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In its first four years, Fancam Pty Ltd. (Fancam), a high-definition, 360-degree crowd-imaging business based in Cape Town, South Africa, had enjoyed considerable growth that was driven in part by its network of resellers around the world. However, the structure and incentives of the reseller channel were becoming too difficult for the business to manage. By February 2015, Fancam's chief executive officer was considering how to fix the firm's channel management strategy. He was considering the use of reseller exclusivity agreements and wondered how to manage such agreements. He also wondered how to improve the company's multi-faceted sales incentive structure, whether to replace resellers with an in-house sales force, and what role these decisions would have on the brand positioning of his company’s product.

This case follows Lebanese entrepreneur, Hind Hobeika, an engineer and competitive swimmer who spends seven years trying to launch a wearable heartrate monitor and motion sensor to help swimmers track their performance while swimming. While the Beirut-based entrepreneur gained initial traction soon after founding her company Instabeat in September 2011, winning $150,000 in prize money from business plan competitions and raising $100,000 from a local venture capital firm, Hobeika soon faced a series of set-backs in trying to manufacture the product. Given the complexity of the hardware product she was trying to build, Hobeika had invested a significant amount of capital in the manufacturing design and had faced continuous delays. In addition, the product was not proving to be economically viable. By early 2016, Hobeika was out of money and had to let her team go. The business issues had also taken a toll on her personal life. However, Hobeika saw a potential path forward. The VC who had originally backed her was closing a new round of funding and was willing to discuss another potential round. More importantly, while in London, she had recently met Alex Asseily, a prominent Lebanese-British entrepreneur who encouraged her to stay the course. He suggested that she relocate to San Francisco, where he would soon be based, and offered to help her. Would it be worthwhile to leave everything behind, relocate, and rebuild the business? Hobeika had to decide: should she continue or not? If so, under what circumstances? If not, what would she do next?

Two recent university graduates were completing a business plan in hopes of securing a government grant to assist them in coming up with the necessary funding to launch a new venture. The pair had developed an idea to launch a new food delivery mobile application. In order to complete the grant application, three years of projected cash budgets, statements of earnings, and statements of financial position would be required. It was spring, and the pair hoped to have the mobile application ready for launch in early autumn.

The case describes how a loss-making ferry company was brought back to financial health, modernised and recapitalised in less than two years, amidst a context of political pressure, stakeholder hostility and a €600 million fine from the European Union. The Société Nationale Maritime Corse Méditerranée (SNCM) was sinking under the weight of French blockades and belligerent unions. Ferries were hijacked and a million people took to the streets to protest against potential job losses, disrupting passenger services to/from Corsica at the peak of the summer season. In May 2014, Guillaume de Feydeau was appointed CEO to devise a turnaround plan to save the former state-owned company from bankruptcy. The new management team not only had to master the political and social intricacies of the situation, but time was of the essence: the majority shareholder wanted out and cash was running dangerously low.

In 2018, the leaders of Cisca Engineering Ltd. (CEL), a small engineering firm in Waterloo, Ontario, faced a decision about whether to go beyond their normal pay scale in order to hire a mechanical engineering candidate they desperately wanted. The company was struggling to attract top talent since its normal base salary capabilities were thought to be lower than those of larger firms. Considering the trade-offs, the company president weighed the potentially negative effect on overall employee morale with the advantages of having a needed new employee. Should he offer the candidate the pipe stress analyst position at a lower salary and risk being turned down? Should he offer the salary the candidate wanted and risk upsetting his other employees if they found out? Should he revamp his compensation system and increase salary levels for all of the company’s engineers?

As Shanghai MarcPoint Information Technology Co. Ltd. (MarcPoint) celebrated its fifth anniversary, its founder was quite pleased by what the company had achieved. MarcPoint was a start-up that offered marketing research services by analyzing user-generated content (UGC) with big-data technologies. The company had been successful and grown steadily since its inception in 2013. It was founded upon the realization that UGC was disrupting traditional marketing research and that big-data analytics provided the technological means to analyze the UGC efficiently and effectively. In 2018, the founder reflected on what MarcPoint’s next steps should be: What technologies should they pursue? Which markets could they target for growth in the next five years? Should they try to transport MarcPoint’s success to overseas markets? All in all, what needed to be done to sustain MarcPoint’s growth and maintain its leading position in the turbulent technical and business environment?

This case provides an overview of the founding and scaling of Chinese artificial intelligence-enabled adaptive learning company Squirrel AI. The case details founder Derek Haoyang Li's struggles to build and scale a comprehensive cutting-edge product and accompanying business model for China's large and growing after-school education industry.

