Initially conceived as a competitor to Bloomberg's terminals, a consortium of financial services firms launched its own secure messaging platform, Symphony, in 2014. Symphony soon expanded beyond chat to include a range of services including data integrations, bots, applications, and a web conferencing solution; by 2019 Symphony's user base grew to 400 thousand clients, larger than Bloomberg's. This case explores Symphony's options for future growth-including how to leverage the need for Robotic Process Automation (RPA) in the financial sector and possible expansion beyond financial services. In analyzing the firm's options, students must consider an array of challenges, including: competitive pressure within the sector and beyond its scope, changing use attitudes for communications technology, the rise of cloud computing, and a changing regulatory environment.
By 2016 the explosion of digital advertising was a global phenomenon. And many industry observers believed that programmatic advertising, that is digital advertising allocated through automated marketing systems, was the future of digital advertising. In a programmatic advertising environment, buyers and sellers of online (digital) advertising connected over an exchange buying and selling available inventory. For advertisers, programmatic marketing offered the promise of less costly and more targeted and effective placements. This Primer discusses the programmatic advertising eco-system and the challenges inherent in negotiating this system (e.g., the persistence of ad blocking and the threat of fraud)-as well as future growth opportunities for programmatic advertising.
The case describes the launch of a social media platform by the largest container shipping company in the world. Maersk Line garnered over 1 million fans on Facebook, 40,000 followers on Twitter, and 22,000 on Instagram. They also launched and became active on other social media networks such as LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Google+ and created a social media home base for Maersk Line called Maersk Line Social that published articles and stories about the company in a less formal manner. The case discusses the organizational aspects of the program launch, as well as pressure from the marketing department to better integrate the largely independent social media operation into the company's broader marketing efforts.
In late 2013, Bloomberg LP, the financial information powerhouse, was challenged by a competing messaging service owned by a consortium of banks, many of whom were Bloomberg's customers. This development came when growth was slowing and news was emerging that Bloomberg's business practices may have compromised the privacy of its customers. Did these events serve to open fissures in the company's ability to maintain industry dominance? This case asks students to consider Bloomberg's business model and the industry's competitive landscape to assess the company's market position.
Research shows that mobile banner ads can be effective for some products--those that are both utilitarian and "high involvement" (bought only after much deliberation on the consumer's part). Marketers who understand this can spend their mobile dollars more wisely and tailor and time their ads for maximum impact.
Our annual survey of ideas and trends that will make an impact on business: Stan Stalnaker heralds a peer-to-peer economy in which consumers become consumer-producers. Tamara J. Erickson dissects the expectations of Gen Y workers. Dr. Jerome Groopman writes a prescription for avoiding misdiagnoses in decision making. Michael Sheehan warns not to resort to the tools of competition when it's really opposition that threatens your company. John J. Medina conceives of a brain-friendly workplace that applies modern science to daily performance. Dan Ariely studies the minds of "honest" people when they cheat. Paul Root Wolpe and Daniel D. Langleben share truths about technologically sophisticated lie detection. Scott Berinato shines a light on the cybercrime service economy. Mark Kuznicki, Eli Singer, and Jay Goldman showcase Toronto, where a technology-driven event led to real social change. John Seely Brown and Douglas Thomas argue that online games are preparing the twenty-first-century workforce. Jane McGonigal calls alternate reality games the promising new operating systems for real-world business. Miklos Sarvary mines the history of broadcasting for wisdom about competing in the metaverses of the internet. Judith Donath asks how true to yourself you'll be in the virtual world. Jan Chipchase surveys the soon-to-be-charted territory of metadata trails. Lew McCreary points a finger at people who blame technology for their bad behavior. Jaime Lerner sees the city of the future in a turtle's shell. David Vogel catalogs the advantages of socially responsible lobbying. George Pohle lets the numbers prove the mass-market promise of China's second-tier cities. Aamir A. Rehman and S. Nazim Ali discuss the boom in sharia-compliant finance. Michael J. Mauboussin identifies the shrinking domain in which experts are the best problem solvers. Garrett Gruener reveals his list of sustainable and unsustainable trends.
In the early 2000's, MOL, the newly privatized Hungarian Oil and Gas Concern considers acquiring a controlling stake in TVK, a downstream customer specialized in the production of polymers. The case highlights the tension between long-term competitive/growth strategy and short-term operational issues and cash considerations, in the context of this particular decision. It also provides the opportunity to explore the broader strategic challenges that this company faces, if it wants to stay alive in the consolidating Central European Oil market. This market is particularly interesting and unique after the fall of the Berlin Wall. It faces deregulation, privatization and major consolidation, as the region's economies move into market economies. MOL, in particular, is a very interesting company, which, despite being a small player could successfully challenge Royal Dutch SHELL, Austria's OMV and large Russian oil companies with its bold acquisitions, thus creating one of the first and largest multinational companies of the region.
Kana is a young Internet software company wondering how it should react to the rapid emergence of Application Service Providers (ASPs), firms that host software applications for customers who can reach those via the Internet. ASPs may be a new channel of distribution for software vendors. Issues of channel design, channel conflict, and resource allocation are all addressed.
This article analyzes how Knowledge Management (KM) is likely to affect competition in the management consulting industry. KM represents a fundamental and qualitative change in this industry's basic production technology. Because management consultants acquire information directly from their customers, for these firms, KM technology exhibits increasing returns to scale. As such, although KM clearly represents an opportunity for some consultants to build a sustainable competitive advantage, it is likely to lead to a shake-out. Based on the industry's early experience with KM systems, this article describes a number of possible future outcomes as well as strategies that consultants can follow.
David Bechhofer, a partner responsible for Bain & Co.'s marketing strategy, faces a dilemma: Traditional marketing is foreign to Bain's corporate culture (which is rather based on customer relationships), yet the firm cannot ignore traditional marketing tools if it wants to face global competition in the rapidly growing consulting industry. Indeed, all of Bain's traditional competitors as well as a lot of new players use aggressive marketing to acquire new segments from the growing customer base. David has to respond to this challenge while staying consistent with the firm's original value proposition, which is highly appreciated by its existing customers. The case provides an opportunity to discuss how to communicate a consistent global corporate image for a services firm whose "raison d`etre" is based on customer relationships.