Set in 2022, this case describes the challenges faced by Singapore General Hospital (SGH), one of Singapore's leading public hospitals, in managing its bed occupancy rate (BOR) to best suit its patient workload pattern and adhere to the government's guidelines, and describes the evolution of its bed management system (BMS) in response to those challenges. Bed management, although a background activity, plays a central role in the effective running of a hospital. While SGH has adopted new technology and best practices in its BMS over the years, there are still frequent mismatches between the available bed supply and incoming patient demand. One of the reasons is Singapore's growing healthcare demand due to its ageing population coupled with a greater awareness of regular healthcare monitoring in the society, which requires capacity expansion. In addition, given that poor bed management in a hospital incurs heavy costs and adversely impacts everyone from patients to nursing staff, doctors and administrators, there is a need for more effective management of the existing bed supply and implementation of new measures to optimise the burden on hospitals. The Bed Management Unit (BMU) at SGH, recognises that the analysis of the workload of the hospital over the previous five years is critical for making many key decisions, such as capacity expansion and class configuration, patient-bed assignment protocols, and the adoption of innovative healthcare processes for effective bed management and healthcare delivery.
The case is set in April 2023, five years since Leow Ban Tat, CEO of Aquaculture Centre of Excellence Pte Ltd (ACE), founded the Singapore-based seafood start-up with the objective to rear healthy fish sustainably and help Singapore improve its food security and self-sufficiency. ACE's fish farm 'Eco-Ark' was an innovative floating closed container system. It was based on Leow's patented technologies - a combination of offshore, marine, and recirculating aquaculture technologies - which helped keep its fish safe from pollutants, pathogens and variations in oxygen and temperature in the sea water, besides minimising the fish farm's carbon footprint. With a hatchery and a processing facility added on board within a year of Eco-Ark starting its operations, ACE offered a fully traceable and integrated value chain from locally sourced eggs to ready-to-use products and one of the shortest fish food production miles in aquaculture. Going forward, Leow planned to undertake egg production as well, to have full control over ACE's supply chain. He also planned to increase ACE's footprint by launching more Eco-Arks in Singapore and internationally, and licensing Eco-Ark's innovative and unique technology to other farms. However, despite healthier and sustainable offerings, the market demand for ACE's products had remained lower than hoped for, largely because of its price premium over cheaper fish imports. Although supported by the Singapore government in its endeavours, the company struggled to cover its expenses and keep afloat. Fully committed to the sustainability vision, Leow believed that his breakthrough design and process would be transformational in the future. However, he wondered how long the company would be able to sustain its operations given the sluggish sales and aggressive competition. What could be done?
Set in 2022, the case describes the partnership between Unilever Food Solutions (UFS) and The Social Kitchen (TSK), a social enterprise, to launch Unilever's flagship alt-meat brand 'The Vegetarian Butcher' (TVB) in Singapore. With a focus on 'future foods', Unilever planned to double the number of products that delivered positive nutrition and minimised environmental impact by 2025. Its vegan foods portfolio comprised nearly 700 products, with TVB as its most significant addition in the high-growth space of plant-based nutrition. UFS's tie up with TSK was driven by its aim to create social impact by helping people make healthier and sustainable lifestyle choices. Furthermore, positioning TVB as a 'brand with a purpose' could help it stand out in the highly competitive plant-based food space. TSK, a well-established social enterprise, provided UFS with an appropriate and credible platform to launch TVB in the city-state. The restaurant at Singapore's Jurong Bird Park, a popular tourist attraction, opened in partnership with TSK, proved to be a cost-effective platform for creating social media impressions, brand awareness and consumer interest. The full menu integration enabled TVB to experiment and develop new products for the taste palate of the locals. However, TSK comprised only one restaurant so far. Was that sufficient to launch TVB successfully in the highly competitive Singapore market? Should the company also look at other alternate food service channels to widen TVB's visibility? Moreover, did the venture generate adequate returns on the investments made by Unilever? Did the brand partnership with TSK and the related social media buzz generate enough sales leads to justify the collaboration moving forward? Most importantly, were sales and profitability in the short-term good enough criteria to assess the long-term intangibles such as a 'socially responsible' brand image and goodwill?