Vazirani Automotive Pvt. Ltd. debuted its first electric hypercar, the Vazirani Shul, in July 2018 at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in West Sussex, England. The Shul was promoted as the first electric hypercar from India; however, although the company was headquartered in Mumbai, India, its manufacturing and design hubs were in California, United States. The Shul was considered unique because the car offered a blend of art and science, in contrast to other hypercars that were designed to appear aggressive and driven completely by science.<br>If successful, the Shul has the opportunity to become the world’s first electric car with a jet turbine-electric powertrain, expected to hit Indian roads by 2021. Could the Shul be successful in India and in the global markets? With design and manufacturing centres in the United States, should the Shul be positioned as an Indian car? Was the strategy of blending art and science in a car unique, and was it a recipe for success?

In November 2018, a co-owner of House of Lasagna, a chain of casual dining restaurants in the Philippines, was considering different marketing strategies to increase customer awareness of the chain’s brand and unique menu. The company had seven restaurants in November 2018 and a target of 25 restaurants by 2020. She was concerned about the customer satisfaction survey that the company conducted every year. The survey reported high customer satisfaction but comparatively low brand awareness. The co-owner knew that high brand awareness was critical for growth. What marketing strategies could House of Lasagna use to increase its brand awareness? Future growth and expansion strategies were most important. Would a loyalty program help increase customer retention?

In January 2017, the Midea Group Co. Ltd. (Midea), a China-based large manufacturer of electrical appliances, completed its acquisition of German-based KUKA AG (KUKA), a large manufacturer of industrial robots. To ease concerns about technologies falling into foreign hands, Midea entered into an alliance with KUKA that ensured KUKA’s independence until 2023. However, within less than a year, KUKA experienced problems in its European and Asian markets. In China, it needed to lower costs. In Europe, a price war slowed down the orders, and the company had insufficient workers to meet demand in the United States and Asia. Some German automotive clients were losing trust in KUKA, and German employees worried about their job security. How could the two companies operate sufficiently independently to maintain their clients' trust, while being integrated enough to improve their efficiencies? How should they be prepared for the expiration of the alliance in 2023?

In 2012, the founders of food wholesale company FoodXervices Inc. Pte. Ltd. identified a gap between food wastage and food insecurity in Singapore. To reduce this gap, they established a charity arm, The Food Bank Singapore Ltd., which operated as a liaison, collecting near-to-expiry, excess, and unwanted food products from food suppliers, retailers, and restaurants for distribution to beneficiary organizations. When the charity was founded, it was set up to be legally independent to ensure clearer accounts and audits and to prevent false allegations of misuse of food donations. In April 2018, the founders were considering integrating these two now-mature entities to take advantage of potential internal and external synergies. They needed to determine the optimal way to integrate the two entities, while considering the needs of all stakeholders.

Teach For Lebanon (TFL) was a non-profit organization (NFP) founded in response to the national problem of low quality public education. The case examines the sustainability challenges that TFL faced in a developing country, covering the financial, legal, and social dilemmas that NFPs struggled with. The case tracks TFL’s innovative solutions to enhance the organization’s financial sustainability and considers scaling-up and initiating a new business to generate additional income. Using benchmarking, students can invent and list their own suggestions for enhancing NFPs’ financial sustainability.

Organic Wellness Products Private Limited (Organic Wellness) was founded in 2015 with the aim to create a sustainable venture for organic products that would boost agricultural entrepreneurship and benefit society by generating rural employment and value creation. By May 2018, Organic Wellness’s market had grown considerably, and the company was exporting to 27 countries around the world and had a pan-Indian presence. While its innovative marketing strategy—free of big spending—had worked well for the organization, the founder needed to decide if he would continue with the same style of cause-related marketing, or whether it was time to invest in marketing channels to create better consumer outreach.

In early 2018, Modena, Italy’s Pagani Automobili S.p.A (Pagani Automobili), a boutique designer and manufacturer of high-performance internal combustion engine powered supercars, was struggling to develop a response to the emergence of electric vehicle technology. This technology appeared to be interesting and potentially useful. It outperformed internal combustion technology in terms of speed and power. In 2018, relatively inexpensive electric cars could already accelerate faster than most supercars over a quarter-mile distance. However, the electric car driving experience seemed very different from the experience of driving a supercar powered by an internal combustion engine, due largely to fundamental differences between the technologies. Could Pagani Automobili build an electric vehicle that its customers would perceive as a true Pagani Automobili creation?

