Lending firms like Partners for Growth (PFG) supplied growth capital to nascent companies, using debt instruments that did not dilute shareholders-contrary to traditional equity funding models. The customized approach allowed entrepreneurs to bring in additional capital without taking dilution in ownership. While instruments such as venture debt was becoming increasingly popular within the U.S. innovation ecosystem, venture debt and tech lending had yet to become widely available to entrepreneurial companies in the Middle East. PFG saw this as an opportunity to expand into the MENA region ahead of other organizations that were not as comfortable with the debt lending business model for start-up companies. The company's leaders had just finalized two term sheets and were discussing how PFG might support two different companies in the Middle East: Tabby, a fintech leader looking to expand "Buy Now Pay Later" financing; and Bayzat, a SaaS company that provided human resources solutions to small and medium-sized companies in the region.

Monifa Porter was in the process of building a product that could work her and her team out of a job. As head of 2401, a subdivision of the corporate innovation and growth company Mach49, Porter was building a technology product that would assist corporations as they designed, built, and scaled new ventures within their existing organization. In late 2022, Porter's team released a minimum viable product of 2401, and was now in the process of designing a product feedback and enhancement cycle that would hopefully turn 2401 into a major revenue stream for Mach49. To do so, Porter would need to run her team with discipline, all while weighing important questions about whether the innovation process could be automated and if so, what implications that had for her team of product managers.

The Merak Capital cofounders sought to tap into the opportunities for entrepreneurs and investors in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere, as the technology community in the region continued to expand. They envisioned creating a regional powerhouse that would invest in new technology companies in the region, and accelerate economic development. This case study explores how the three cofounders approach their immediate priorities, in order to position Merak Capital to broaden their vision to include venture capital, growth equity, and private equity. How would they use the next 12 months wisely, and effectively? How would they plan for the broader business scope-and think about expanding into other Middle East countries, and beyond?

The Tender case follows the journey of Miles Parker from his early days of joining an equipment financing company as a partner to the company's founder, through pivoting the company's product, and working with several different investors including high-net-worth individuals and private equity.

Boubyan bank grew from a small Islamic bank in Kuwait to one of the largest and most successful financial organizations in its home country. As the bank is entering its next phase of growth, the leadership must confront how to successfully deal with issues around digitization, regional and global expansion, as well as recruiting talent in a more complex and increasingly hybrid world of digital and physical solutions.

This case describes 23andMe CEO and cofounder Anne Wojcicki's founding story and her recent attempts to scale the company's direct-to-consumer genetic testing franchise while simultaneously expanding its pharmaceutical development aspirations.

CircleUp was founded in 2012 as a marketplace that matched accredited investors to emerging consumer packaged goods companies. A tool that the team developed early-on to reduce the friction involved in finding and evaluating new companies, Helio, gradually become very accurate in predicting the growth trajectory of early-stage companies. Ryan Caldbeck, co-founder and CEO of CircleUp, decided in 2018 to shut down the marketplace and focus the company on leveraging Helio's insights to directly provide equity and credit financing to CPG startups. This decision was followed by two difficult, significant discussions. First, Caldbeck met with the board of directors, where one investor reacted negatively and asked to sell his stake in the company. Second, Caldbeck presented the new direction to CircleUp employees, some of whom worried what would happen if the company became an investment firm instead of a tech company. By 2019, Caldbeck was on the precipice of another big change for CircleUp. The firm was raising a large fund to begin systematic investing, but finding investors for the disruptive offering was proving difficult. Additionally, as word spread about the power of Helio's insights CircleUp began receiving partnership offers from large, established companies. These offers caused Caldbeck to debate if CircleUp should further monetize Helio.

Align Technologies was a leader in disrupting the orthodontist and dental markets with the original development of clear plastic aligners, which allowed for customized solutions to malocclusions, the incorrect alignment of teeth and jaws. Unlike traditional braces, plastic aligners enabled more flexibility and customization by combining digital and physical technologies that were convenient and attractive than other alternatives. As the company began to enter its third decade, the leadership team was dealing with the challenges of new competition, expiring patents, how to improve international growth and how best to increase operational efficiency.

