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Student spreadsheet for case W13196.

Jumbo Group Ltd. (Jumbo) was among Singapore’s leading food and beverage establishments. Founded in 1987, the group consisted of eight brands and operated 16 outlets—14 in Singapore and two in China. On October 28, 2015, Jumbo announced its initial public offering (IPO) of SG$22.06 million, consisting of two million retail shares and 86.23 million placement shares at SG$0.25 each. In this highly competitive market, the company’s chief executive officer and chairman was motivated to list Jumbo so it would have a bigger platform and better exposure to grow faster. He hoped a softer IPO market would attract more long-term investors. Jumbo was clearly profitable, but based on its past financial performance, what would be a reasonable valuation for each of its shares? The case covers valuation using the discounted cash flow model, weighted average cost of capital, discounted dividend model, and relative valuation, as well as the computation of underpricing.

The senior director of marketing for Strength Pharma, an Indian sports nutrition company, was managing the November 2016 launch of the company’s whey protein supplement, Muscle-RDX. This product would be the first protein supplement approved by the Food Safety and Standard Authority of India for athletes who participated in high-endurance sports. Muscle-RDX would provide a domestic option for Indian athletes who competed in these sports and who wanted to purchase affordable supplements that delivered effective results. However, before the product launch, the senior director of marketing needed to develop demand forecasts, which would determine the most appropriate pricing strategy and package size for the new product.

BrightStar Care was a rapidly growing franchise of home health care agencies. Founded by husband and wife team JD and Shelly Sun as a single agency near Chicago in 2002, by 2016 nearly 300 BrightStar franchises were open across the United States, generating over $300 million in revenue. BrightStar was now a very different company from the one Shelly and JD had started up during their first year of marriage. Shelly Sun, CEO, had decided to franchise the business in 2004, believing that the franchise model presented a relatively low-risk and high-return approach to growing BrightStar. As franchises began to sell, Sun quickly set about building scalable operations and infrastructure, including a centralized technology function and custom software for franchisees. As more and more locations opened around the United States, she focused on growing BrightStar's national marketing profile and putting measures in place to distinguish BrightStar's services as higher-quality than that of its competitors. A shifting regulatory landscape and labor shortages posed challenge, but BrightStar continued to grow swiftly. As the company evolved and Sun attempted to spend more time away from headquarters, surveying the field and building relationships, she knew she needed a strong senior management team. Some members of her senior team had been with BrightStar for years, expanding their responsibilities as the company expanded, while others she recruited from outside. In the early 2010s, Sun was close to filling all BrightStar's crucial executive roles, but had to consider whether some longtime leaders were the right fit for the company's current needs. As she thought through the composition of her senior team, she also revamped her board of advisors and pursued international franchising opportunities and a debt recapitalization. By early 2016, Shelly was looking to the company's next phase of growth while handing management of her executive team to BrightStar's President and COO.

In 2007, the founders of Airbnb were looking to solve a problem and ended up transforming their idea into a $10 billion company. What started as a quick website to advertise an overnight stay on their apartment airbeds along with breakfast in the morning eventually grew into an online accommodation booking business that spanned the world. Airbnb used its business model to carve out an extremely important space in an already crowded industry. However, along with success came challenges in terms of the scalability of its business model. In 2014, Airbnb was also facing legal challenges by state attorneys general that could make its business model suspect. The founders had to decide whether to defend their business model in a court of law and in the court of public opinion, or change it.

In September 2013, Sanjit “Bunker” Roy was honoured with an award for his vision and leadership in addressing global problems through his novel organization, Barefoot College (Barefoot). Barefoot’s mission was to improve the lives of impoverished rural residents by upgrading their existing skills with training so the villages and their residents were self-sufficient. When he started the college in the state of Rajasthan, India, in 1972, Roy never dreamed that Barefoot would be able to affect the lives of millions of people in 24 countries. Barefoot’s global footprint was spreading at a rapid pace with requests for even more locations. Roy wondered whether he should freeze the organization in its present state or continue to increase its presence with a centralized headquarters. Alternatively, he could replicate the autonomous model on a smaller scale, still adherent to the beliefs, values, and assumptions that were the foundation of Barefoot College. This case won second prize at the ISB-Ivey Global Case Competition 2016 in the overall category.

