This case study examines the entrepreneurial journey of ROOTCLOUD, a visionary company focused on creating universal IIoT platforms to drive the transformation of China's manufacturing industry. By enabling its clients with digital solutions, ROOTCLOUD also enhanced the capabilities of its own platform, which further increased its value proposition. The company's comprehensive range of IIoT solutions spanned heavy equipment aftermarket, manufacturing equipment management, industry-wide intelligent equipment management, and intelligent manufacturing. However, throughout its history, ROOTCLOUD grappled with the challenge of aligning its vision with market demand, which eventually led to a strategic crossroads: Should the company focus on becoming profitable quickly by establishing itself as the leader of a sub-sector? Or should it seek greater scalability by developing a universal platform that could lay down a "digital foundation" for manufacturers from all sectors?

He increased the sales of products such as Pulmicort RespulesTM after their patents expired, generating significant social benefits by making medical treatment and medicines more accessible in lower-tier markets. Wang was promoted to President less than two years after joining AZ. While working primarily to boost sales in China, Wang introduced another task not tied to performance targets: innovation. To facilitate innovation, AZ reached beyond the pharmaceutical sector and worked with partners in the "3D" (diagnostics, device, digital) industries to launch "a patient-centric, integrated disease diagnosis and treatment platform." This initiative enabled pharmaceutical companies, which had acted only as drug suppliers during treatment, to engage in all stages of the patient journey, from education and screening, diagnosis and treatment, to follow-up and rehabilitation. Their first innovation project was the construction of pediatric nebulization centers, which were equipped with smart nebulizers powered by IoT and digital technologies. Following the initial success, AZ co-launched the chest pain center (CPC) project and the prostate cancer integrated diagnosis and treatment (PiDT) project, which not only delivered benefits to patients and hospitals but also granted partners access to hospital resources. The integrated diagnosis and treatment platform focused on areas where AZ excelled, such as respiratory and cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, so participating hospitals and patients could "naturally" choose AZ's products. However, a closer look at its sales revenue revealed that AZ was not always the primary beneficiary of the platform, and its return on investment proved to be modest.

This case traces the digital transformation exploration of NOVA VISION (also called "Baodao Glasses"), as the leading Chinese service-oriented eyewear retailer sought continuous improvement. The company developed informatization construction in its early stage. In the internet era, it started an online business and tried the O2O (online to offline) model in 2013. In 2019, it launched a methodology for private domain traffic operations and implemented drastic organizational changes. They followed its strategic positioning of "professionalism + digitalization" and operational goal for transforming the traditional "store operation-centered" sales model into "member operations as the core" service-oriented retail model. However, NOVA VISION's digital initiatives were not recognized by peers for many years, nor have they solved the industry's essential pain points, such as the high proportional personnel costs and the steadily rising store rents. NOVA VISION still faces internal and external challenges. The extremal challenges include threats from upstream players in the industry chain of lens and glass frame brand giants as well as competition from eye hospitals that enter the optician industry. Internal challenges come from its employees, who may be full of confusion and uncertainty about the future. It is crucial that NOVA VISION better implements the "professionalism + digitalization" strategy and ensures organizational changes bring effective outcomes. Wang Zhimin, chairman of the board of directors, still has a strong idea for exporting the company's own experience and upgrading the industry through platformization, which is full of unknowns. Will future generations still need glasses? What kind of glasses will they need? The future of eyewear service retail is blurry... NOVA VISION's related exploration reflects several important issues in the development of China's optical retail industry, such as "healthcare vs. fashion" needs, "online vs. offline" scenarios,

This case describes how Opple Lighting, a leading company in China's lighting industry, developed its e-commerce business as online selling brought wholesale changes to the traditional market. Numerous questions emerged as the company embarked on its e-commerce journey. The gulf between online and traditional offline distribution channels in lighting meant that many management figures opposed the move, seeing it as a threat to long-established business lines. Opple's e-commerce team needed to find a way to gain recognition and business support from other departments. While flexible pricing is common in offline stores, price transparency is a defining feature of e-commerce. The next hurdle was ensuring that the e-commerce business avoided direct competition with offline channels. Traditional lighting fixtures are the result of long-term R&D and are subsequently produced in large quantities, whereas e-commerce products undergo rapid iteration and come in small batches. The final challenge for this department was to determine how to iterate new products and which distribution channels to use. The case chronicles the development of Opple's e-commerce business unit between 2012 and 2019. During this period, the team continuously optimized different links, including product development, production, manufacturing, logistics, warehousing, marketing and after-sales service. It also adjusted organizational structure, pursued an innovative talent management approach and improved its performance incentive system. The BU's efforts paid off as online sales rose to make up 30% of total revenue in 2019, up from 6.5% in 2003. E-commerce became a new growth driver for Opple. The BU also spearheaded changes in the company's working culture, structure and incentive system. In 2020, however, Opple witnessed a decline in both online profit and growth rates as competition intensified. What lessons can Opple draw from its journey into e-commerce to be better prepared for the future?

ZBJ.com (ZBJ), an online platform that connects knowledge workers to small and medium-sized enterprises, is China's largest outsourcing platform. Founded by Mingyue Zhu in 2006, ZBJ had grown into a unicorn with 4,000 employees and a daily transaction volume of RMB15 million by 2017. During the company's 11-year history, ZBJ had launched ten transformation campaigns to overcome various challenges by changing its products, operations, and business model. For example, it encountered winner-takes-all competition, disintermediation (when service providers and clients took transactions off the platform to avoid the platform's 20% commission fees), the rise of fake transactions, member management issues, and difficulties in delivering satisfactory services to large enterprises. Zhu must decide how to use the next campaign to address challenges that had emerged since the last campaign and how ZBJ should expand globally.

ZBJ.com (ZBJ), an online platform that connects knowledge workers to small and medium-sized enterprises, is China's largest outsourcing platform. Founded by Mingyue Zhu in 2006, ZBJ had grown into a unicorn with 4,000 employees and a daily transaction volume of RMB15 million by 2017. During the company's 11-year history, ZBJ had launched ten transformation campaigns to overcome various challenges by changing its products, operations, and business model. For example, it encountered winner-takes-all competition, disintermediation (when service providers and clients took transactions off the platform to avoid the platform's 20% commission fees), the rise of fake transactions, member management issues, and difficulties in delivering satisfactory services to large enterprises. Zhu must decide how to use the next campaign to address challenges that had emerged since the last campaign and how ZBJ should expand globally.

Founded in 2013 as a laundry service featuring online ordering for home pickup and delivery, China's edaixi (eWash) illustrated the online-to-offline (O2O) business model. As yet unclear in 2016 was the optimal way to organize third-party laundry service providers, locally sourced teams of freelancers, and in-house operations.

Founded in 2013 as a laundry service featuring online ordering for home pickup and delivery, China's edaixi (eWash) illustrated the online-to-offline (O2O) business model. As yet unclear in 2016 was the optimal way to organize third-party laundry service providers, locally sourced teams of freelancers, and in-house operations.