On November 2, 2021, Enrique Lores, CEO of HP, Inc., ended the first online huddle of the week with his executive leadership team. The day was an historic one for the Palo Alto-based global company: six years earlier, HP Inc. came into being after the split of the iconic hardware company into two: HP, Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. As soon as Lores, who had become CEO the year prior, took over the reins at HP Inc., he immediately began to strategize the aggressive transformation of the hallowed company from a product-oriented to a customer experience-oriented company, identifying three areas, each requiring significant innovation: 1. Evolution of core business models to adapt to changing customer needs; 2. Pursuit of adjacencies in relation to the personal computer and print businesses; and 3. Leveraging platforms (capability and asset) and software assets to create new businesses. The broad and deep change initiative that he had charted for HP would require changes in skills, talent, infrastructure, and culture. To communicate what was required of his team, shift their thinking, and achieve a better multiple on their earnings per share, Lores asked his leaders to focus their attention on three key concepts: (1) Advance the business models of HP's core businesses; (2) Disrupt using HP's core assets; and (3) Transform the processes, cost structure, go-to-market capabilities, supply chain and brand of HP. Perhaps unsurprisingly, discussions at the morning meeting centered around the need to harness the past and drive the future. Markets were changing, HP's performance was accelerating and the company was seeing new customer behaviors. In addition, there was an inflection point in the PC stack and importantly, 3D printing, where HP had a great position, was attracting a lot of interest.

On November 2, 2021, Enrique Lores, CEO of HP, Inc., ended the first online huddle of the week with his executive leadership team. The day was an historic one for the Palo Alto-based global company: six years earlier, HP Inc. came into being after the split of the iconic hardware company into two: HP, Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. As soon as Lores, who had become CEO the year prior, took over the reins at HP Inc., he immediately began to strategize the aggressive transformation of the hallowed company from a product-oriented to a customer experience-oriented company, identifying three areas, each requiring significant innovation: 1. Evolution of core business models to adapt to changing customer needs; 2. Pursuit of adjacencies in relation to the personal computer and print businesses; and 3. Leveraging platforms (capability and asset) and software assets to create new businesses. The broad and deep change initiative that he had charted for HP would require changes in skills, talent, infrastructure, and culture. To communicate what was required of his team, shift their thinking, and achieve a better multiple on their earnings per share, Lores asked his leaders to focus their attention on three key concepts: (1) Advance the business models of HP's core businesses; (2) Disrupt using HP's core assets; and (3) Transform the processes, cost structure, go-to-market capabilities, supply chain and brand of HP. Perhaps unsurprisingly, discussions at the morning meeting centered around the need to harness the past and drive the future. Markets were changing, HP's performance was accelerating and the company was seeing new customer behaviors. In addition, there was an inflection point in the PC stack and importantly, 3D printing, where HP had a great position, was attracting a lot of interest.

Tim Höttges was at the outset of his seventh year as CEO of Deutsche Telekom (DT) in 2020. The company served more than 184 million mobile customers and had a presence in over 50 countries. Over the course of the previous 7 years, European telecommunication companies had experienced varying degrees of success. Revenues for telecommunication companies in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain as a whole fell by 14 percent from 2012-2019, while DT's revenues rose by 38 percent, with fully two-thirds of DT's revenues generated outside of Germany in 2019. In late January, 2020, Höttges and his executive team are focused on the challenges faced by European telcos: advances in "digitization," "cloudification" and "softwarization" of the telecommunications network, along with the growth of 5G wireless capabilities, and the emergence of new types of co-opetitive relationships with the hyperscalers, large companies like Amazon and Microsoft that were making efforts dominate the public cloud and cloud services industries and expand into related verticals. This case describes the strategic challenges facing DT in 2020 and beyond that Höttges needs to think about and act upon: (1) the evolution of network technologies to cloud-centric production models, (2) attractive products and services as well as customer interaction through digital channels, synergies, and efficiency levers in internal processes, (3) the battle with the hyperscalers, and (4) the resolution of the fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) challenge in Germany.

