個案總覽

PowerPoint supplement to case 723351

PowerPoint supplement to case 723351

Grove Collaborative (herein Grove), both a manufacturer of household/personal-care products and an online marketplace offering its own products and those of third parties, was led by its founder Stu Landesberg. The case was set in February, 2020 - eight years after its founding as "ePantry" and during a time when the company had attained a "unicorn" billion dollar valuation. Despite Grove's rapid growth as a private company, and its prior accomplishments in environmental sustainability (e.g., its status as a certified B Corporation - a concept reviewed in greater depth in Question 1), Landesberg had identified that Grove needed to do more to address the issue of plastic waste to both help the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) meet an important 2025 goal and to help continue Grove's track-record as a leader in environmental sustainability. In particular, Landesberg had decided to aggressively eliminate plastic from all products sold on its online marketplace in approximately five years. What Landesberg was unsure about is how to go about this transition. In particular, Landesberg was contemplating whether or not to make a public pledge to eliminate plastics by 2025. A sense of urgency was provided by three factors: first, the consumer packaged goods (CPG) sector's lack of progress toward the UNEP's goal - a lack of progress with serious and potentially irreversible environmental consequences; second, the need to start working aggressively toward developing plastic-free versions of products - a need based on Grove's widespread use of plastic components in products sold on its online marketplace and the current lack of technology to easily and/or cheaply eliminate plastics from key CPG products; and third, the behaviors of competitors that approach, or might overtake, the leadership of Grove as a sustainability innovator. The case turns on deciding whether a five-year plastic pledge was helpful in simultaneously promoting environmental sustainability and

Eco Cookstoves (EC), an American social enterprise teamed up with the ZSB Foundation in 2007 to reduce indoor air pollution. This case describes EC's strategy of developing custom high-performance cookstoves for the base of the pyramid (BOP) households and its expansion into Honduras and Mexico that began in 2011. The social enterprise was successful in opening an assembly plant in Honduras in 2014 by partnering with the Honduran Government. While the government programs enabled EC to partner with a local non-profit to distribute free eco-friendly planchas to Honduran customers, such programs did not exist in Mexico. So, in 2015, EC had to decide which foreign entry strategy was right for the Mexican market. This case gives instructors the unique opportunity to discuss environmental sustainability issues, apply the Triple Bottomline framework in the context of international entry strategies, and effective social innovation to mitigate indoor air pollution and climate risk.

Indiagro is a national-level farmer produce company (FPC) primarily operating in the government-to-business (G2B) segment. The National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd. (NAFED) and the Department of Consumer Affairs have appointed Indiagro to procure 10,000 tonnes of onions from the Bhavnagar and Amreli districts in Gujarat under the Price Stabilisation Fund (PSF). This case discusses the challenges Indiagro's chairperson, Padma Shri Genabhai Patel, faces at different levels of onion procurement. Since onion is a perishable commodity, this process has its own set of dynamics and complexities. The case tries to examine how Indiagro managed its supply chain operations and developed its systems and processes around these complexities. It focuses on the substantial role Indiagro plays in filling the institutional voids in the agricultural commodity markets in India. It helps understand the value created by Indiagro for its member farmers compared to when they operate individually or through the Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC).

The case is set in the fall of 2022. The protagonist is Barry McCarthy, who replaced John Foley, Peloton's founder, as CEO earlier that year. Peloton Interactive, Inc. (Peloton) is a fitness and media company specializing in internet-connected exercise equipment such as stationary bicycles and treadmills. Over the 2018-2021 period, Peloton grew its revenues at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 110%. Yet, by 2022, Peloton was in crisis. Total revenues remained flat at $3.6 billion, and Peloton lost almost $3 billion that year. Its market cap had fallen 94% from a peak of nearly $50 billion (2021) to less than $3 billion (2022). Barry McCarthy's strategic intent is to pivot Peloton to a subscription-based content business. Previously, when serving as chief financial officer at Netflix and Spotify, Barry McCarthy successfully implemented a content-based subscription model. Can he achieve similar success at Peloton?