Family businesses are unique and complex; they have aspects and layers to them that are unlike any other organizations because at the root of family businesses' identities are the aspirations of both the business and the family's members, which could be at odds with one another. This note-a meta-analysis drawn from many authors' work-explores an approach that identifies ways to unify family and business, examining new possibilities and building a strong resiliency in the process. This analysis of various characteristics within family businesses provides opportunities to learn about how families are unique, offers examples of family businesses (when possible), and, most importantly, leads to clear recommendations.

Public entrepreneurship is much like its private sector counterpart; however, public entrepreneurs face additional challenges due to weaker competitive forces in the public as compared to private sector, with objectives that often are poorly defined and performance that is difficult to measure. Despite the impact on public good, how to enact changes successfully in public sector organizations to be more entrepreneurial is poorly understood. This article summarizes current research on public entrepreneurship and presents a detailed case study of a successful entrepreneurial change in a public sector organization. A five-step change process used to enhance entrepreneurial behaviors was implemented in a public sector organization and the qualitative and quantitative results demonstrated substantial performance improvements over 4 years (i.e., quantitative performance in some areas was more than 10 times greater). We explain key steps that produced successful outcomes and how to avoid common challenges in the implementation of ongoing entrepreneurial behaviors in public sector contexts.

This is a two-part case series. Case A begins in October 2012, when Encompass Singapore has introduced innovative ways to increase the capacity of its facility to cope with its fierce growth over the past few years in the Pay-tv industry. The company has captured over 50% of the market for outsourced digital playout services in Asia. The sheer speed of growth that Encompass Singapore is experiencing calls for an innovative, solutions-driven approach to almost all aspects of the business. Growth in the media industry is costly and capital intensive. At the same time, the group is facing increased competition. Process innovation has been critical in supporting the growth of the company since 2009, but can that alone continue to fuel double-digit growth? Case B is set in April 2019, when the media industry has shifted gear, and Pay-tv demand is declining. Online television content and Video on Demand services have instead started to see a growing demand in the market and Encompass is forced to adjust its strategy to cope with changing industry and market. Can process innovation continue to support the growth of the company amidst technology disruption and changing trends? What can be Encompass's growth strategy moving forward?

This is a two-part case series. Case A begins in October 2012, when Encompass Singapore has introduced innovative ways to increase the capacity of its facility to cope with its fierce growth over the past few years in the Pay-tv industry. The company has captured over 50% of the market for outsourced digital playout services in Asia. The sheer speed of growth that Encompass Singapore is experiencing calls for an innovative, solutions-driven approach to almost all aspects of the business. Growth in the media industry is costly and capital intensive. At the same time, the group is facing increased competition. Process innovation has been critical in supporting the growth of the company since 2009, but can that alone continue to fuel double-digit growth? Case B is set in April 2019, when the media industry has shifted gear, and Pay-tv demand is declining. Online television content and Video on Demand services have instead started to see a growing demand in the market and Encompass is forced to adjust its strategy to cope with changing industry and market. Can process innovation continue to support the growth of the company amidst technology disruption and changing trends? What can be Encompass's growth strategy moving forward?

In 2018, the Singapore-based telecommunication operator StarHub Ltd. (StarHub) acknowledged that in 2017 its total revenue was relatively flat and its net profit had declined. In the face of rising competition and a slowing global economy, the company needed to explore new sources of revenue growth. Two areas of growth seemed promising. The first area involved the launch of StarHub's smart retail analytics for small and medium enterprises in the retail food and beverages industry, which had been experiencing a high churn rate. The second area would apply StarHub's new robotics and automation solutions in the labour-intensive hospitality industry, which suffered from an oversupply of properties and would likely see exits and consolidation. StarHub needed to choose between the two investment options.

In May 2018, B9 Beverages Private Limited (B9 Beverages), the owner of craft beer Bira 91, reached a total of over US$100 million in funding after receiving $50 million from Sofina SA, a Belgian investment firm. This third round of funding would allow the company to meet the various objectives that the founder and chief executive officer had planned for the company’s new Bira 91. He wanted his India business to break even by 2019 and expand fivefold over the next three years. He also wanted to establish a leadership position in the Indian premium beer market. The company also planned to launch Bira 91 as a public company through an initial public offering within the next few years. His long-term goal was to make Bira 91 a product rooted in India, as well as a global leader in craft beer. As the market and competition continued to grow, B9 Beverages had to develop a strategy to differentiate Bira 91 in the crowded global beer market.