Erste Group ("Erste"), one of the largest financial services providers in Central and Eastern Europe, faced a rapidly changing business environment in 2019: fintech startups were unbundling retail banking services as consumers' expectations for service in the digital age were evolving-and increasing. Yet, on the 200th anniversary of its inception as the first Austrian savings bank, Erste had overcome a number of strategic, leadership and spatial challenges. In response to the rise of digital banking, Erste created George, a digital platform; grew an omnichannel offering; and developed a strategy based on being a trusted provider of financial literacy, thereby enabling customers' financial health. The creation and growth of George gave rise to organizational challenges: to support the business strategy, Erste's digital innovation lab, Erste Hub, was located in a separate organization, away from Erste's other Viennese properties. The dispersal of Erste's operations throughout 28 inner-city locations in Vienna created major organizational and logistical challenges for the bank as it grew, making the search for a suitable physical solution an imperative-for decades. The development of a consolidated facility for Erste was kindled by the purchase of an unusually large parcel of land in 2007, and culminated in the staged occupancy of an innovative new campus in 2016. In 2019, Erste celebrated a momentous anniversary and executives and employees reflected on the multi-faceted impacts of the spatial consolidation of the group's local operations, including Erste Hub. Throughout this time period, Erste implemented fundamental changes within the organization. In parallel, leaders looked to the physical configuration of the new campus to impact how teams completed their work and, ultimately, boost the ability of the members of the organization to deliver on the new goals of innovation at Erste.

The Opendoor case follows head of market operations Megan Meyer as her team develops a strategy to enter Los Angeles, a substantial departure from the existing real estate markets the company had worked in through 2018. Particular issues explored include market segmentation, new market entry strategy, and quantitative analysis of unit economics and addressable markets.

Supplement to case SM298A. Jonas Spangenberg, CEO of BoKlok, an entrepreneurial industrialized construction venture focused on providing low-cost housing to a sharply defined, relatively low-price market segment, must identify and manage forces within three contexts as he develops and guides BoKlok's growth strategy: the residential construction industry, and Skanksa and IKEA, BoKlok's parent companies. Students are asked to consider Spangenberg's strategic actions in relation to the external context-an industry beginning to feel the impact of information technologies (digitalization) in the design, manufacture and assembly phases of construction-and in relation to the company's internal context: parent companies Skanska and IKEA. Organizationally, BoKlok was nested within Skanska, one of the top ten construction companies in the world, and was dependent on Skanska for BoKlok's continued growth and development. Yet, historically, culturally, and from a brand perspective, BoKlok was patterned after IKEA, the low-cost furniture retailer. Spangenberg's most direct strategic challenges relate to fine-tuning BoKlok's business strategy in light of industry turbulence and, with the support of Skanska, developing a strategy for entering the U.K. market, and preparing his organization for executing the U.K. strategy. The first case can be used on its own to develop a deep understanding of the conditions that led to the founding of BoKlok and to clearly identify its novel business strategy and the success that it has been able to achieve by January 2018. The second case is set in September 2018, at the time that the Swedish housing market entered a downturn and BoKlok and parent company Skanska were dealing with the effects of contraction in their home market while preparing for BoKlok's expansion into the United Kingdom.

Jonas Spangenberg, CEO of BoKlok, an entrepreneurial industrialized construction venture focused on providing low-cost housing to a sharply defined, relatively low-price market segment, must identify and manage forces within three contexts as he develops and guides BoKlok's growth strategy: the residential construction industry, and Skanksa and IKEA, BoKlok's parent companies. Students are asked to consider Spangenberg's strategic actions in relation to the external context-an industry beginning to feel the impact of information technologies (digitalization) in the design, manufacture and assembly phases of construction-and in relation to the company's internal context: parent companies Skanska and IKEA. Organizationally, BoKlok was nested within Skanska, one of the top ten construction companies in the world, and was dependent on Skanska for BoKlok's continued growth and development. Yet, historically, culturally, and from a brand perspective, BoKlok was patterned after IKEA, the low-cost furniture retailer. Spangenberg's most direct strategic challenges relate to fine-tuning BoKlok's business strategy in light of industry turbulence and, with the support of Skanska, developing a strategy for entering the U.K. market, and preparing his organization for executing the U.K. strategy. The first case can be used on its own to develop a deep understanding of the conditions that led to the founding of BoKlok and to clearly identify its novel business strategy and the success that it has been able to achieve by January 2018. The second case is set in September 2018, at the time that the Swedish housing market entered a downturn and BoKlok and parent company Skanska were dealing with the effects of contraction in their home market while preparing for BoKlok's expansion into the United Kingdom.

