個案總覽

Student spreadsheet supplement to case W20664

By the end of 2019, Trōv, Inc. (Trōv) had ceased to sell its flagship direct-to-consumer single-item coverage insurance product. Going forward, Trōv would no longer compete as an insurance company, but would instead focus on expanding its technology in order to equip established insurance companies, financial institutions, and technology companies with the modern, all-digital insurance apps required to remain competitive and/or gain market share. In doing so, Trōv offloaded the enormous financial burden associated with customer acquisition. Heading into 2020, Trōv's business was divided into two main units-Trōv Enterprise and Trōv Mobility. As a result of this strategic shift from a business-to-consumer (B2C) strategy to a business-to-business (B2B) strategy, Trōv's leaders were faced with a new set of questions. Should they implement a fee structure that would allow Trōv to achieve profitability as a B2B technology provider? Were Trōv's new products designed to respond to its clients' desired customer segmentation? How should Trōv allocate resources between its Enterprise and Mobility businesses?

An effective and highly motivated executive at 3DP Incorporated, a company that specialized in manufacturing objects with three-dimensional printing, often told his friends that he thought he could be the next Steve Jobs. He wanted to take advantage of the "next great opportunity" to change the world by producing and marketing his own creations. However, his inability to deal effectively with his subordinates, peers, and superiors, as shown by instances of abrasive behaviour throughout the cases, contributed to his eventual downfall.

Just Arrived is an online platform that matches newly-arrived immigrants in Sweden with employment opportunities. As one of several for-profit and non-profit start-ups in Europe that is looking to address the refugee crisis, the case enables a comparative analysis of a few of the core choices that a social enterprise has to make when developing a solution to a problem of this scale and scope. Used as an introductory case for a course on social enterprise and systems change, it touches on the background and experience of the founders, and their product development process. It shifts to explore which business model (for-profit or non-profit) and organizational structure might be most effective in addressing the problem, and how to evaluate the effectiveness of their efforts. And finally, it looks at how these organizations are working to change the system in the long-term, with a combination of direct service to refugees and employers, as well as the indirect influence of the media and through national or European policy changes.

This case describes the career of Eiichi Shibusawa (1840-1931), a serial entrepreneur who is widely known as the "father of Japanese capitalism" and as a pioneer of socially responsible investment. Born in feudal Edo Japan, following the Meiji Restoration in 1868 Shibusawa transitioned to working for the government in the new Ministry of Finance. He played a central role in the creation of Dai'Ichi Bank, a national bank and Japan's first joint stock company, in 1873. He subsequently became a prolific venture capitalist, being involved in founding nearly 500 companies and 600 public organizations over the course of his lifetime. The companies he founded, such as Oji Paper, Tokio Marine Insurance Company, and the Osaka Spinning Company were central to the modernization of the Japanese economy. He was also active in forming business associations, including the Tokyo Bankers Association, and supported many social enterprises in education. In 1901 he was associated with the founding of the Japanese Women's University, the first private university for women. Shibusawa was a student of Confucianism and developed the concept of gappon shugi, which has been variously translated as ethical or stakeholder capitalism. While traditional Confucianism in Japan had regarded commerce as lacking virtue, Shibusawa argued that creating wealth was a virtuous activity. He believed that ethical principles had to be central to the pursuit of wealth, and that business must serve all stakeholders, so that the country as a whole could flourish.

David Beisel, Rob Go, and Lee Hower are non-partners at different-and-established venture capital (VC) firms. They decide to leave their positions to start a new seed-stage VC firm. The case covers the genesis of the firm, the formulation of its strategy and operations, and the founders' fundraising efforts. A key decision the case protagonists must make is whether to partner with two very successful entrepreneurs, who propose a merger with NextView. The two entrepreneurs are willing to invest up to $100 million personally and put NextView in business, but the expectation is that the firm will no longer be independent. NextView's fundraising process has taken much longer than expected, and so, the NextView team considers a critical decision: merge and lose control or stay independent and risk failure.

In late 2017, Satrix, one of the largest passive asset management firms in South Africa and a pioneer in the industry since 2000, had to decide its strategy going forward in a market where passive asset management had become increasingly commoditized and competitive. Over the previous three years, as a result of increased competition and changing investor expectations, Satrix had faced increased pressure to reduce its management fees. The total expense ratio (TER) of the Satrix 40, Satrix's flagship ETF, was 38 basis points (bps), more than double that of many of its new competitors. To maintain the company's position in the industry, Satrix's leadership was considering cutting the TER on its flagship ETF by almost 75% from 38 bps to 10 bps. The fee change would dramatically lower Satrix's margins, but the company's leadership was concerned that Satrix couldn't afford to not make the change; nearly 10% of assets the company managed came from the Satrix 40. What should they do?

Can a social purpose and stakeholder capitalism confer a powerful competitive advantage in the age of COVID-19? For PayPal, the answer is yes. After spinning off from eBay in a 2015 IPO, the company declared its purpose as "democratizing financial services" by ensuring that low-income consumers and small businesses can efficiently and inexpensively manage their money. The company fully lives into this purpose, sending employees out into communities to experience firsthand the indignities and high fees imposed on the unbanked, dramatically lowering the cost of international remittances, enabling small businesses to access working capital without credit checks, and facilitating cross-border purchases for small merchants. The company takes the welfare of each stakeholder group seriously: achieving racial and gender pay equity, raising hourly worker pay and benefits to ensure a living wage, and building a diverse and inclusive culture; working closely with regulators and law enforcement to unearth signs of sex trafficking and terrorism; aggressively removing hate-group transactions; providing $4 billion in credit to hundreds of thousands of small businesses that would never have qualified for bank loans, especially those owned by women and people of color. Together these actions have built a high degree of trust that creates a competitive moat in the otherwise commodity business of online payments. During the pandemic, the company was able to get stimulus funds to individuals and small businesses far faster and less expensively than banks or the SBA, and committed $500 million to investments in black-owned businesses. In the 5 years since its IPO, despite intense competition from major banks and credit card companies, Google, Apple, and countless VC-backed fintech players, the company has more than doubled its users, increased profits and boosted the stock price 500%.

