive strategic decisions about the composition of the lending portfolio (portfolio shape), the product-mix and the geographical-mix, without compromising on the risk appetite guidelines laid down by the board. Finally, the case also brings into focus issues related to organizational design, incentive mechanisms, and performance measurement.
Service-learning projects typically take place in the community adjacent to a school. However, service projects can also take place in distant communities to create different learning experiences. Creating a service-learning experience in a distant location requires planning to ensure a quality learning experience. The service project should relate to the academic goals of the course connected to the trip, while also leveraging the location's unique opportunities for learning. The logistics of planning and traveling with a group of students can appear daunting; however, administrative support for college trips can be of great help in creating a successful service-learning trip.
This case is based on highly publicized events surrounding lethal medication manufactured and sold by a small pharmaceutical company outside Boston, Massachusetts called New England Compounding Center (NECC). Formed in 1998, NECC was owned and operated by husband and wife Barry Cadden and Lisa Conigliaro Cadden, along with other family members. In conjunction with its sister company, Ameridose, the businesses focused on preparing prefilled syringes and large vats of medication into smaller intravenous bags, ready for individual use. It also compounded medication for individual patients' specific needs. But as the business grew aggressively, taking larger and larger orders, fast production was prioritized over safety and sanitation. A fungal meningitis outbreak in the fall of 2012 was linked to steroids fabricated by NECC. Despite an immediate recall, the allegedly contaminated product had been distributed to more than 14,000 patients in 23 states. In total, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 751 cases of fungal infection that could be linked to tainted steroid injections compounded by NECC. Of these, 64 were fatal. How should the legal system respond?
Despite their popularity, pay-for-performance incentives haven't worked as well as proponents had expected. Research by Alexander Pepper, of the London School of Economics, identifies four reasons why: (1) Executives are more risk-adverse than financial theory suggests, so they don't see the at-risk portion of their pay packages as very valuable. (2) They discount heavily for time, so they don't assign much worth to long-term incentives. (3) They care more about relative pay--creating an arms-race mentality that drives packages higher. (4) Pay packages undervalue intrinsic, nonmonetary motivations to work--and many executives would happily take less pay in exchange for a job that was better in other respects. What should companies do in response to these findings? Pepper suggests, among other steps, eliminating long-term incentive pay, raising salaries, and using annual cash bonuses to encourage desired behaviors. "You can pay executives considerably less in total--but do it in a different way," he says.
Researchers who examined data from a longitudinal study of Americans age 50 and older have found that mortality rates for people who retired at 66 were 11% lower than those of people who retired at 65. Could work be the secret to longevity?
The case study on Rosneft was written to focus on two central themes, (1) the impact of state ownership on the governance and functioning of large corporations in emerging markets, and (2) the growth of State Owned Multinational Corporations (SOMNCs) in the oil and gas industry. The study offers rich insights into the chaotic founding of Rosneft reflecting events that have a lot of parallels in other emerging markets that have been through transformative economic reforms. It chronicles the actions of two powerful leaders who have shaped the destiny of the company from a grab bag of odds and ends to a modern corporation that has become a global powerhouse in the oil and gas industry. In doing so, the case offers several important lessons both in leadership and strategy especially as it applies to mixed ownership companies in settings where the government plays an instrumental role in directing the destiny of corporations.
China's three National Oil Companies (NOCs) collectively represent a potent force in the world of oil and gas. While they have been mostly focused on domestic priorities since their founding, they started a methodical program of globalization at the behest of the Chinese government in the mid 1990's. By 2016, they had completed a string of overseas acquisitions and seemed poised to gain enough strength to become contenders in the competitive battles against the more established International oil Companies (IOCs). The government had announced its intent to reform the NOCs in order to make them more efficient such that they would be able to compete against the best globally. The idea was to create a Chinese ExxonMobil out of the three NOCs. However, the road ahead appeared rocky. There were three main issues that posed formidable obstacles. First, the governance structure and state control had bred a culture that did not seem ready for transformative change. Political interference and lack of a clear strategic direction were just two of the outcomes associated with the resistive culture. These shortcomings manifested themselves in the second major obstacle namely the instinct to protect resources although the NOCs themselves did not seem to have the technology to monetize the reserves. The slow development of shale was a case in point. Despite controlling the world's largest reserves of shale, China had not been able to come anywhere close to replicating the runaway success that the US had demonstrated. The government had not articulated a clear shale development strategy, and had been dragging its feet with respect to trying imported technology and allowing foreign companies to operate leases. Lastly, there were clouds on the horizon with respect to global expansion as well. The decline in energy prices and a slowing down of domestic economic growth in China had stifled the global march of the NOCs.
Ferrari - the prancing horse - had opened at the top end of its target price range - $52 per share in the U.S. - raising nearly $1 billion for Ferrari's owner, Fiat. Like most IPOs, the share price of RACE (the ticker symbol for Ferrari), settled in the weeks following the launch. But now many analysts and mutual fund managers were all asking the same thing: was Ferrari a promising equity or simply another of the equity eye candy IPOs to hit the market in recent years?
CH2M Hill was an employee-owned and controlled professional engineering services firm providing engineering, construction, consulting, design and design-build, procurement, engineering-procurement-construction (EPC), operations and maintenance, program management and technical services to customers all over the world. A large portion of the company's project business was funded by governments. With $5.9 billion in sales in 2015 and 25,000 employees worldwide, the company was a global player. But in 2014 CH2M Hill posted record losses. A multitude of project and contract cost overruns around the world had resulted in losses that threatened the firm's very survival. A private capital equity injection had provided critical refinancing - but at the loss of pure employee ownership and control. Now in 2016, after returning to profitability, many of the firm's core owners, its employees, questioned whether the firm's unique employee ownership structure would survive.