In 2014, the Patient Room of the Future (PRoF) was the largest European open innovation consortium in the healthcare sector. Established in 2009 by a group of manufacturers who were suppliers to the health care sector, PRoF brought more than 300 professionals from multiple disciplines and industries together to think about and contribute to the future of the health care industry. The consortium derived its power from a novel interdisciplinary approach, resulting in the successful completion of four projects. Yet its future presented many unanswered questions: How would PRoF continue to provide an innovative and dynamic environment for its members and stakeholders in the healthcare sector? How would PRoF’s projects achieve large-scale adoption, and what resources were needed to do that? What was the next step in the consortium’s development?

In January 2016, the chief executive officer of Apollo Gleneagles Hospitals (AGH) was reflecting on the 12-year journey that had led to the establishment of AGH as the strongest pillar of holistic healthcare in Eastern India. AGH brought together the best infrastructure, equipment, people, and systems to serve the people of Eastern India with end-to-end tertiary healthcare. The institution grew with a continuous drive for expanding knowledge, introducing the latest technologies, and building a culture of compassion and care. However, AGH’s success had led to a shift in focus, drawing the attention of several leading tertiary care hospitals to the untapped healthcare delivery potential in Eastern India. This shift meant increased competition for AGH and higher expectations from its customers. AGH wanted to maintain its leadership position and better understand the organization’s future challenges and focus areas. Which business model would best serve the people of India: expanding the current location or launching a multi-location facility? How could AGH maintain its current high level of recognition, expertise, and availability?

In the spring of 2015, a marketing professor from Indore City in India was looking for an academic, entrepreneurial opportunity that would allow him to work alongside his wife. The professor came across a franchise proposal for a preschool with Delhi-based Wonder Kidz Education Pvt. Ltd. The total investment in the project would be approximately ?625,000, and cash profits would come in the first year. After discussing the opportunity with the company’s director, the professor was interested in taking on the franchise. However, not being an expert in finance, he was confused about the calculations and decided to seek an opinion on the financial feasibility of the project before making his decision.

Researchers at the Ontario Veterinary College had formed a company, Immuno-Genetics Inc., to develop new technologies to measure the immune response of dairy cows by using a blood test and skin thickness test on individual cows. Cows who showed a high immune response were unlikely to contract a number of common diseases. The test results thus allowed dairy producers to determine the likelihood of cows having health problems over their lifetimes. This information was valuable in managing a dairy herd to optimize performance and minimize health costs. Immuno-Genetics' early marketing research supported the launch of the technology, but an effective marketing strategy had to be developed. Immuno-Genetics had to determine who should be targeted, what products should be sold to each target, how the products should be priced, and what method of distribution to use. In addition, a promotional strategy needed to be developed for the product launch, and sales and profit projections needed to be made for the first two years of operations.

Alchemist Accelerator follows the story of Ravi Belani, founder and Managing Director of Alchemist Accelerator, as he leads one of the leading enterprise-focused accelerators in Silicon Valley. The case discusses the origins of the program, as well as the many challenges faced by Belani and his team as they seek out potential methods of scaling the program. The management team debate difficult choices, such as how to preserve the quality of the Alchemist program while also reacting to rapidly changing market dynamics. This case prepares students who are interested in learning more about venture capital, enterprise startups, and enterprise-focused accelerators.

In April 2015, Ian Shakil and Pelu Tran, co-founders of Augmedix, are discussing how to grow their emerging health care startup. The company's sole product, also called Augmedix, streams video of doctor-patient interactions to remote medical scribes, thus freeing doctors from the burden of having to manually input information into an electronic medical record (EMR) and giving them additional time to focus on patients. Shakil and Tran had grown the company by allowing any qualified doctor or health system to use the service, but are now discussing whether they should segment the market and focus on a particular type of client. They also wonder whether Augmedix's current pricing appropriately reflects the value their service provides. Lastly, the two want to discuss how to staff and structure the company's nascent sales function as Augmedix grows.

