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Supplement for product 9B21C020.

Supplement for product 9B21C020.

In February 2020, Pan-China Consulting Services Co. Ltd. (Pan-China) was entering its third decade in operation. Pan-China’s founder was reviewing the firm’s evolution and discussing several key opportunities with his team. Over the previous two decades, the company had shown solid performance in providing financial and capital markets advice to over 200 companies. It had generated strong returns for its key investors, who ensured that every deal was financially secured by the company’s auditing, financial, and consulting expertise. However, the founder and his two senior advisers had to make some decisions. Should Pan-China participate in a new round of private placement investment? Should it consider investing in a second opportunity? Which fund issuance would be the best fit for Pan-China? Was its consulting and investment business model sustainable?

In January 2020, Kombi Sports Inc. was at a strategic crossroads in a changing industry. The Montreal-based firm had evolved from a niche provider of alpine performance gloves to a premium Canadian winter apparel brand. Its success could be attributed, at least in part, to its strong collaborative stance and interesting partnerships. However, increasing competition in the industry, particularly among brick-and-mortar retailers, raised questions for Kombi about how and where it should focus its efforts for future growth.

Based in Bengaluru, India, Invento Robotics (Invento) was a start-up that manufactured humanoid robots. In October 2017, Invento received a mandate to develop a humanoid robot to welcome India’s prime minister and the US president’s senior adviser at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit that year in Hyderabad. It was a high-stakes event for Invento; a positive reception to the robots would mean many leads for the company, while a negative response could mar Invento’s reputation. While Invento’s time had hitherto been spent on research and development, there was pressure for it to now determine an overall marketing strategy. It was imperative that Invento quickly crystallize ideas about its customers, product positioning, branding, pricing, distribution channels, and promotions.

In late 2020, Wendy’s was an iconic North American fast-food chain with a history of innovation. The corporation’s inventive approach to its promotions was particularly apparent in its use of social media, even more so in its unique management of the company’s Twitter account. In addition to using Twitter to provide customer support and advertise its products in an online setting – two traditional activities conducted by many a business on Twitter – Wendy’s had used the platform to regularly make fun of users and competitors, as well as respond to teasing and other playful challenges issued by Twitter users. Evaluating the company’s Twitter strategy proved difficult, however. How could Wendy’s chief executive officer determine whether the company’s approach on Twitter positively affected sales? How could he improve the company’s future social media strategy?

At the November 2019 Open Day conference, the vice-president of JD.com shared his understanding of the role that supplier collaboration played in an uncertain environment. Through 15 years of fast growth, JD.com had become the largest business-to-consumer platform in China with more than 30,000 suppliers. Using a boundless retail strategy, JD.com had to build a seamless channel from supplier to customer, which required a close look at how to collaborate with the suppliers through digital technology. However, working with people from different companies raised many challenges. Without a proper solution, the effectiveness of the supplier collaboration would suffer.

As a leading short-video social and livestreaming app in China, Kuaishou Technology’s Kuaishou application (app) was facing various challenges, including fierce competition from ByteDance Ltd.’s Douyin. In June 2018, to sustain its long-term growth, Kuaishou needed to evaluate the possibility of entering the livestreaming e-commerce market, as livestreaming was becoming one of the hottest ways to sell to Chinese consumers. The co-founder and chief executive officer of Kuaishou Technology needed to decide whether Kuaishou should launch a livestreaming e-commerce business. If so, should Kuaishou cooperate with an existing e-commerce platform or build its own e-commerce ecosystem? What potential challenges might Kuaishou face in its livestreaming e-commerce business expansion?

Jay Bharat Spices Pvt. Ltd., a company located in Cuttack, India, was involved in the manufacturing and distribution of spices across India under the brand name Bharat Masala. The company specialized in producing basic spices such as turmeric powder, cumin powder, and chili powder. The senior management team had recently noticed a rise in demand for the spice garam masala in the East India market and asked the company’s vice-president of East India operations to oversee the launch of this new product over the next six months. The vice-president was now struggling with multiple constraints related to the launch, including storage capacity in the warehouse and various financial constraints that were forcing him to look for a more economical and efficient solution.

Student Spreadsheet to accompany product W25298.

Instructor Spreadsheet to accompany product W25299.

Following its official launch on April 6, 2020, Quibi, a mobile-only short-form video streaming platform that had raised over $1.7 billion had failed to gain the traction it was expecting and fell well short of its first-year growth projections. The company ultimately announced that it was shutting down after just six months in October 2020. Exactly where had Quibi gone wrong, and what lessons could investors learn from their failed investment in the company?