Set in 2021, this case describes how Amazon and Walmart have been two of the most successful retailers in history and are responsible for changing the rules of the game in the retail industry in the US. Over the years, the two firms had perfected contrasting business models to enable their dominance on the respective offline and online retailing. Walmart's model of low prices and strategic partnerships with suppliers had redefined supply chain practices and lowered system costs through the adoption of information technology. Amazon's online model of convenience of shopping from anywhere, anytime comprised a high-quality user-friendly platform with a large product catalogue, and a widespread and reliable fulfilment infrastructure to deliver the orders quickly to the shopper. In recent years, the growing customer preference for omni-channel retailing, an integrated experience that seamlessly comprised digital and physical retail, had compelled the two companies to make substantive investments in developing capabilities and acquiring resources in what was hitherto the other's domain. This leads to several questions that engage students. With Walmart and Amazon racing to add online and offline retail respectively, would their distinctive business models morph to become similar to each other? Or should each focus on its core strength, while offering the other service (online for Walmart and offline for Amazon) as complementary? Were online and offline retail more suited to different customers and product categories? And did their respective future prospects truly justify the dramatic difference in market capitalisation between the two retailers?
Set in 2021, the case highlights how S4Capital, a digital-first advertising and marketing services company, develops a disruptive and innovative business model to meet the industry's growing demand for agility, digital prowess, flexibility, and efficiency, better than the traditional, analogue, holding company model of existing advertising networks. The company's practice of a 'zero earn-out' approach in its mergers and acquisitions, along with an upfront cash payment, share in its equity to the entrepreneur-founders, and incentives to retain the senior management of the acquired firms, also made it a favourite potential partner for like-minded technologically savvy companies in the domain. By September 2021, the S4Capital group comprised more than 26 companies, had a market capitalisation of around US$6.5 billion, and its revenues had grown by 49%. However, it faced many challenges as well. While S4Capital's adoption of unitary branding provided a platform for seamless integration of talent and capabilities across its offices globally, it required constituent agencies to give up their individual, and often highly iconic identities, and build a collaborative mindset for the collective good. In 2021, the group's merger with Zemoga, a digital transformation company, enabled S4Capital to plug a crucial gap in its menu and offer tech services besides content and media solutions. However, the inclusion and integration of a new practice area as the third pillar would entail having a more complex and unwieldy structure. In immediate terms, S4Capital faced an uphill task in acquiring and retaining talent in some of its markets. In Asia Pacific, where it was focusing on growth, the availability of suitably qualified tech-savvy manpower was inadequate. While in the US, its largest market, the pandemic had unleashed a wave of 'Great Resignation' in the corporate world, resulting in high staff turnover as people increasingly opted out of their current jobs.
Set in May 2021, this case describes the journey of transformation Hai Sia Seafood (Hai Sia), a Singapore-based seafood company, embarked upon five years earlier. Hai Sia, a family business established forty-five years earlier, supplied high quality, fresh, and processed seafood at competitive prices for domestic consumption in Singapore. However, the seafood processing industry in the city-state, including the port, was woefully backward. Hai Sia operated a manual processing plant that was twenty years old, and relied completely on labour intensive work processes, even though digitisation was on the rise in the country and consumers were increasingly migrating online in their buying behaviour. The company faced many challenges such as quota constraints on the number of foreign workers it could hire, inconsistency in quality due to human error, low productivity, and more importantly, the changing profile of its customer base. Hai Sia undertook many steps to transform its operations, including plant renovation and automation, digitisation of work processes, expansion into e-commerce, launch of a consumer brand, and product development for the retail market. The results were promising and the business grew from 1800 tons in 2015 to 2500 tons in 2020. However, the considerable corresponding investments to support these initiatives had adversely impacted the company's profitability. Ang Junting, the deputy director, knew that if he were to spend more time and resources in modernising the business, the senior management would need to be convinced about the returns that these investments would eventually bring. Moreover, he wondered if going forward, a similar business model that centred on automation, upskilling, training, and consumer retail could be successfully replicated in the neighbouring Southeast Asian economies.