Fola Laoye is the Group Managing Director of Hygeia Group, a Nigerian healthcare insurer and provider, and she is deciding on the optimal strategy to grow the provider arm of her business. Hygeia Group was founded in the 1980s by her physician parents, and although operating a healthcare company in Nigeria offered challenges particularly in human resources and infrastructure, by 2011, it had expanded to include three hospital and clinic sites and a large insurance company. The company has just received a large equity investment from an international private equity company, and it has decided to focus on expanding tertiary care capabilities in its hospitals. A consulting team has identified cardiology, oncology and advanced surgery (orthopedic and minimally invasive) as areas with strategic potential. However, Ms. Laoye must decide which of these options offers the greatest growth opportunities. In addition, as her company grows, she must decide the how best to structure the payor and provider aspects of her business in a way that maximizes synergies for both.

In late 2011, Netflix was migrating from its highly successful business model of delivering DVDs by mail to streaming movies and other media content directly to subscribers' televisions. To be profitable, Netflix decided to charge more for receiving DVDs by mail—a service that its existing customers had come to expect as a minor add-on to their original subscription arrangement. This charge led to a huge backlash: subscribers defected and Netflix's stock price dropped. Netflix faced the dilemma of remaining profitable in the video streaming business while paying much more for content and dealing with competition that had been absent in its DVD-by-mail business model. The company was at a crossroads; the path it chose would affect its future. Should it return to combining the two services or continue with two separate services and live with the consequences?<br><br>This case is a follow-up to Netflix, 9B09M093, and precedes Netflix: Proving the Skeptics Wrong, 9B16M081.

Netflix, a subscription-based movie and television show rental service, offered content to subscribers either via DVDs delivered by mail, or through Internet-based streaming. After splitting the two services, the company lost subscribers, and its stock price plummeted. Most observers were skeptical that Netflix could maintain its profit margins, given the increased cost of acquiring streamable content. However, Netflix not only reduced its cost per user but also increased its subscriber growth both in the United States and internationally. Were these moves sufficient to deliver the growth needed to support its rising stock price? Netflix also faced increased streaming costs because it used disproportionately more bandwidth than other streaming companies. Would these costs mean that the Netflix business model was no longer viable?<br><br>This is a follow-up case to Netflix, 9B09M093, which describes the company’s innovative business model of delivering DVDs by mail, and Netflix Inc.: The Second Act—Moving into Streaming, 9B16M080, which describes the after-effects of the dual-subscription model.

In October 2014, the chief executive officer (CEO) of a high-end, invite-only digital branding firm was contemplating which (if any) web analytics service the company should offer to its clients. The CEO knew that in order to justify the high price his firm charged its executive and celebrity clientele, all ancillary services like web analytics reporting would have to be just as extravagant and just as functional as the core product-branded website design. With three web analytics options on the table, all with relatively similar characteristics yet vastly different price points, the firm had to identify the differentiated advantages of each option.

Infinity Life Insurance Company was a joint venture between two Indian public sector banks and a U.K.-based insurance firm. The company began its operations in November 2009, as the youngest entrant in the life insurance market in India. Within three years of launching operations, it ranked among the top 10 private firms for new business premiums. When the joint venture project started, the senior leadership group identified numerous challenges and various strategies to address those challenges (detailed in this case). The company connected its basic business strategies to a set of human resource strategies, which were then applied through various human resource processes (detailed in case B). With the Indian government focusing on further liberalization in the insurance sector, the joint venture needed to be ready for the next leap. Which processes should it continue, and which needed to be changed?

Supplement for product 9B16C036.

In October 2014, the chief executive officer (CEO) of a high-end, invite-only digital branding firm was contemplating which (if any) web analytics service the company should offer to its clients. The CEO knew that in order to justify the high price his firm charged its executive and celebrity clientele, all ancillary services like web analytics reporting would have to be just as extravagant and just as functional as the core product—branded website design. With three web analytics options on the table, all with relatively similar characteristics yet vastly different price points, the firm had to identify the differentiated advantages of each option.