Founded in 2017, Simply Good Jars (SGJ) was launched with the introduction of a unique salad-in-a-jar line of products. The founder, owner, and chief executive officer of SGJ was looking to build a ready-to-eat salad business with a mission of “making better-quality delicious food more attainable.” The SGJ brand promoted healthy, quality ingredients and sustainability. Initially, the product was tested in various locations, including vending machines in airports and businesses, and coolers in grocery stores. After achieving early success, SGJ’s founder quickly found pressure to balance growth opportunities with limited financial resources. In 2022, five years after starting the business, he had to decide whether to scale up and mass market SGJ’s products or continue to serve a niche segment through the company’s salad-in-a-jar business.

In March 2020, Canadian-based venture Braze Mobility was experiencing growth challenges. The company had commercialized an anti-collision system to enable safe wheelchair navigation, which had been well received by the US market following a fruitful collaboration with the US Department of Veterans Affairs. The chief executive officer of Braze Mobility was now facing some big decisions. Should the company continue to expand its current export model, diversify into the Canadian market, or tap into growing online demand directly from consumers? Compounding the complexity of the problem was the departure of a key member of the team and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Braze Mobility was well positioned for growth, but its next steps would be crucial to its success or failure.<br><br>Related case: Academic Entrepreneurship: Navigating Commercialization Challenges, product number W28370.

Founded in 2017, Simply Good Jars (SGJ) was launched with the introduction of a unique salad-in-a-jar line of products. The founder, owner, and chief executive officer of SGJ was looking to build a ready-to-eat salad business with a mission of "making better-quality delicious food more attainable." The SGJ brand promoted healthy, quality ingredients and sustainability. Initially, the product was tested in various locations, including vending machines in airports and businesses, and coolers in grocery stores. After achieving early success, SGJ's founder quickly found pressure to balance growth opportunities with limited financial resources. In 2022, five years after starting the business, he had to decide whether to scale up and mass market SGJ's products or continue to serve a niche segment through the company's salad-in-a-jar business.

In March 2020, Canadian-based venture Braze Mobility was experiencing growth challenges. The company had commercialized an anti-collision system to enable safe wheelchair navigation, which had been well received by the US market following a fruitful collaboration with the US Department of Veterans Affairs. The chief executive officer of Braze Mobility was now facing some big decisions. Should the company continue to expand its current export model, diversify into the Canadian market, or tap into growing online demand directly from consumers? Compounding the complexity of the problem was the departure of a key member of the team and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Braze Mobility was well positioned for growth, but its next steps would be crucial to its success or failure. Related case: Academic Entrepreneurship: Navigating Commercialization Challenges, product number W28370.

Proactive for her began amid the Covid-19 pandemic, in August 2020 as a digital platform to provide accessible, evidence-based, primary, preventive non-judgmental healthcare services for Indian women, who were often dissuaded from seeking help as premarital sex and menstrual health was considered taboo. From her research and experience, Jacob identified that it was difficult for women to find unbiased and empathetic medical professionals who respected patient autonomy. By May 2022, Proactive was a platform that provided one-on-one teleconsultations, support programs, and webinars to customized treatment. It had reached over 5,000 women and opened its first flagship clinic in Bengaluru. It raised $1.2 million in its seed round in October 2020 and $5.5 million in Series A in January 2022. Proactive experimented with new solutions and products, with patient centricity at its core but as it prepared for Series B, had to figure out what business model would allow it to build a sustainable and profitable business that addressed the core issues?

In March 2022, investors at venture capital firm QED consider strategy for establishing business in Africa.