Set in 2019, this case describes the challenges faced in the adoption of DfMA (Design for manufacturing and assembly) concept by Singapore's construction industry. Use of DfMA increased productivity manifold, requiring less time for completion and less manpower, in addition to providing a safer and healthier work environment. The transition entailed a significant shift in the way different stakeholders such as developers, consultants, architects, contractors, vendors and the government operated in the domain, as the design and construction processes using DfMA were more akin to factory production and manufacturing industry than to the prevalent construction industry. Consequently, the existing ecosystem in the industry was not suited to the new technology and lacked supportive services and economies of scale. In addition, Singapore's easy access to low-cost migrant labour from regional countries had made the labour-intensive methods far more lucrative for the developers and contractors. In particular, the case presents the journey of two avant-garde companies - Teambuild, and LHL in their quest to adopt Prefabricated Prefinished Volumetric Construction (PPVC) and Mass Engineered Timber (MET), two lead DfMA technologies in their projects, supported by Building and Construction Authority (BCA) of Singapore. BCA, as the key enabler for proliferation of DfMA technology, provided support to organisations keen to adopt it by subsidising training programs and co-funding technology adoption. However, despite a few landmark successes, the majority of the industry was risk averse and preferred to continue with the cheaper and conventional construction method that they were well-versed in. Going forward, it was important to create additional value and better interfaces for the stakeholders in order to bring down their associated tangible and intangible transaction costs.
This case study is set in July 2021. It describes the ageing landscape in Singapore including the policies that have been developed to address Singapore's rapidly ageing population and features the stories of two seniors. Since the 1980s, the Singapore Government had been developing plans and policies to help seniors, "to not just add years to life but add life to years". The concept of successful ageing, defined by the five indicators - no major diseases, no disability, high cognitive function, physically fit and mobile, and active engagement with life, had been a focus area of the Singapore government for the past four decades. However, the rate of successful ageing had remained low, at only 25.4 percent. Given the rapidly ageing population, Lim Soon Meng, a director at Singapore's Ministry of Health, wondered what else could be done to help more seniors age successfully? This case introduces the concept of the Third Age and invites discussion on the topic of successful ageing.
This case describes the journey of Gucci, a hundred-year-old luxury fashion brand, and how over the years it has reinvented its designs and marketing strategy to grow its market dominance world-wide. In 2015, Gucci's dismal performance over two successive years led the fashion house to rejig its top management, and bring in Marco Bizzarri, as the new President and CEO, and Alessandro Michele as the new creative director. By end-2019, the duo had achieved a remarkable turnaround, having tripled Gucci's sales and quadrupled its profits over 2015. In the process, they had redefined 'luxury', transformed the high-end fashion industry and contemporised the Gucci brand by being avant-garde and embracing new paradigms such as purpose-driven, gender-neutral, cross-generational and digital-oriented strategies. However, despite regaining its position as the world's fastest growing luxury brand, Gucci had clocked a much lower annual growth in 2019 than 2018 and 2017. Did this indicate that the brand was losing its relevance and needed to reinvent itself again? Could Gucci's recent foray into beauty products, making it more accessible and affordable, be diluting its brand equity? Additionally, the outbreak of the global pandemic Covid-19 in 2020 had plunged the luxury industry and the fashion house to new lows. The only silver lining was Gucci' strong digital capability, which helped the brand recover some of its lost ground through an increase in online sales. With the pandemic relenting in China, the luxury market in the country had begun to revive since March 2020. However, it was difficult to predict how other markets would behave post-pandemic. Would consumers be driven by the need to compensate for the lost opportunity to consume, or would the pandemic induce in them values that encouraged cutbacks in discretionary spending? Moreover, if the other markets did not pick up, what would be the effect of an increased dependence of the luxury brands on Chinese consumers?
Set in May 2020, this case describes the entrepreneurial journey of Bynd Artisan (Bynd), a Singapore-based atelier that sold premium paper and leather goods. Founded by Winnie Chan and James Quan in October 2014 as an entity distinct from Chan's traditional paper and leather goods family business, Bynd had grown to become an iconic retail luxury brand recognised for its artisanal excellence and heritage. Over the years, it had won numerous accolades in Singapore for the craftsmanship, quality and designs of its bespoke products. By 2020, Bynd had five retail stores in the city-state and employed 35 people. However, Bynd's sophisticated and premium product line predominantly catered to professionals, managers, executives and technicians (PMETs) above the age of 23 years. Its' high-end pricing made it inaccessible to the younger customers such as the Generation Z. In order to target these young customers, Chan and Quan planned to launch a second product line under the brand name 'reBynd' - made of recycled material, comprising simpler but more modern designs, and priced significantly lower than Bynd. However, the founders faced a dilemma regarding the retail channel - online or physical - to be used for distributing reBynd's products. On the one hand, the online channel seemed to be a better fit with the target customers' profile, and the brand's sustainable positioning and value proposition. On the other hand, reBynd, as a new and a lifestyle-related brand, would need a tactile physical environment to gain customers' acceptance. Moreover, despite the high internet penetration in Singapore, brick & mortar sales had dominated its retail industry by far. What retail strategy should Bynd consider for its second brand, given the trade-offs associated with both online and offline channels? More importantly, would the introduction of a cheaper secondary brand dilute the primary brand's luxury status?
