個案總覽

This case examines the financial performance of Bob's Baloney, a leader in the ultrapremium bologna market. While the business appears to be doing well with respect to most of its stakeholders, its largest equity investor has recently expressed strong dissatisfaction with the company's financial performance. Students are invited to examine the financial statements and ratios associated with the business to understand the source of the underperformance and to provide recommendations for business policy changes.

Spreadsheet supplement for case UV8015.

SRS and the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) follows the process by which SRS, a lean maker of remotely-operated submersible vehicles, navigates the DIU's acquisition process. Set up in 2015 to speed the U.S. military's access to promising commercial technologies, the DIU supports U.S. innovation while aiding early-stage ventures in multiple ways: with revenues via prototype agreements, with technology validation for potential investors, and potentially with sizeable production contracts. In 2019, the DIU was looking to augment this effort by investing in pre-prototype startups and commercialization efforts earlier in the technology development cycle, but its limited size and resources begged larger questions of how to build capacity and scale.

By January 2020, sustainable investment firm Generation Investment Management (Generation), founded in London in 2004, had grown from a shared vision among seven founders to a 90-person firm managing $27 billion in public and private equity. Throughout its history, Generation had worked towards its mission of seeking to generate superior financial returns by investing in sustainable companies that created long-term value. The case examines Generation's investment process in general, and in particular with respect to a global manufacturer of agricultural equipment. It also examines some of the strategic decisions and challenges facing the firm.

In July 2019, Green Trend Holdings Co. Ltd. (Green Trend) faced a difficult situation with regard to flaws in the preparation of its proposed initial public offering on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong. According to the remedy measures raised by the underwriter facilitating the initial public offering process, Green Trend needed to raise additional capital of ¥1 billion with a proposed annual interest rate of about 30 per cent. Of course, the company could have postponed the initial public offering; however, without the long-awaited return following a successful initial public offering, all the efforts taken in past years would be in vain. The uncertainty of the capital market would further complicate the future road to an initial public offering. Did Green Trend have better alternatives?

In July 2019, Green Trend Holdings Co. Ltd. (Green Trend) faced a difficult situation with regard to flaws in the preparation of its proposed initial public offering on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong. According to the remedy measures raised by the underwriter facilitating the initial public offering process, Green Trend needed to raise additional capital of ¥1 billion with a proposed annual interest rate of about 30 per cent. Of course, the company could have postponed the initial public offering; however, without the long-awaited return following a successful initial public offering, all the efforts taken in past years would be in vain. The uncertainty of the capital market would further complicate the future road to an initial public offering. Did Green Trend have better alternatives?

Capital markets facilitate the appropriate exchange of money. For lenders and borrowers, the interest rate is the primary pricing mechanism that markets use in this exchange. For borrowers deemed to have higher credit risk, lenders add a risk premium to the interest rate to compensate for higher risk. Credit risk is the risk that the borrower will default on (not pay) the payments agreed upon in the loan. Such risk-based interest rates ensure that money flows appropriately between lenders and borrowers. Credit analysis is the process of determining a potential borrower's credit risk. This note explores credit analysis and its relation to the credit-risk premium in interest rates.

BusBoard Prototype Systems Ltd. (BusBoard), a company based in Calgary, Alberta, that designed and manufactured printed circuit boards targeted at the electronics hobbyist market, managed foreign-currency transactions on a transaction-by-transaction basis. The company’s general manager had been buying and selling CAD and USD while attempting to maximize the company’s value, timing transactions based on previous experience and professional judgment. This was challenging because she did not have any experience with currency futures or options, and she wondered if she could improve company performance by trading currencies differently. Exchange-rate volatility put constant pressure on her ability to make the best choice. The company paid most of its suppliers and received most of its payments from customers in USD. Highlighted in the case study is a recent transaction in which BusBoard ordered parts and supplies from a Taiwanese supplier, with 50 per cent payment due on contract negotiation and the remaining 50 per cent due on delivery. The general manager knew that developing a more effective way to manage currency transactions could play a big part in keeping the company profitable in the future.

