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Sets the stage for analyzing the strategy of labor organizer Ray Rogers in bringing J.P. Stevens to the bargaining table when conventional union tactics failed. Though set in the specific context of labor-management relations, it illustrates much more fundamental aspects of negotiation analysis, strategy, and tactics. A rewritten version of an earlier case.

Supplements the (A) case. A rewritten version of an earlier case.

Follows Jeff Hawkins, Donna Dubinsky, and, later, Ed Colligan from the founding of Palm, Inc., through the founding of Handspring, to the point that Handspring and Palm began considering a merger. Examines the conditions that drove the two rival companies toward a merger. In a relatively stagnant market for personal technology, Handspring lacked the financial resources to launch its next-generation product, the Treo 600; meanwhile, Palm's market position was threatened by a lack of breakthrough product innovation and viable growth plans. From the date of its founding, Handspring nurtured a rivalry with its chief competitor, Palm, Inc. By early 2003, Palm, Inc. had stabilized its business, while Handspring found itself in a dire financial situation. Handspring pursued two financing alternatives: a PIPE and a merger with Palm--engendering two different operating states for the company. The board of directors and management team were fairly evenly split between the two deals, each of which involved uncertainty.

By the mid-1980s, it was clear that not all transplant centers in the growing organ transplantation market were able to achieve and sustain the same levels of quality and high rates of transplant procedure success. Similarly, significant variation had emerged in the cost of these complex and expensive procedures. Within this dynamic environment, United Resource Networks (URN) was founded in 1989. The express purpose of this new organization was to manage variation in the transplantation process to enable the delivery of higher quality, lower cost, more predictable results to patients, employers, and health insurers. The company would accomplish this by establishing a virtual network of transplant centers that were made available to its customers through preferred contracting arrangements. By 2004, URN had built the largest transplantation network in the United States, growing at an average annual rate of 40% over the last 10 years. With 4,000 customers and 44,000,000 covered lives, the network managed approximately 10% of the nation's organ transplants each year. Explores the URN business model as an example of the innovative strategies being used by health plans to carefully manage complex medical conditions and control the risks associated with expensive procedures, such as organ transplants.

At the dawn of the 20th anniversary of its involvement in China's passenger car industry, Shanghai Volkswagen (SVW) found itself caught in changed external and internal environments, with factors critical to its past success gone or quickly diminishing. Although taking first-mover risks has rewarded Volkswagen with a dominant market position and high profitability, such dominance and profitability might not be sustained in the long run as the competitive landscape transforms. The test is whether SVW can quickly adapt to the new environment and establish a new set of competitive advantages that positions it favorably against its rivals.

Many decry the preponderance of merger failures and conclude that mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are failed strategies. However, analysis of the causes of failure is often shallow and the measures of success weak. Focuses on what makes a merger successful and the appropriate manner of evaluating merger success. Extensive field research of the merger of J.P. Morgan and Chase Manhattan Bank in 2000 illustrates the drivers of merger success and how to improve and value the contributions of mergers.

A study involving over 200 senior managers demonstrates that overall firm performance is strongly influenced by how well a firm's business strategy is matched to its organizational structure and the behavioral norms of its employees. Identifies a taxonomy comprised of four different combinations of structure/behavior types: Management Dominant, Customer-Centric Innovators, Customer-Centric Cost Controllers, and Middle Ground. These alternative structure/behavior types are then matched with specific business strategies (i.e., Prospectors, Analyzers, Low-Cost Defenders, Differentiated Defenders) to identify which combination(s) of structures and behaviors best serve to facilitate the process of implementing a specific strategy.

Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, was named by Fortune as the "most admired company in America" for the years 2003 and 2004. However, these and other accolades have not quieted a chorus of critics, including organized labor, feminists, human rights activists, environmentalists, local businesses, and antisprawl activists, all of whom revile the retail giant for its business practices, resulting in a growing negative consumer perception of Wal-Mart's corporate citizenship. Wal-Mart has instituted a comprehensive nonmarket strategy to counter this criticism, employing a proactive combination of social, political, and legal strategies to manage a contentious environment that could threaten its future growth and financial success.

Should you set up your own sales force or should you outsource it? The standard analysis is cost based and assumes that the direct sales force is a fixed cost and that the outsourced sales force's cost varies with sales. The standard analysis then calculates the sales volume at which the direct sales force's costs equal the outsourced sales force's costs and suggests that for sales volume above that quantity, firms should use a direct sales force. This analysis has two problems. First, several other cost factors are not considered in the standard analysis. Second, the standard analysis considers only cost, ignoring coverage efficiency and selling effectiveness differences between the two sales forces. Details and develops both problems.

Grupo Garantia was a spectacularly successful conglomerate group in Brazil. Observers commonly called its founder The Midas King - all he touched seemingly turned to gold. The group encompasses four main businesses: Brazil's biggest investment bank; one of Brazil's largest retail chains; one of the world's largest breweries; and an equity investment company. The collection of six cases (including an appendix on Brazil's socio-politics) examines the fortunes of each of the businesses and of the corporation during the period of Brazil's globalization. Students must decide how to shape the future of the group's businesses, which global competition has variously boosted or ravaged. The Grupo's fate is also in question given the stabilization of Brazil's economy and the need to structure corporations according to the new circumstances faced by an economy more integrated into the world economy.

Supplements the (A) case.

Supplements the (A) case.

Supplements the (A) case.

Supplements the (A) case.

Provides a detailed process to revitalize a mature company whose growth is abating. Includes a disciplined, analytical approach as well as helpful advice on the human and organizational aspects of the revitalization process.

Supplements the (A) case.

Covers the management control process.

Describes Standard & Poor's sovereign credit ratings business. Provides background on the history of credit ratings agencies, the meaning of credit ratings, the expansion of the sovereign ratings business over recent decades, and the market for credit ratings. Also, discusses current debates in the United States and elsewhere relating to the use of credit ratings in financial and prudential regulation.

Describes Standard & Poor's sovereign credit ratings scales and the credit rating process. In particular, describes the role and function of the rating committee and the analytical categories considered in arriving at a final sovereign credit rating.