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As part of the privatization in Eastern Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Dow Chemical made a major investment in the Halle-Leipzig region, one of the largest chemical industry sites in Europe. The executive in charge of Dow's operations in the region, Bart Groot, increasingly felt that the long-term success of Dow's investment depended on a more dynamic development of the entire regional economy. On his own initiative, in 1997, Groot launched a private sector-driven effort to enhance the economic development in central Germany, the region located around Halle-Leipzig. Bundling together 50 other firms and four cities, he founded a regional marketing effort to brand or market the area, but then shifted focus to building clusters. Examines the motivations of companies and company executives to get involved in regional competitiveness efforts and provides a platform to discuss the factors that drive the success of cluster-building efforts through cooperation across firms in a disadvantaged area.

Eat2Eat.com was an Internet-based restaurant reservation service covering a dozen cities in the Asia Pacific region. The principal business of Singapore-based Eat2Eat Pte Ltd., it was launched in 2000 by an entrepreneur and former investment banker with US$1 million of his own capital. He quickly established the capabilities and business model, but after five years the registered user base remained relatively small at about 12,000. He thought the next step for the company was to expand that user base and hoped that the company could change the way people made plans to eat out. Resources--specifically, time and money--were limited, so any promotional efforts would have to be innovative and efficient. Focuses on entrepreneurial marketing with sub-themes of financing and small enterprise management as it tells the story of an entrepreneur who had an idea and enough money to launch it, but then struggled to achieve adequate scale.

The September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States precipitated US military actions in Afghanistan and Iraq, increasing demand for certain military assets. Domestically, the attacks crippled an already struggling airline industry, hurting domestic aircraft orders at Boeing Company, the only US producer of large-frame commercial aircraft. Boeing's supporters on Capitol Hill proposed procuring converted Boeing 767 airframes to replace the Air Force's aging fleet of aerial refueling tanker aircraft. Yet, the Air Force could not fit a purchase of the tanker aircraft into its budget without sacrificing other key programs. Leasing the aircraft through a special purpose entity was suggested as a solution. Critics questioned the cost, need, and structure of the tanker deal and pushed Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to reject the agreement. HKS Case Number 1845.0

In May 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld approved an agreement allowing the Air Force to lease 100 converted Boeing 767 aircraft as aerial refueling tankers. The deal's critics, most prominently Senator John McCain, argued that no the aircraft were not needed, that the lease was a thinly disguised purchase designed to circumvent the budget process, and that the agreement was a government handout to the Boeing Company. As the deal neared Congressional approval, evidence surfaced of illegal conduct involving an Air Force acquisition executive and Boeing, casting uncertainty over the agreement's prospects. This case discusses the financial and accounting issues of leasing rather than purchasing the aircraft, the translation of commercial business practices to government, and the process and purpose of government budgeting. This case is best used in concert with "The Boeing Tanker Lease Deal (A)." HKS Case Number 1846.0

This case looks at the adoption by the city of Coventry, UK, of a 1998 law meant to enhance collaboration among public agencies to reduce crime rates. Coventry created a Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnership and hired staff to coordinate activities among the police, local government, public housing, nonprofits, and the business community (plus later, fire and the national health service). The law gave communities little guidance on what anti-crime activities to pursue, or how to coordinate them, yet it proposed to hold partnerships responsible for crime rates. This case traces Coventry's efforts to find mechanisms for implementation, as well as the spillover effects of the law onto other areas of potential cooperation among government bodies. Students will gain an understanding of the challenges at the local level of implementing well-intentioned, but poorly specified, national legal mandates. They will see how an individual leader can make a difference in setting common goals and holding agencies accountability. They will also learn about some innovative collaborative approaches to crime prevention. This case can be used in courses about public management, about leadership, or about policing. HKS Case Number 1831.0

Mark Jacoby, VP of the Americas sales organization at Clearion, a fictional software firm, has missed his quota for the first time in his career at the company. He needs to reevaluate his strategies for setting quotas, allocating headcount, and assigning territories. Describes the changes he makes and asks students to consider making improvements on them.

Discusses the reasons and uses of triangular or three-party mergers to complete a business acquisition or tax-free corporate reorganization.