David Bladow and Matthew Schwab, close friends and former college roommates, left their jobs and moved to San Francisco to start a new venture together. After exploring the gifting industry, they ultimately focused on floral delivery. They launched BloomThat, an on-demand service that made sending flowers as easy as sending a text message and gained initial traction over Valentine's Day in 2013. On the back of this success, the team was accepted into Y Combinator for the summer of 2013, raised $3.6 million of seed funding over the next year, and in December 2014, secured $4 million of Series A financing. Problems arose soon after BloomThat expanded to Los Angeles in early 2015, and by the summer, the company teetered on the brink of collapse. Aggressive restructuring saved BloomThat, and existing investors provided bridge financing in late 2015. In the end, however, the turnaround was not enough to attract new investors. When the case picks up in May 2017, Bladow and Schwab must decide what to do next. One option is to shut down BloomThat and move on. The other is to search to sell the start-up to one of the large companies in the industry, with the cofounders knowing that the process will take multiple months, would yield a low valuation and require them to go work for the incumbent for a meaningful period of time. Given their position in the capitalization table, the co-founders are unclear how the value from such a transaction will be divided with the venture capital and venture debt investors. With this uncertainty, the co-founders need to decide how to proceed.

The unexpected passing of Dave Goldberg in May 2015 triggered the most difficult period in the history of SurveyMonkey, a global online survey software company headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area. In a state of emotional shock, the team was forced to find answers to complex strategic questions, navigate a convoluted process of CEO succession and, ultimately, reinvent the company. Over three years later, the company was starting a new chapter with an IPO, and faced a mix of old and new challenges, including reinventing its product portfolio and brand; expanding internationally; attracting a larger share of large clients-the "Enterprise" customers; navigating an ever-changing competitive landscape; and incorporating new technological innovations such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. The company had come a long way-that was unquestionable-but there were still obstacles ahead.

The purpose of this case is to look at Autodesk's cultural, organizational and technological challenges as the company undergoes a recent leadership transition. The case examines the strategic agenda enacted under Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost: the company's shift to a subscription business model, the digitization of the company's internal technology infrastructure and shift to cloud computing, and the disruptive convergence of the company's construction and manufacturing end-markets. Students will also be introduced to different methodologies regarding the optimal organizational design for technological innovation and product development. Students will additionally gain an understanding of the challenges a leader of a large, complex corporation faces to improve the company's culture and become a mission-driven organization.

As retail shopping has changed with the rise of e-commerce, Target Corporate, one of the largest retail stores in the United States, made the strategic decision to invest in developing a core data science and technology team to remain competitive in its physical and online shopping experiences. The company hired a team of technologists who initially worked at enhancing the company's digital and mobile solutions, but soon began influencing the company's physical retail locations. The case explores the opportunities and challenges of competing against retail behemoths such as Amazon and Walmart, while integrating digital and physical cultures.

In July 2018, Google's Android software platform was fined $5 billion by the EU's Antitrust Commission. This case follows Hiroshi Lockheimer, SVP at Google responsible for Android, Google Play, Chrome and ChromeOS, as he and his team respond to the fine and the challenges of managing Android's increasing ubiquity and success.

This case follows Silicon Valley software veteran Thomas Siebel as he launches a new company, C3, in 2009, and steers it through two major pivots - transforming the business from a firm focused on energy conservation to a data management, machine learning, and artificial intelligence platform for large enterprises. The case looks at the multiple business transformations and re-brandings C3 went through and examines the strategic challenges the company was facing in 2018 as it began to compete head-to-head with companies such as IBM and SAP. In 2009, three years after selling his eponymous enterprise software company Siebel Systems to Oracle for nearly $6 billion, Siebel launched a new business, C3. "C" stood for carbon, and the "3" was shorthand for three "M" words: measure, mitigate and monetize. The idea was to help large companies navigate the new world of carbon taxes and reduce their carbon footprints. But after just two years, C3 was in trouble. It had found clients for its software product, C3 Energy Management, yet oil prices had stumbled, and in wake of the financial crisis, companies pulled back on spending. Siebel was no going to give up. He saw great potential in the data flowing from sensors in smart meters, turbines, transformers and other infrastructure in power grids. In 2012, he laid off about 100 of C3's 150 employees, retaining the core engineering team. The company renamed itself C3 Energy and helped grid operators aggregate and analyze data from various sensor devices and enterprise software systems. C3 Energy's engine processed data at very high rates, then applied machine learning to do useful things, such as predictive maintenance, detecting theft, and monitoring sensor network health.