Healthy buildings and superior air quality are increasingly important since people now spend so much time indoors. Indoor spaces drive performance and productivity. Commercial real estate landlords and investors are responding to the demands of sophisticated tenants and end users by making investment choices around indoor air quality and certification, and related expectations for increased rent or increased occupancy. It's anticipated that these learnings will extend to other situations including offices, schools, hospitals, factories, and homes. This case investigates the tradeoffs in several engineering, marketing, and finance decisions. The setting is a billion dollar premier new office building on Park Avenue in New York City, designed by the eminent architecture firm Foster + Partners. The decision factors in the case include health information from CogFX and 9 Foundations of Healthy Buildings research from the T.H. Chan Harvard School of Public Health.

Mindtree Limited (Mindtree) was promoted by a group of first generation entrepreneurs and had established itself as a successful digital business company. Larsen & Toubro Limited (L&T), a successful conglomerate primarily in the business domains of construction and engineering, was looking to increase its footprint in information technology services. In 2019, L&T acquired more than 20 per cent stake in Mindtree and sought to increase its stake to 66 per cent by acquiring shares in the open market and making open offers to shareholders. Though Mindtree's management and promoters were very much opposed to this takeover attempt, the company's ability to keep a determined acquirer with deep pockets at bay would not come easy. The promoters of Mindtree, who had nurtured the company for the last two decades, faced the real threat of losing management control to L&T, the large and aggressive corporate group.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. Chapter 1 discusses the emergence of blockchain along with some of its potential successes and challenges. Blockchain and its potential contributions have created skepticism, mostly due to its link to Bitcoin. Just like any new technology, blockchain-technically a subset of Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)-has its own jargon to explain its features; several of these terms are described. The chapter goes on to compare the emergence of blockchain to that of the internet. Just as the internet disrupted the current world and delivered unexpected change so too can blockchain. But the reputation of cryptocurrency has been one of criminality; however, it is a natural evolution of the money system, which relies on mutual trust. While commonly misunderstood, blockchain is a database holding strings of encrypted information. It cannot be tampered with because each block has a fixed position in the chain: Changing the data in one block means changing the data in all those that follow it. Utilizing blockchain can streamline processes, cut out costs, improve lives, and reduce risk.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. Chapter 2 begins by discussing challenges of digital currency: knowing that a transaction has been completed correctly and being accepted as a symbol of value without recourse to traditional physical reserves. David Chaum's original ideas and principles of cryptography are described. An overview of the Cypherpunk movement is given. Satoshi Nakamoto's blockchain proof of concept finally put into place a working decentralized mechanism for the prevention of double spending via Bitcoin; features of Bitcoin are discussed. The chapter then explores Ethereum, the first blockchain infrastructure purpose-built for distributed computing. "Smart contracts" are rules for a transaction laid out in ledger's code and are essential to Ethereum. Cryptokitties is used as an example of smart contracts managing digital asset transactions. Past infighting within the Bitcoin and Ethereum communities is described. The expanding of blockchain technology into enterprise has a few unique challenges, especially privacy and verification. Permissioned blockchain solves those problems, replicating all the benefits of blockchain as a transparent, immutable record but eliminating the anonymity of users and open viewing of transactions and smart contracts.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. This chapter describes the rise in the number of cryptocurrencies, how some of them have been innovative, but how most are not good business projects and are often scams. This gave Bitcoin and blockchain a bad reputation. However, this chapter argues that cryptocurrency was thrown into an already broken system. When it comes to token fundraising, new ideas are constantly being proposed, some of which people should be wary of. The importance of and differences between utility and security with tokens are discussed. Legislative issues surrounding blockchain and cryptocurrency are also described for several countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and some smaller states. Various types and classes of cryptocurrencies and their different features are described, including Monero, stablecoin, and XRP. Cryptocurrency is gaining popularity in many countries, especially where it has utility for users. It could in a sense "bank the unbanked." Cryptocurrency started with the intention of being money for the people, decentralized and unfettered by agency or authority, but users have made it into de facto banks. Ultimately, if cryptocurrency is truly going to be embraced, there must be a real advantage over the status quo.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. Chapter 4 explores the potential future and value of blockchain. Blockchain is a great tool to solve many problems in the most appropriate way; however, a major threat to distributed ledger technology is using blockchain as the default, manipulating the solution to fit, and forgetting the original problem in the process. This chapter looks at when blockchain is truly needed as well as its real-world applications and addresses the misunderstanding that blockchain is a repository of absolute truth. The relationship between supply chain and distributed ledger technology is discussed. Case studies and examples are given. When it comes to the traditional centralized banking system, blockchain-based systems can deliver greater transparency, confidence in records, and long-term savings. Blockchain technology can also help overlay confidential data repositories with a layer of encryption and enable access for only those parties with the right key. This could also be helpful in areas such as medical records. Infrastructure management can also benefit from blockchain and distributed ledgers; management of energy distribution and addressing the full lifecycle of large capital projects are specifically explored.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. This chapter turns to the gaming world. Gaming has inspired the development of concepts that could not have been otherwise realized without blockchain. This chapter specifically looks at the idea of ownership in games, nonfungible tokens (NFT), and the phenomenon of paying to play. Three characteristics of gamers in the blockchain space are given by Gabby Dizon: collectors, investors, and players. The emerging game economy must have a balance between these types of users. Community management is a new discipline important in holding the attention and loyalty of consumers; community is also a vital aspect of blockchain and cryptocurrency adoption. NFT principles can be applied to sectors outside of gaming, including supply chain generally. Scalability of blockchain, speed, and sharding are also discussed. One of the approaches to scaling has been the development of side chains as another layer on established protocols. Examples of side chains and practical considerations for scaling blockchain projects are given.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. This chapter is all about data. It discusses the process of owning our data, the implementation of blockchain within government, and legal considerations for organizations adopting distributed ledger technology. Personal information is often stored digitally and publicly now, but these lists started being hidden from public view as privacy awareness grew. The idea of privacy versus surveillance is discussed as is the importance of digital identity. Blockchain can be used for identity verification and recording, verifying, and keeping safe other aspects of personal data. Blockchain can also be used in many areas of government. Digital assets, land registries, real estate, and trust in elections are all explored in relation to blockchain. Challenges of blockchain development are also addressed, including automation of processes, branding and intellectual property, and data protection.