Companies are concerned about finding new sources of revenue and cutting costs to stay afloat during the COVID-19 crisis. But those aren't the only risks they need to manage. They must also consider the impact of their activities on their myriad stakeholders. Those that don't pay attention to corporate social responsibility may end up hurting their performance, their reputation, or both.

The founder of Gogoro had always wanted to revolutionize the energy market from day one since he started the electric scooter business that featured an innovative battery swapping technology. Over the course of five years, he had developed a premium line of electric scooters, gained market share to about 90 percent, and turned his startup into a "unicorn" with a valuation reaching $1 billion. With its battery swapping infrastructure built out across the island of Taiwan, Gogoro sensed the opportunity to become something bigger - most probably a smart energy platform that could complement the main grid. But as a sudden change in government subsidies and the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic took a toll on the scooter sales, how should Gogoro position itself going forward?

In July 2020, the management team of Harvard Business School Online (HBS Online) had to decide how to allocate its marketing budget for fiscal year 2021 between various digital channels and its portfolio of courses. Since its launch in 2014, HBS Online had grown to almost $60 million in revenue and there were concerns about its potential overlap with other HBS programs such as executive education and Harvard Business Publishing. Growth of HBS Online also raised questions about potential brand dilution of HBS.

Technology doping accusations were made when several athletes wearing Nike, Inc.'s (Nike's) ZoomX Vaporfly 4% Flyknit running shoes won sporting events in 2018 and 2019. In December 2019, the International Association of Athletics Federations was investigating the issue and was considering banning Vaporfly shoes from the Olympics and other sporting competitions. Soon, Nike's competitors, including Adidas AG, Reebok International, and Saucony, counteracted with their own versions of an innovative midsole component. With technological advancements taking place in several spheres of sports shoes, experts demanded that boundaries be drawn in terms of both innovation and the high price of athletic shoes such as the Vaporfly, whose ban could have financial implications for Nike. Could Nike leverage innovation to fight a competitive battle? How could it promote the use of the Vaporfly shoe, given the controversy surrounding the technology? What streams of innovation should Nike pursue for its growth?

In February 2020, the executive vice-president of Manufacturing and Supply Chain at CoolIT Systems (CoolIT), met with the company's chief executive officer (CEO) in their Calgary office. The company had recently developed a new range of products that provided liquid cooling solutions to large-scale data centre installations for high-performance computing. In addition to expanding capacity to meet demand, the CEO was also concerned about the requirements and expectations of the company's new customers and the implications for its operations and supply chain. He asked the executive vice-president to prepare recommendations for CoolIT's operations and supply chain strategy for its line of products for the data centre market. What would the relationship with a contract manufacturer entail, and what key capabilities did CoolIT need to look for in a potential supplier?

To drive growth in digital ecosystems, companies need to develop two partnering capabilities: digital readiness and curation. Digital readiness requires that ecosystem value is distinctive and that partners are digitally organized and connected via technology such as APIs. Curation requires that ecosystem partners share joint goals, benefits, and information. Both capabilities are positively correlated with higher ecosystem market share and higher revenues.

The case "Pricing during a Pandemic" looks at food pricing during a natural disaster, in this instance a pandemic, which caused widespread disruptions in supply chains. Using data from India, a country whose food supply chains are particularly vulnerable to food supply disruptions due to limited warehousing facilities, the case examines the evolution of vegetable prices before and after the COVID-19-induced economic lockdown in India. It evaluates the price movement across three platforms: wholesale, offline retail and online retail. The data shows a sharp spike in food prices post-lockdown, raising concerns about price gouging by retailers. The case allows one to discuss what constitutes sufficient evidence of price gouging and the role of public policy in identifying such behavior. It also showcases the pricing strategies of various market players and can be used to discuss business ethics.

Spreadsheet supplement for case ISB208.

We crafted the case study "Software Acquisition for Employee Engagement at Pilot Mountain Research " for use in Business Marketing, Buyer Behavior, or Operations Management courses in undergraduate, MBA, or Executive Education programs. The Pilot Mountain Market Research (PMMR) case study provides students with the opportunity to examine how buying decisions can be made utilizing online digital tools that are increasingly available to business-to-business (B2B) purchasing managers. To do so, we created fictitious research studies and data to realistically portray the kinds of information that are publicly available to B2B purchasing managers on the Internet today. In this case study, we introduce students to fit analysis, coding quality technical assessment, sentiment analysis, and ratings & reviews analyses. Students are challenged to integrate findings from these diverse analytical tools, combining both qualitative and quantitative data into concrete employee engagement software (EES) purchasing recommendations.

The Bomi Mexico case recounts the difficulties faced by Mario Sicilia, a recent CEO of Bomi Mexico, shortly after his acquisition of the company through a search fund. The case specifically highlights a situation where two key employees raise concerns about the COO.

Spreadsheet supplement for case 521027.