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Greg Simpson was the chief executive officer of Simpson Seeds Inc. (SSI). He and his two brothers, second-generation owners of a family farm, had started the seed company. From humble beginnings in Moose Jaw, SSI had grown to be the largest privately owned lentil exporter and seed retailer in Saskatchewan, Canada, distributing pulses to nearly 80 countries worldwide. Simpson and his brothers had recently added a new red lentil–splitting plant to the family business; however, the new plant required leadership. The brothers were also considering how to continue the family legacy. Transitioning management and leadership of SSI would not be easy. Five of nine cousins from the third generation worked at SSI. Would the new plant be the ideal launching pad for the third generation, allowing them to learn how to lead and manage a segment of the family business? Simpson and his brothers were scheduled to meet on Monday, when Simpson was to deliver a proposal for succession planning.

BYD Company Limited (BYD) manufactured rechargeable batteries, mobile phone components, and automobiles. In 2008, the company caught the attention of Warren Buffet’s investment group, and their investment in BYD caused BYD’s share price to increase 917.86 per cent over just a year, setting Chinese investors’ expectations high for BYD’s release of A-shares, planned for June 2011. <br><br>BYD’s 2010 annual report showed that the company’s performance had already taken a dip, but its prospectus was optimistic about the market prospects. The first quarter report for 2011, issued the day before the A-shares were to be released, was not as optimistic. BYD’s A-shares fared well on the first day of release, but the company’s net profits declined remarkably, and reports forecasted further decline. However, the company’s 2011 annual report showed a drop in operating profits of just 49.04 per cent year over year—just slightly less than the 50 per cent decline that would have triggered intervention by the securities regulators. <br><br>Was the company making a remarkable recovery? Were BYD’s A-shares still a sound investment, or had the company “managed” its financial statements to protect itself and its securities underwriters?

Environmental & Best Safety (EBS) China was the subsidiary of an American mid-sized firm in the safety products and services industry. Between 2000 and 2015, it had employed at different points a variety of strategic approaches to the Chinese market, including local market exploration and learning, autonomous local research and development (R&D), the transfer of local knowledge to centralized R&D, and the return of localization. The global business of EBS had experienced a continuous downturn over the last five quarters. The situation in China was even worse, with sales significantly under the initial target for the Chinese market, which had been the fastest-growing market for EBS over the last 10 years. In 2015, the global EBS president and the head of EBS China needed to make a decision about the next stage in the business strategy of EBS China. The meeting would be critical for EBS China to re-position itself within EBS worldwide.

In 2010, two entrepreneurs launched Joyful Frog Digital Incubator (JFDI), Southeast Asia’s first start-up accelerator in Singapore. They aimed to help develop Singapore’s start-up environment through a structured program that provided access to early stage funding and mentorship. More than 70 start-ups had graduated from the program, and more than half had raised substantial funding. However, five years later, in 2015, JFDI faced challenges as a result of Singapore’s small market size, the more than 20 accelerators that had entered the market, and an uncertain macroeconomic climate. The founders wondered whether JFDI should open up new revenue streams by diversifying into advisory and consultancy services, such as in-house accelerator programs in established corporations. Alternatively, should the company expand geographically to broaden its access to capital, talent, and new markets? Or were there still other options that the founders should pursue?

In January of 2016, Singapore International Airlines Group (SIA) announced that it had secured more than 90 per cent stake in Tiger Airways Holdings Limited (Tigerair), and would take Tigerair private. Once the buyout offer closed on February 19, trading in Tigerair’s shares would be suspended because the free float had fallen below the minimum 10 per cent threshold. Tigerair had been suffering losses amounting to more than SG$600 million from 2012 to 2015. When SIA initiated the buyout offer, Tigerair’s shareholders wanted to use the discounted cash flow model, the discounted dividend model, and relative valuation to determine whether the buyout was a fair deal.

In 2013, the chief business officer at the Bombay Stock Exchange needed to prepare a recommendation on whether to pursue liquidity enhancement schemes in the equity cash market. The Bombay Stock Exchange, the oldest stock exchange in Asia, had held a monopoly in India until 1994, when the National Stock Exchange was launched. When derivatives were introduced to the Indian stock exchanges in 2000, the Bombay Stock Exchange had been unprepared, and the National Stock Exchange soon captured the entire derivatives market. In 2011, the Securities and Exchange Board of India approved the introduction of the Liquidity Enhancement Incentive Programmes on illiquid securities in the derivatives segment. The Bombay Stock Exchange then introduced the incentives for various illiquid products in the derivatives segment, but lost profit as a result of the incentives it paid out. Had the Liquidity Enhancement Incentive Programmes improved liquidity in the derivatives segment? Was it worth sacrificing profit to gain liquidity and market share? The chief business officer needed to address the long-term benefits of liquidity enhancement schemes and the merits of introducing such schemes to the Bombay Stock Exchange’s equity cash market.

