Husband-and-wife co-founders Patrick and Alexandria Gentry had built Sprout Solutions to be one of the biggest Software-as-a-Service human resources management platforms in the Philippines, guided by the mission to "impact the life of every Filipino by improving business in the Philippines." In 2019, they closed a $6 million Series A round of funding; in 2022, they were projecting what a Series B funding round might look like. Crucially, they were pondering two different growth trajectories: to stay in their home market of the Philippines and move towards creating an entire HR ecosystem including fintech offerings; or branch out into neighboring markets, a path which may attract more global investors.

This case examines the challenges and opportunities of doing business in Seoul, South Korea. It highlights South Korea's economic development in the decades leading up to 2023 in the context of its history, culture, and politics.

Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool (SMART), a set of software and analytical tools designed for the purpose of wildlife conservation, had demonstrated significant improvements in patrol coverage, with some observed reductions in poaching and contributing to wildlife population growth. Jonathan Palmer, Executive Director of Conservation Technology for the Wildlife Conservation Society, wondered how far to promote the integration of a new predictive analytic tool being developed at Harvard University, called the Protection Assistant for Wildlife Security (PAWS), and whether the data that PAWS gathered from the parks and wildlife reserves would be reliable enough for artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to work effectively.

Based in Shanghai, China, Huazhu Group, the world's third-largest hotel operator, was known for its standardized IT system. It helped the company boost efficiency during the COVID-19 pandemic. Chief Digital Officer Xinxin Liu also faced some longer-term challenges: What resources and digital strategy would the company need as it tapped into the higher-end hotel market to become a multi-brand hotel giant? How should Huazhu balance the needs between using its IT solutions to scale its own operations on one hand and to empower other hotels on the other?

Based in China, Envision was one of the world's leading Greentech companies. Chief Executive Officer Lei Zhang had set the goal of achieving carbon neutrality across the company's global operations and supply chain by 2022 and 2028 respectively. As part of its longer-term goal of finding ways to match the supply of renewable energy with demand more efficiently, the company was also pursuing a Smart City project in Singapore as well as building the world's first net-zero industrial park in Inner Mongolia. In face of the many opportunities afforded by the fast-changing energy sector, with constraints on its human as well as financial resources, was Envision taking the best actions for the future? And will they be enough to combat the "climate crisis" that humanity is facing?

China's peer-to-peer (P2P) lending industry had over 3,000 platforms at its height in 2015. China Risk Finance (CRF) was one of the country's P2P success stories. With over 1 million borrowers using CRF's platform, it raised $60 million in its 2016 IPO on the New York Stock Exchange. Yet the pace of P2P's rise spooked financial regulators, sparking a crackdown on the industry that would lead to its demise in China. This B case tracks CRF's tumultuous attempts to salvage its business in the face of sudden and sweeping changes to the rules governing its industry as well as the lengths to which the Chinese government went to ensure the stability of its financial system, even at the expense of its development.

The COVID-19 pandemic had forced a production cut in the factory of Sercomm, one of the world's major telecom equipment producers, in China. The case explores and highlights the challenges that Chief Executive Officer James Wang faced: How could Sercomm recover and ramp up production to meet its U.S. clients' immediate demands? In the longer term, how could it manage the increasing shortage of migrant workers in China? As a supplier of hardware components to the U.S., the company was also caught in the cross-fire of U.S.-China trade tensions due to the tariffs imposed on telecom products. Should the company move its production out of China? Could adopting Artificial Intelligence in the production line be an option?

Founded in 2015 by serial entrepreneur, Colin Huang, Pinduoduo Inc. (PDD) had become China's fastest-growing e-commerce platform in history. PDD pioneered a new approach to online shopping that allowed shoppers to share products, invite friends to form shopping teams, and purchase together at discounted prices. The company's rapid development helped it debut on the Nasdaq in July 2018, only three years after its inception. The fast growth was partly boosted by PDD's heavy investment in marketing and branding, such as through coupons and promotions. How should the company make its competitive advantages more sustainable? Could its business model be replicated outside China?