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HSBC is one of the largest and most global financial institutions in the world. The company has identified Bital, Mexico's fourth largest bank, as a potential acquisition target. Negotiations have come down to the wire, and the controlling Mexican shareholders are trying to get HSBC to raise its offer. Is it worth it? HSBC must decide on both strategic and short-term financial criteria under some degree of uncertainty as illuminated by a due diligence process. The HSBC executive who has handled the acquisition at a local level, and would be chief executive officer of HSBC Mexico should the deal go ahead, is assessing the pros and cons of the acquisition and must also identify the priorities which he and his team would have to address, including culture change issues, re-branding Bital as HSBC Mexico, personnel issues and maintaining the continuity of the business.

A recent MBA graduate describes the joys and frustrations of an expatriate life - both at personal and professional levels - as experienced by a young, single woman. She has been living in Bangkok for three years and is slowly adjusting to the local way of life when she receives a job offer that will relocate her back to her home in Hawaii. Reaching a decision, however, is not easy given career-related uncertainties in both countries as well as the array of conflicting emotions that confront her. She must decide how to sort through these issues. Should she remain in Bangkok or return home? Her decision is complicated by the fact that she had not entertained the idea of returning to the United States.

A supervisor at a telesales office has received very low ratings on an employee survey and the marketing manager is concerned that this team leader is not performing well. The marketing manager must decide what actions are needed to improve the leadership skills of this supervisor.

A summer assignment is turning into a nightmare for an intern at a large consulting firm. He has just receive his third reprimand from his boss, and is concerned how this relationship is distracting him from the project he needs to complete and how it could hurt his chances of obtaining full-time employment. He must decide how he can salvage the relationship with his boss and whether this organization is the best fit for him.

Three engineering students consider the direction they should take with their award-winning design project, the Golf Swing Analyzer. Media attention to their project indicated that the idea had the potential to become a successful business venture. The students were unsure whether to manufacture and market the device themselves or sell the design to an interested party.

Broad Air Conditioning is a Chinese company with a proactive environmental attitude, but suffering from deteriorating financial results. The company founder and chief executive officer must decide whether to start producing electricity powered air conditioners to improve its financial results easily or stick to its ideal and only manufacture machines powered by heat. The major theme of this case is to understand corporate social responsibility, by discussing how an enterprise can find a way to harmonize the relationship between benefitting the company and protecting the environment, especially in developing countries.

Gorenje D.D. is a kitchen appliance manufacturer located in the small town of Velenje, in Slovenia, a newly independent country that separated from Yugoslavia in 1991. Simultaneous with gaining independence, Slovenia also underwent a change from the unique market socialism that had characterized socialist Yugoslavia, to free enterprise capitalism. Furthermore, manufacturing firms in Slovenia had produced largely for the Yugoslav market, while after independence they were forced to compete in the wider European market. The company faces new challenges and key decisions in corporate culture, human resources and competitive strategy to face a turbulent environment.

Microfinance is a field that has received increasing attention over the years in the development community. It consists of the delivery of financial services to people excluded from traditional banking institutions. For many years, most work was done on issues like credit and saving methodologies. However, the emphasis has switched in recent years to institutional sustainability to maximize impact through the commercialization of microfinance. A key component of microfinance commercialization is the mobilization of funds from money and capital markets, to decrease dependency on donors and governments and to enhance the financial intermediation of microfinance institutions. One of the most innovative ways to mobilize funds for microfinance lending is through the establishment of microfinance funds that channel investments from capital markets to microfinance institutions either as loans, guarantees or - less often - equity. BlueOrchard Finance has been a major actor in this arena through the management of the Dexia Microcredit Fund (DMCF). HKS Case Number 1762.0

In May 1996, two world renowned climbers, along with some of their clients and guides, perished on Mount Everest in the mountain's deadliest tragedy to date. The accounts of survivors imply that biased decision making contributed to the tragedy. Did a decision lead to this tragedy or was it an unfortunate mountaineering accident? The case provides the opportunity to explore decision biases such as framing, escalation of commitment, anchoring, and over confidence and the issues of leadership style, group behaviour, team management and communication.

The president of the Nutan Mumbai Tiffin Box Suppliers Charity Trust had just returned to his office after meeting with Britain's Prince Charles, who was on an official visit to Mumbai. The Trust was the managing organization of the dabbawallah meal delivery network. The dabbawallah's service was cited internationally by management scholars and industry executives as an exemplar in supply chain and service management. The service had acquired a reputation for its delivery reliability in Mumbai. International interest in the dabbawallahs was largely due to a 1998 article published by Forbes. However, many observers now expressed concerns over the future viability of the dabbawallahs' service given the difficulty in duplicating its delivery network elsewhere, the emergence of other lunch competitors in Mumbai, and an array of environmental changes affecting both its customers and the workforce. The case allows a discussion of service and supply chain management issues related to operational excellence.