In April 2006, SAP AG CEO Henning Kagermann faces several critical decisions. Over the past two years, Kagermann has put in place a bold growth strategy for the company--one that aims to transform the business software applications giant into a pioneer in the emerging Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) technology field, a leader in the small- to mid-size enterprise market segment, and a relevant solution provider for a broader population of business software users. Concurrent with the formulation of this strategy, Kagermann has instituted many internal changes and initiatives designed to make SAP into a more agile, efficient, and globally aligned organization. In several cases, these changes to organizational design, leadership, management processes, culture, and values directly challenge what many consider to be the foundational principles of this highly traditional, 30+year-old German company. Kagermann's plan and changes are not met with universal enthusiasm by employees or customers. Approximately one year after his public announcement of SAP's new growth strategy, Kagermann must now assess the situation and decide how to proceed. He has made repeated statements to the market that by 2010 SAP would be a company transformed, and even publicized specific quantitative goals that would substantiate such a transformation. However, in the meantime, a new development has occurred. Resurgent demand for SAP's legacy software applications is driving record revenues and profits and pushing SAP's stock price to new heights. As a result, Kagermann must answer several key questions. How can he determine whether the current pace of execution regarding the new growth strategy is right? How should he sequence the rollout of internal changes still required to support the corporate transformation? And given the industry environment and the resurgent growth of SAP's legacy business, how should he balance resource allocation between short- and long-term opportunities?

After nearly 100 years as a mid-size regional law firm, Duane Morris entered a period of spectacular growth led by CEO Sheldon Bonovitz. Originally founded by Quakers, the firm had a distinct organizational culture featuring a number of unique or unusual business practices: a transparent and flexible compensation system, practice-group integration across multiple offices, ancillary businesses, early adoption of financial reporting software, and consensus-based decision making. The firm was proud of its corporate culture and sought to maintain it as it grew, bringing in only people who would fit the culture, in small groups. In 2005, the firm completed its first merger, taking over a 64-person San Francisco firm. Growth was necessary to remain competitive, but could Duane Morris maintain its unique culture while bringing on large numbers of new attorneys?

After over four centuries in business, the Beretta family's gun making enterprise stands at an important threshold. The family and its hometown have provided the cultural and philosophical underpinnings that have seen the company through good times and bad. Now, the firm must address a more insidious challenge. How to continue to grow and adapt to new market and competitive situations while retaining the core that brought the company to where it is today. The role of corporate culture is juxtaposed with stability in the face of change, dedication to craftsmanship and the latest technology, close-knit family bonds and an ardor for individualism. The exercise of seemingly contradictory business concepts and approaches is examined.

Shareholders of Unocal, a mid-sized American oil and gas firm, had watched the value of their stock rise ever since rumors of a takeover surfaced early in 2005. Trading in the low US$40s at the beginning of the year, competing firms outbid each other, taking Unocal's per share price above US$60 by mid-summer. International oil companies, flush with cash due to high oil prices and facing low reserve replacement rates, increasingly sought to acquire strategic assets. Unocal's significant natural gas reserves in Asia, combined with its expertise in deep water drilling, made it a particularly attractive target for CNOOC, China's state-controlled offshore oil company. Though CNOOC trumped earlier offers with a US$67 per share, all-cash deal, valued at US$18.5 billion, the firm encountered stiff opposition from Washington and Wall Street.

Su Yee Goh, a director in a Singapore office, considers a proposal by a pregnant female executive for an alternative work arrangement so that she could both continue to work and spend more time with her family. Goh wants to keep the executive at Shapiro Global, but is afraid an alternative role would be disruptive to the marketing team and could create dissension among the other employees.

Reviews the purposes and ingredients in the governance (or steering) of a family business system. Explores at a high level the governance of the family business, its owners, and the family. Focuses on how these governance structures, processes, plans, and agreements interact.

Explains the purposes, processes, standards, plans, and agreements that together help to govern (or steer) a family that owns a family business.

This technical note discusses the practice of angel investing, particularly its meaning and suitability to emerging markets. Adapted from a chapter in An Executive Briefing on Angel Investing in Latin America (Batten Institute), this note focuses on business in Latin America, but the discussion and the relationships discussed are relevant and perfectly suitable to discussions of early-stage finance and entrepreneurship in all emerging economies. Additionally, the note explores the role of angel investors and venture capitalists on entrepreneurial activity and economic development.