In March 2016, India-based information technology start-up MD Solutions was facing a human resources challenge. Since 2012, the company had offered a three-day-a-month flexible work arrangement to its employees. Because of a family emergency a star performer, and the key person on a high-value project, needed to be relocated to his hometown, which was over 1,000 miles away. The company faced several challenges: how could it devise a new flexible work arrangement policy for retaining the star performer without hurting the cost structure and team morale; deal with virtual complexities; and develop a sustainable human resources framework that would benefit the company in the long-run in terms of performance excellence and talent retention.

Spreadsheet for product 8B16N071.

In 2011, a health care director at London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) asked one of her managers to review two candidates for promotion to a front-line coordinator position. The manager was tasked with the job of choosing between two promising candidates who were quite different from each other. He had to carefully review the qualifications of the two candidates and determine which one would be better suited to the role. Use with supplement 9B16C050.

Supplement for 9B16C049.

The founder of a digital media firm had to decide whether to list or to sell his company, PacificLink iMedia (PacificLink) in 2015. The founder had fielded more than 20 offers from various companies to acquire PacificLink since 2007–2008. He rejected all these past offers, because he was working to position the company to list on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. However, in 2015, the founder received an offer from Accenture that appealed to him because PacificLink was finally in a position to satisfy all listing requirements for the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. He knew that he must consider many criteria in making his critical decision to sell or list PacificLink. See also the first and second cases in the three-part series, 9B00M024 and 9B09M023.

In April 2016, the owner of Kreative Works, a small-scale furniture manufacturer in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India, decided to expand his company’s product line in response to increased market competition and a shift in consumers’ buying patterns and preferences. The intent was to extend the company’s market reach from its traditional target of educational institutes and offices to a consumer market by marketing a premium lounge chair and a family of dining chairs. The owner also wanted to expand the market geographically. Kreative Works did not have the capacity to open multiple retail outlets. Given these circumstances, should the company market its new product line in a single retail outlet or through an exclusive dealer or distributor (a centralized channel structure), or by distributing its products through multiple distributors or retailers (a decentralized channel structure)?

CircusTrix Trampoline Parks (CircusTrix) was started in San Francisco, California, in 2011 after the founder first experienced an indoor trampoline park. Less than five years later, the business had grown to more than 28 facilities worldwide, grossing US$24.5 million in 2014 alone. The company had originally expanded internationally to maintain its first-mover status in the emerging extreme recreation industry, but was now facing a problem that could derail the company’s international growth for years to come. A customer in the brand new CircusTrix park in Edinburgh, Scotland, had injured himself and blamed CircusTrix. As a result, city officials had shut down the facility, with another park scheduled to open in just over two weeks in Glasgow. The public relations issue was threatening to cost the founder not only his brand new operations in the United Kingdom, but likely also the additional upcoming locations in Germany, France, and Holland.

In 2012, a former crown attorney for Canada’s Department of Justice started Timeless Herbal Care, a company that was intended to capitalize on Jamaica’s deregulation of marijuana for medical purposes. The entrepreneur and his family relied on their ties to Jamaica and his legal expertise to create a legislative framework for Jamaica’s medical marijuana industry to meet international standards. Concurrently, Canada was readying legislation to allow qualified individuals to purchase and use medical marijuana. As one of about a dozen Health Canada-authorized licensed producers of the product, the new venture was entering uncharted space where legal and business issues would likely emerge within the next few years. The entrepreneur needed a strategy to combat the misconceptions about the use of marijuana for medical purposes and concerns regarding the importation of Jamaican marijuana product into Canada.

In 2016, a soccer fan closely followed the scores, standings, and transfers of players in the European soccer leagues. Having witnessed countless exchanges of players from one team to another, she wondered about the factors that team managers considered when determining the players’ market values. She gathered data on 77 notable soccer players in an effort to better understand the essential factors that made the players valuable. Could she use the variables she had collected to also build a functioning model that would predict a player’s market value?

Instructor spreadsheet to accompany product 8B16E030.

Student spreadsheet to accompany product 9B16E030.

The Canadian brand manager of Zelboraf had to decide how to introduce and price Zelboraf in the Canadian market. Zelboraf was a breakthrough discovery in treatment for melanoma cancer patients. Hoffmann-La Roche (Roche) began developing Zelboraf in 2005. During the clinical trials, the drug yielded such positive results in targeting late-stage (metastatic) melanoma cancer that Roche ended clinical trials early in order to expedite FDA approval and market launch. A competitor was developing a drug—Dabrafenib—that targeted the same segment of patients with B-RAF genes. It was unclear if this specific market segment could support two similar products. It was also unclear whether Dabrafenib’s Canadian market launch would affect the likelihood that Zelboraf got on the approved drug list to secure government reimbursement. The brand manager and her team also needed to determine the right price point for Zelboraf. Roche had to set a price that ensured profitability, but did not compromise Zelboraf’s competitive position.

Instructor spreadsheet for product 8B15N002.

Excel spreadsheet for students.