Eli Lilly and Company is a leading U.S. pharmaceutical company. The new president of intercontinental operations is re-evaluating all of the company's divisions, including the joint venture with Ranbaxy Laboratories Limited, one of India's largest pharmaceutical companies. This joint venture has run smoothly for a number of years despite their differences in focus, but recently Ranbaxy was experiencing cash flow difficulties due to its network of international sales. In addition, the Indian government was changing regulations for businesses in India, and joining the World Trade Organization would have an effect on India's chemical and drug regulations. The president must determine if this international joint venture still fits Eli Lilly's strategic objectives.

Bombardier Transportation, one of the world's largest manufacturers of passenger rail cars, has successfully negotiated the purchase of Adtranz, a large European manufacturer of rail equipment. The newly appointed chief executive officer has been brought in to manage the acquisition. The new CEO faces many challenges including decisions about the pace of integration, location of headquarters, organization structure, personnel retention and personal management style. Students may use this case to discuss post-acquisition strategy and how fast companies should move to integrate acquisitions.

Jinjian Garment Factory is a large clothing manufacturer based in Shenzhen with distribution to Hong Kong and overseas. Although Shenzhen had become one of the most advanced garment manufacturing centres in the world, managers in this industry still had few effective ways of dealing with the collective and deliberate slow pace of work by the employees, of motivating workers, and of resolving the problem between seasonal production requirements and retention of skilled workers. However, the owner and managing director of the company must determine the reasons behind the deliberately slow pace of the workers, the pros and cons of the piecework system and the methods he could adopt to motivate the workers effectively.

ASIMCO International Casting Company, a joint venture between ASIMCO and Caterpillar, had recently finished several major projects designed to upgrade the manufacturing capabilities in its foundry. The plant was now under significant pressure to increase revenue, and had received an invitation to bid on a new customer order. While this order might provide the ideal opportunity to further upgrade its process technology and capabilities, significant challenges were presented by several critical product characteristics. Alternatively, the plant's limited resources could focus on meeting the internal needs of one of its partners. Caterpillar was expected to authorize test runs of two new products soon; however, the annual production volumes were very uncertain.

Cambridge Laboratories is essentially a fee-for-service provider of laboratory tests. It spends less than 0.5 per cent of revenues on research and development and holds relatively few patents for a biotech company. It now has an opportunity to invest $5 million to establish a joint venture with an Australian proteomics company that operates on a drug discovery (royalty) model. The founder of this company believed that his technology could eventually result in the discovery of new drugs that would generate significant royalties. While the proteomics firm has superb technology, some of the intellectual leaders in the field on its staff, and partnerships with some impressive companies, its technology is yet unproven. Cambridge Labs is also concerned that its existing relationships with big pharmaceutical companies could be jeopardized if it begins to take an intellectual property position in proteomics. In addition, the Australian company consists primarily of PhDs in molecular biology, while Cambridge Labs is dominated by business executives whose primary focus is generating strong financial returns for shareholders. The cultural differences between an Australian science-oriented laboratory and a publicly traded American outsourcing company become apparent during the negotiation phase of the joint venture proposal. Students are asked to evaluate the joint venture and consider whether the cultural and strategic differences can be reconciled.

Hill & Knowlton is a division of one of the world's largest communication services group. Tagging e-mail communications to support knowledge management codification and connection strategies is an important issue for managers. Issues related to privacy and performance need to be considered. The worldwide director of knowledge management at Hill & Knowlton needs to assess the degree to which tagging should be enforced in a communication services organization that supports numerous clients around the world.

Palliser is Canada's second-largest furniture company. The company has production facilities in Canada, Mexico and Indonesia, and has experimented with cutting and sewing leather in China. The company is looking at further expanding the relationship with China. Ever since Palliser set up a plant in Mexico, the company has faced increasing competitive pressure from Asia, especially from China. The president of Palliser must decide what form this relationship should follow. Should it be an investment, either wholly or partly owned, or should it be through subcontracting?

Kobe Steel Ltd. started as a large manufacturer of steel products and has diversified into other sectors including iron, aluminum and copper products, engineering, machinery and electronic information. Headquartered in Japan, it established overseas laboratories that were given technology-based missions to assist with the diversification away from the company's core business. One such laboratory, the Electronic Materials Center (EMC) located in North Carolina, evolved from a research oriented focus to a product development focus. The center's major products were expected to launch EMC in a profitable business venture and help spear head Kobe Steel's diversification effort. However, the organization context and economic environment in which Kobe Steel was attempting this were extremely complex. This included multicultural issues, emerging markets, technologies new to the company and even natural disaster. The supplement Kobe Steel USA, Electronic Materials Center: The Commercialization of New Technologies (B), product 9B04M018 looks at the issues faced in a consulting situation.

CNS is a small biotech company. The founder of the company is deciding if it's worth applying for phase I approval that will allow the company to continue its research. He must determine the value of the research. Using the traditional DCF valuation method, he is not sure if this captures all of the value of the research and must decide if either the Black-Scholes or binomial model would more accurately determine the value.

Toyota is a large, international automobile manufacturer headquartered in Japan, with plans to become the largest worldwide automaker, striving for 15 per cent of global sales. Toyota is committing itself to be the leader of the hybrid-electric automotive industry, and is relying on changes in the industry and customer perceptions to bring its plan to fruition. Toyota's challenge is to develop consumer attitude and purchase intent, from an early adopter, niche market model into universal mainstream acceptance.