In 2006, a nascent market for music-enabled mobile phones was emerging to challenge Apple Computer's dominant position in the digital music industry. Through its iPod line of portable digital music devices and its iTunes Music Store, Apple controlled more than half of the market for both music player hardware and online music sales. But the evolving ability to merge those devices with mobile phones, and to deliver music to mobile handsets (via streaming, side-loading content from a PC or downloading it wirelessly over the air), created a potentially market-changing opportunity for players in several industries. Examines the key players, including Apple; the major wireless service carriers, such as Cingular, Sprint-Nextel, and Verizon Wireless; technology and service vendors, such as RealNetworks and Microsoft; and mobile virtual network operators, such as Virgin Mobile. Covers the origins of the mobile music business, projections on its potential size, its technological building blocks (such as file formats, digital rights management systems, wireless network infrastructure, and handset capacity), and the key dynamics--music delivery method, pricing, mobile-PC integration--that characterize mobile music business models.

Toyota is one the most successful car companies in the world. The company set the ambitious growth goal of a 15% share of the global markets by 2010 (up from 11% in 2005). For this, the European market is becoming of strategic importance. The case outlines Toyota's global strategy before focusing on the European market in particular. Sales in Europe increased by over 50% between 2000 and 2005. In the process, Toyota's European manufacturing capacities more than tripled to over 600,000 units over the same period. Although Toyota was on the growth path, the launch of the Aygo posed many challenges. The segment was very price-sensitive and production cost had to be tightly controlled. Toyota decided to enter a joint venture with PSA, the maker of Peugeot/ Citroën. The case shows how cost reduction was the overriding principle and explains how both companies worked together. But selling a car with 93% parts commonality also posed many challenges on the marketing side: Toyota wanted to target younger customers in order to lower the average age of customers. Toyota had no experience in this segment and hence had to go new ways. The case takes readers through the various steps Toyota took in order to promote the Aygo. Learning objectives: Toyota is a latecomer to the European minicar segment. The case analyzes how Toyota changed the business system in order to deal with the various intricacies of this segment. On the manufacturing side, Toyota entered a joint venture with Peugeot/Citroën and built a new plant in the Czech Republic. The cars rolling off this assembly line had a parts commonality of 93%. But the innovations did not stop at the factory gate. Toyota invested in a massive Internet presence, meeting potential customers at locations of their preference and sponsorship of concerts etc. The case is a good platform for discussing Toyota's changes to the existing business system, both upstream and downstream.

The management of McDonald's Argentina faces a communications crisis: A controversial TV program urges consumers to stop visiting McDonald's stores and refrain from eating McPollo (McChicken) burgers following an official announcement that potentially harmful bacteria had been found in these chicken products. Although the McDonald's management believes that the information is probably unfounded, it is 100% committed to doing the right thing. This case looks at how companies may find themselves victims of unexpected events. In the name of a political cause or for "convenient personal" reasons, smart but unscrupulous customers may challenge leading corporations and the trust that other consumers had put in their hands. Corporate damage can be significant. Consequently, communicating effectively in times of crisis is absolutely key. The objective is to learn best practices for crisis management, how companies can prepare themselves to limit the potential damage, how to act and react and what are the "dos and don'ts" when facing this kind of situation.

Greater job mobility among engineers and scientists has caused the extended social networks of inventors to become increasingly connected. As a result, invention increasingly occurs within small worlds (or social networks) that straddle firm boundaries. Small worlds provide both strategic opportunity and potential threat; while they can increase creativity within a firm, they also aid in the diffusion of creative knowledge to other firms through personnel and knowledge transfer. Firms that operate within small worlds, such as Silicon Valley, long ago learned to manage invention in an environment of rampant knowledge spillovers across firm boundaries. Now, however, all firms need to learn how to manage innovation in a small world environment. offers advice about how to do so.

Explores the challenge of merging brands successfully following corporate mergers. It develops a framework for corporate and product branding strategies, as well as for creating the appropriate brand identity among the merged firm's target consumers. A critical key to successful brand mergers is to align the architecture of the merged brand portfolio to brand strategy and identity.