This case describes the 2016 market entry in California of an innovative construction system for housing: BONE Structure, developed by the Canadian company of the same name. The choice of this structural system and construction method for a single family home in Palo Alto, California, provides the backdrop for a discussion about process innovations in manufactured housing and environmental sustainability. This case highlights BONE Structure's successful revamping of the supply chain for housing, a design for energy efficiency that has the potential to be even more so (if steel manufacturing could be powered by renewables), and finally, a building system that enables construction and renovation in difficult locations.

In March 2002, Singapore Airlines (SIA), recognized internationally for quality, profitability, and management, was facing difficult operating conditions. Dr. Cheong Choong Kong, deputy chairman and CEO, considered how he and his management committee would respond to the forces of globalization, regulatory adjustment, and the impact of terrorist attacks in America on the airline and the industry. Their challenge: to position the airline for continued growth in a globalizing industry while maintaining the airline's loss-free record. The airline's continuing challenges would stretch SIA's people far beyond the demands of its previous history. Was the company's strategy right for the more turbulent times ahead, and was the organization durable and flexible enough to ensure its success?

Describes a small consulting business, Business Networks, led by Les Cunningham. The firm's primary product was the establishment of groups or "networks" of similar businesses and the facilitation of each network's biannual meetings. Owners of individual firms, called networkers, met to tackle each other's business problems and share solutions. The networks were formed of like-sized remodeling contractors that specialized in similar lines of business. Provides a description of one biannual meeting and perspective from network members on the pros and cons of the process of performance improvement.

Dave Pottruck, president and co-CEO of Charles Schwab Corp. (CSC), is contemplating a piece of news in the June 1, 1999 edition of the Wall Street Journal that was about to send shock waves through the brokerage community: Merrill Lynch's decision to launch online trading on December 1, 1999. Customers at Merrill Lynch would be able to trade online for $29.95/trade or, for a minimum annual fee of $1,500, make as many trades as they wanted. Now that Merrill Lynch had joined the online trading revolution, Pottruck wondered, how would this affect Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. (Schwab), and what should the company do in response? Pottruck observes that Merrill Lynch, E*Trade, WingspanBank, and Schwab, although competing for similar customers, appeared to be doing so from very different starting points. Pottruck considers the competitive dynamics of the brokerage industry and wonders: How can Schwab maintain its growth trajectory in the face of so many, varied competitors? What other firms might enter the space? How could Schwab protect and grow its existing customer base? Was Schwab getting "squeezed in the middle" or could it create a "category of one"?

Dave Pottruck, president and co-CEO of Charles Schwab Corp. (CSC), is contemplating a piece of news in the June 1, 1999 edition of the Wall Street Journal that was about to send shock waves through the brokerage community. The newspaper had just announced Merrill Lynch's decision to launch online trading on December 1, 1999. Customers at Merrill Lynch would be able to trade online for $29.95/trade or, for a minimum annual fee of $1,500, make as many trades as they wanted. Now that Merrill Lynch had joined the online trading revolution, Pottruck wondered, how would this affect Charles Schwab & Co., Inc. (Schwab), and what should the company do in response? Pottruck observes that Merrill Lynch, ETrade, WingspanBank, and Schwab, although competing for similar customers, appeared to be doing so from very different starting points. Pottruck considers the competitive dynamics of the brokerage industry and wonders: How can Schwab maintain its growth trajectory in the face of so many, varied competitors? What other firms might enter the space? How could Schwab protect and grow its existing customer base? Was Schwab getting "squeezed in the middle" or could it create a "category of one?"