Set in January 2020, this case describes the entrepreneurial journey of Hayman Microfinance (Hayman), which provided financial solutions to the low-income strata and rural population of Myanmar who had limited or no access to banking services. Over 2015-2020, Hayman grew to become a 25-branch strong company with a loan portfolio of US$29 million, 129,000 active borrowers, and 155,000 depositors. Besides its product attributes, targeted marketing approach, trained work force and effective delivery, Hayman's success could also be attributed to its corporate social responsibility (CSR) thrust in the areas of health, education, safety, and the environment. Over 2017-2019, many international players had entered Myanmar. While some of these entrants had big spending budgets, they lacked first-hand experience of the country's rural poor, and had limited knowledge of the demanding bureaucratic processes followed by the Myanmar government in the financial sector. Sultan Marenov, the Executive Chairman and Managing Director of Hayman, believed that Hayman would be an ideal partner for such investors; however, he was yet to clinch a satisfactory deal. Would highlighting Hayman's CSR program as a core element of its business model strengthen the company's value proposition to potential investors? How much did the social activities contribute towards building the company's brand equity among its key stakeholders, and a sustainable competitive advantage?
This case describes Visa Inc's (Visa) challenges in light of the growing influence of financial technology companies (fintech) in the payments space. In 2018, Visa had firmly established its leadership in the industry with its ubiquitous network of merchants, customers, and financial institutions in 200 countries. However, the rise of fintech over the past two decades had led to an explosion of new competitors and new methods of payment. While Visa found it easier to collaborate with the big tech (e.g. apple) and payment ecosystem (e.g. Paypal) companies in adopting new technologies and offering new payment solutions, it found it challenging to partner with emerging fintech's (e.g. TransferWise and Paytm) fast evolving business models. In less-mature markets, the emerging fintech's low go-to-market cost often bypassed the need for expensive physical payments infrastructure. And, in mature markets, new technologies leapfrogged the traditional card payment infrastructure by building direct connections with merchants and customers through alternate networks. How should Visa proceed vis-Ã -vis these start-ups that were seeking to redefine the payments industry? Should it preserve its legacy position by competing against these fintechs or should it seek collaborations with them to avail of mutually beneficial market opportunities? Or should it take the lead as a facilitator, actively invest in the start-ups, partner with them, and drive innovation in the payments industry?
Set in January 2020, the case describes Singapore-based retailer Iuiga's omni-channel journey. Launched in May 2017 as an e-commerce only venture, Iuiga offers a curated range of high- quality products in the 'home and living' category at affordable prices. It sources these products from China-based original design manufacturers (ODMs), which produce for large global brands (known for their superior design, quality and hence high prices), and retails them under its own brand name at much lower and transparent prices. In May 2018, Iuiga launched a pop-up store to drive greater brand presence and customer engagement. Buoyed by the store's runaway sales, the firm decided to adopt a longer-term brick-and-mortar retail strategy, and by December 2019, it had established nine retail stores that contributed 80% of its total sales and employed more than 40 sales people (full time and part time). It had been almost 20 months since Iuiga adopted omni-channel retailing. Looking at the latest sales and customer data, Jaslyn Chan - Head of marketing at Iuiga, wondered if going physical had been worth it, or whether the sales in the offline channel had grown at the cost of sales in the online channel. Moreover, what types of customers did the different channels attract? Should the company increase the physical footprint further? Would opening additional pop-up or brick-and-mortar stores enable more customer acquisitions and tapping of new market segments?