Following the 2008 China milk scandal, Chinese infant milk formula products were regarded as unsafe, and Chinese consumers were preferring to pay high prices for the products of foreign brands. As one of the few companies not involved in the milk scandal, China Feihe Limited (Feihe) was able to maintain steady growth in product sales in the medium- and low-end market, but it did not have a differentiation advantage over foreign brands; therefore, its sales results in the high-end market were poor. In 2015, Feihe carried out a strategic transformation and repositioned its brand proposition, which led to increased customer value. The company also launched a new product series, which allowed it to create a competitive advantage. In 2019, Feihe was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. However, other brands started to imitate Feihe in developing products that were suitable for Chinese babies, which made investors doubt whether or not Feihe could maintain its competitive advantage. What action should Feihe take to maintain its competitive advantage and its position in the market?

In 2017, the chief executive officer (CEO) and chief financial officer (CFO) of Swiss-based BauZentral, a privately owned family business, faced a restructuring challenge. BauZentral produced and sold electrical systems, plumbing systems, and smart security and energy solutions. In 2014, when the current CEO took over from his father, the company needed to address the growth associated with its successful international acquisition strategy. However, the firm’s historical structure maintained tight family control, which needed to change to address the realities of the international expansion. The CEO and CFO recognized that the firm had too many different regions with different market conditions, products, and competitive environments to be effectively run from the head office. The CEO and CFO planned to use the family constitution and the firm’s financial targets as criteria to devise a governance system to align the interests of management with the interests of the family owners. Their aim was to restructure the organization to achieve the firm’s goal of becoming a global supplier while also respecting the family’s values. What type of new governance and compensation structure should they design for the firm?

The Sunshine Foundation of Canada (Sunshine) was a national, Canadian-focused, self-funded charity established in 1987 and headquartered in London, Ontario. In the second half of 2020, the chief executive officer (CEO) and president was deciding how to create an effective email template that would serve the larger organization as the first point of contact for potential donors. Sunshine’s relationships and donor pipeline were the organization’s lifeline, and with strong competition in the non-profit milieu, the CEO knew securing funds in the individual-giving category would be difficult. How could she outline Sunshine’s differences and highlight why the prospective client would be interested in becoming a donor? How could she convert these prospects into new Sunshine donors?

As 2019 ended, the founder and chief executive officer of Nudestix Inc. (Nudestix) had overseen phenomenal growth during the firm’s five years of operation. However, the company was about to encounter a series of issues as a result of the global COVID-19 pandemic that resulted in lockdowns, stay-at-home orders, and closures of non-essential businesses around the world. Nudestix, like many companies, suffered a severe decline in revenue. How could the company respond to this crisis in a way that would minimize its losses?

Presentation to accompany product 8B21M026.

On July 29, 2020, Jeff Bezos, the founder and chief executive officer of Amazon.com Inc. (Amazon), testified before a United States House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law that was investigating the company for engaging in anti-competitive practices. Although the company offered low prices and did not distort consumer welfare principles despite its large market size, the Committee questioned whether it had exploited its sellers on both Amazon Marketplace and the Amazon Web Services Marketplace. The company was accused of not only exploiting sellers but also using their sales data for developing its private-label brands. As committee members were looking to redefine monopolistic practices, it was also recommended that Amazon should be split to avoid anti-competitive practices. Was it time for Bezos to proactively split Amazon and avoid antitrust actions against his company owing to its market dominance? What could he do to manage antitrust issues against his company?

In 2020, the head of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) Academy, faced some tough decisions surrounding co-creation initiatives. The UEFA Academy was founded in early 2019 to address the learning needs of the football world with the aim of advancing the game. Since its inception, the UEFA Academy had been enthusiastically received by the sporting world. However, in pursuit of constant improvement, the head of the UEFA Academy wondered whether the use of co-creation could bring innovation and excellence to the UEFA Academy’s programs. Which key stakeholders should the UEFA Academy involve in this initiative? What factors should be considered when formulating the UEFA Academy's value co-creation strategy? And what co-creating activities should the co-creation initiative focus on?

In May 2020, Chinese state-owned Shandong Gold Group was attempting to acquire the Canadian gold mining company TMAC Resources, whose gold mines were located in the High Arctic. If this acquisition took place, it would be the first time Shandong Gold Group would operate a gold mine outside of China. However, it would be a challenge for Shandong Gold Group to operate a mine in such a hard-to-navigate polar environment. As well, there were other lingering questions: How would the company handle the relationships with the indigenous Inuit people during the development stage of the project? Would Shandong Gold Group’s potential acquisition of TMAC Resources be successful, considering the Canadian government’s recent strengthening of its reviews of foreign acquisitions of Canadian companies? Would Shandong Gold Group’s state-owned identity increase the uncertainty of this potential transaction?