AllSpice, a software-as-a-service company that built a GitHub-like revision control tool for hardware engineers, was in the midst of preparing for rapid scale when the 2022 market downturn left them with big decisions to make. Cofounder and CEO Valentina Ratner had to map out the company's path to a successful Series A while deciding on how they should dedicate their resources. Early customer discovery experiments showed that engineers had an interest in the product, but Ratner needed to figure out the go-to-market motion they should focus their effort on: a bottoms-up freemium model, a top-down enterprise model, or something in between that relied on targeting engineers directly through inside sales efforts. Leading into her April board meeting, Ratner devised a plan to share with her investors.

Prepandemic, small business exits were expected to increase dramatically owing to pent-up supply and the aging business owner population. COVID-19 may have dampened those expectations because of increasing information asymmetries that limited selling options for the small business owner (SBO). SBOs exit for many reasons (e.g., illness, family, retirement), so postponing a sale may not be a viable option. Alternately, SBOs can absorb crisis uncertainty by accepting different deal terms. We propose that one such strategy is to include seller financing as part of the deal terms, thereby signaling to the acquirer the SBOs' confidence that the purchase is sound. We examine the results of 1,909 exit transactions from both before and after the financial crisis of 2007--2009 and over a 10-year postcrisis horizon. We find that sellers accept a lower price and less favorable terms with increased seller financing in the 24 months postcrisis, and that waiting longer to sell after the crisis improves deal terms for sellers, as this affords SBOs time to exit. Additionally, reduced information asymmetry improves deal terms. Finally, we provide strategies for SBOs to lower information asymmetry in small business exits.

Fake it 'til you make it--that is, deceptively claiming a new endeavor exhibits characteristics of successful entrepreneurial ventures to gain support from others--has become an accepted practice in entrepreneurship. One overlooked hazard of this strategy is that entrepreneurs' efforts to fake it can become a slippery slope in which the deception escalates to a point where stakeholders accuse entrepreneurs of committing fraud. We delineate that the responsible use of faking it in entrepreneurial endeavors rests on entrepreneurs' full appreciation of the determinants that make turning fiction into fact less and not more difficult. Leveraging prior research to offer new insights, we outline these determinates as controllable vs. uncontrollable elements, sole vs. contingent entrepreneurial action, and limited vs. extensive stakeholder interactions. We also look at faking it examples Lordstown Motors and uBiome, two startups whose founders engaged in and escalated faking it to the point where stakeholders accused them of fraud.

The case describes the scientific approach taken by the founders of Mimoto - an electric scooter-sharing company offering dockless, keyless scooters available 24/7 - to develop their business idea. After a successful launch, they must decide whether to scale up their current strategy of renting scooters to individual customers or enter a new segment - renting to businesses (moving goods rather than people).

By 2021, Manvendra "Manny" Saxena had acquired three small California street sweeping firms through a search fund and had combined them under the umbrella company PowerSweeping. Consistent with the search fund model, his goal was to streamline PowerSweeping's operations, help it grow, and then one day sell it at a high valuation. That was easier said than done. The three firms that made up PowerSweeping played in two different sweeping subindustries--municipal and construction--which used different equipment, served different types of customers, and had different revenue characteristics. The firms also employed both non-unionized and unionized workers from two unions, which limited Saxena's ability to integrate them. As Saxena generated a strategy, he also faced increased fuel, repair, maintenance, parts, and labor costs in the post-COVID environment, as well as intense competitive pressure from ASC, the largest street sweeping conglomerate in the United States. ASC was eyeing a roll-up merger through California and had made an offer to buy PowerSweeping--though the offer was less than what Saxena believed was its actual value. How could Saxena quickly streamline PowerSweeping and stave off inflation and competition long enough to unlock the company's true value for himself and his investors?

This exercise and its accompanying handouts, designed to be used in courses for non-MBA audiences that explore aspects of entrepreneurship, guide students through the development of their very own business plan. From researching and deciding on a business concept, to developing prospective customer profiles and understanding target markets, to creating financial and operations projections, this set of materials helps students step by step as they build a deliverable, functional business plan over the course of multiple class sessions.

Handout for Exercise UV8571