Set in 2018, the case describes how Zang Hao, the CEO and co-founder of Iuiga, a Singapore based e-commerce start-up, eschewed the conventional e-retailing model by acquiring complete control over its value chain including ownership of the items retailed through the adoption of original design manufacturer (ODM) business model and marketing of its brand in addition to storage, logistics, and distribution. Under the ODM model, Iuiga contracts the manufacturers of large global brands known for their superior quality to manufacture the same products for Iuiga, and then proceeds to retail it directly under its own brand name at much lower, and transparent, prices on its online platform. By targeting quality-conscious customers with a range of products in the home and living category, Iuiga's sales grew fivefold within the first eight months of its launch. However, soon after, the sales growth began to plateau. One of the key reasons identified for the slowdown was the limited market reach of the brand due to its presence only on the online medium. With e-commerce penetration in Singapore at only 5 percent, the majority of the consumer market lacked awareness of the Iuiga brand and the value it offered. This led the company to consider creating an omni-channel presence by opening a pop-up store to drive face-to-face customer engagement and boost Iuiga's brand building efforts. However, this raised many concerns. Would Iuiga's current team be able to manage both the online portal and the pop-up store? With the omni-channel platform entailing unavoidable additional expenses such as rental, people, services and integration costs, would it undermine the strength of Iuiga's core business model? Also, the brick & mortar space was an unchartered territory for its management team, with no prior experience to bank upon. Most importantly, would Iuiga be able to convert the offline footfall to online traffic?
This is a two-part case. Case A introduces Kim Underhill as the new Regional Head at Appliances International, a leading global appliances manufacturer that has sold more than 30 million household and professional products in over 70 markets. Underhill was headhunted in December 2016 to help revive the firm's declining performance in the key Asia-Pacific markets of India, Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia. Of the four markets, India, had proved to be particularly challenging with AI having a marginal presence, stagnant sales, recurring losses, and poor brand image in the country. Upon taking charge, Underhill sensed some wariness on the part of the India team in dealing with a woman leader. She held meetings with the employees to understand the issues better, and thereafter decided to implement a series of measures to help turn the situation around. Over the next few months, she laid off a number of senior managers whom she believed were incompetent and lacked motivation. She implemented new performance incentives for the sales staff. She also met the key customers, and worked towards addressing their concerns and misgivings with AI. However, by the end of the year, there was no significant improvement in AI India's sales performance or relationships with its channel partners. With 14 months gone by, Underhill was worried. Had she overcommitted by promising to turnaround the company in two years? What should she do now? Case B sees Underhill implementing other initiatives to turn the company around, such as joint activities with channel partners, investment in brand activities, running of product and service training, and holding regional meetings to encourage open conversations among colleagues across different offices. She also drew upon AI's matrix structure to have experienced managers located in other countries assist in coaching employees at the India office. Consequently, AI's sales in India began to grow, recording 20% increase in the following year.
This is a two-part case. Case A introduces Kim Underhill as the new Regional Head at Appliances International, a leading global appliances manufacturer that has sold more than 30 million household and professional products in over 70 markets. Underhill was headhunted in December 2016 to help revive the firm's declining performance in the key Asia-Pacific markets of India, Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia. Of the four markets, India, had proved to be particularly challenging with AI having a marginal presence, stagnant sales, recurring losses, and poor brand image in the country. Upon taking charge, Underhill sensed some wariness on the part of the India team in dealing with a woman leader. She held meetings with the employees to understand the issues better, and thereafter decided to implement a series of measures to help turn the situation around. Over the next few months, she laid off a number of senior managers whom she believed were incompetent and lacked motivation. She implemented new performance incentives for the sales staff. She also met the key customers, and worked towards addressing their concerns and misgivings with AI. However, by the end of the year, there was no significant improvement in AI India's sales performance or relationships with its channel partners. With 14 months gone by, Underhill was worried. Had she overcommitted by promising to turnaround the company in two years? What should she do now? Case B sees Underhill implementing other initiatives to turn the company around, such as joint activities with channel partners, investment in brand activities, running of product and service training, and holding regional meetings to encourage open conversations among colleagues across different offices. She also drew upon AI's matrix structure to have experienced managers located in other countries assist in coaching employees at the India office. Consequently, AI's sales in India began to grow, recording 20% increase in the following year.