Supplement to case E562. Between the back half of 2015 and early 2018 CircleUp had both grown and changed substantively. The company's core data and Helio platform had enabled the firm to offer a new set of equity and credit services to startup consumer companies that were too small for traditional private equity but needed growth capital. The transformation of the company was both exciting and a bit unexpected as CEO Ryan Caldbeck navigated the organization through tremendous change and growth.

MGM Resorts International was built as a gambling business. Over the past few decades, through its development of restaurants, live shows and musical performances, it has transformed into a fully-fledged entertainment company. Now, in 2017, it looks to pivot again - to find the future of "destination entertainment" for its Millennial consumers.

By almost any measure, Charles Schwab Corp. appeared to be killing it in 2017. The wealth management, banking, custody and brokerage firm's stock was trading near its all-time high. It was posting unprecedented levels of new client accounts, net new client assets, revenues and profits and had a record $3.12 trillion in client assets under management. Schwab was taking customers and assets from old-line wire houses like Morgan Stanley, while fending off challenges from young Fintech upstarts by being a fast follower. Despite its relatively large size, Schwab saw itself as a disruptor. Schwab was attracting more net new assets than any other publicly traded full-service investment firm and its operating costs were lower than competitors like Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley. Still, there was no doubt that challenges loomed on the horizon. For example, how could Schwab maintain or improve trust in an era of intense cyber-threats and increasingly sophisticated technology that some consumers found invasive or even creepy? Were its products elegant and simple enough? In the era of Uber and Amazon, customers' expectations were rising. And what if a big tech company like Google or Amazon started to move onto Schwab's turf? Key to staying ahead, CEO Walt Bettinger felt, was maintaining a laser focus on the customer, and being willing to cannibalize Schwab itself to find new growth. Schwab, he thought, had repeatedly proved its willingness to do so over the previous four decades, most recently by introducing a robo-advising product. "Disruption occurs when someone listens more carefully to customers, or better anticipates what customers might want before they even realize it themselves. Most companies are disrupted because they lack the will and courage to disrupt themselves first," Bettinger said. Could Schwab stay vigilant and keep up that courage? Or was it already being disrupted and didn't realize it?

From 2010 to 2017, General Electric pivoted from an industrial behemoth to a data-driven tech company by incorporating big data analytics across all of their subsidiaries. As the world's first "digital industrial" company, it named and the Industrial Internet - the "internet of things" for manufacturing - and is poised to win big in the future, as the current CEO, Jeff Immelt, hands over the reins to his predecessor, John Flannery.

For 20 years, TTTech had honed its innovative suite of technology solutions, developing cutting-edge products for customers such as Audi, General Electric, Cisco, Boeing, Airbus, and HYDAC International. Yet the two cofounders were perhaps even more excited by a confluence of market and technology trends in TTTech's favor-trends that aligned perfectly with TTTech's products and capabilities. One of the most pronounced tailwinds was the race towards fully autonomous vehicles. Within the industry, there was growing consensus that cars would become fully autonomous in the next decade or two. Given the complexity associated with developing the networks and electronic systems that would enable autonomous vehicles, manufacturers looked to companies like TTTech to provide the underlying technology needed to turn this vision into a reality. Yet the trend towards increasingly complex electronic systems was not restricted to the automotive industry. Across every industry, physical devices, machines, vehicles, and buildings were becoming embedded with electronics that allowed for the collection and exchange of data, all of which enhanced automation. Against this backdrop, Kopetz and Poledna believed that TTTech could reach more than $200 million in revenue by 2020. Yet achieving this success would not be without its challenges. TTTech would have to align itself with the right strategic and financial partners, continue to hire top managerial talent, and compete in multiple industries, each of which had its own set of unique regulations and standards. TTTech was in a strong position to achieve explosive growth, yet Kopetz and Poledna would have to navigate several hurdles in order to realize that growth.

Mariam Naficy (Minted CEO) and Melissa Kim (Minted COO) have grown the company to become a leader in the online printed cards, independent design and art market segments. As the business has continued to scale they wrestle with simultaneously growing their existing business while also looking at expanding into new markets, all the while keeping their existing customer base engaged. The case highlights the difficult decisions management faces in deciding where to pursue growth opportunities when choices might be overly abundant while also focusing on the importance of profitability