Blockchain technology has been gaining popularity in recent years and has inspired both innovation and skepticism. Written for business decision makers and students, this text provides an overview of the history, current applications, and future potential of distributed ledgers and cryptocurrency. Strengths, weaknesses, growing opportunities, and potential threats are all discussed. This book keeps a business context in mind when introducing technical frameworks, helping strategists understand both risks and rewards of various blockchain implementation approaches as well as factors that influence whether or not this is a practical solution for current problems. Chapter 7 deals with potential opportunities for blockchain as well as threats. A major issue is the sustainability of the technology. The amount of energy required for blockchains is phenomenal, but the option of renewable energy is not always welcomed. Efficiency of processors, recycling, and reusing are other sustainability issues that blockchain and cryptocurrencies face. This chapter also discusses the question of whether or not blockchain is actually needed in many instances. Immutability of information and archiving pose threats to blockchain integrity. While cryptocurrency is founded on decentralization, the difficulty of keeping it decentralized is rising as blockchains grow and go back for decades. The question of quantum computing and its potential impact on cryptography are also discussed. Blockchain can be applied to accounting, auditing, and commercial letters of credit. Blockchain has the potential to change society, but that must include education and support to harness opportunities.

On September 24, 2018, two analysts were asked by the pension fund they worked for to evaluate the prospects of long-term investing in India's banking sector. They set off to identify and select a bank stock that was fundamentally strong and should be included in an equity portfolio. For their research, the two analysts used the CAMELS analysis framework, a model that examined six factors-capital adequacy, asset quality, management quality, earning ability, liquidity, and sensitivity to market risk. The two analysts narrowed their research down to HDFC Bank Ltd. stock for valuation and tried to determine the intrinsic price of the bank shares. The objective of the HDFC Bank Ltd. stock valuation was to identify a banking stock that would make a strong potential long-term investment for the pension fund's equity portfolio.

An up-and-coming staffer at a small family foundation was considering whether to recommend a corporate bond investment to the foundation's investment committee. Her exploration was inspired by an article that identified some attractive corporate bond investments, and she was examining the merits of specific bond issues from Allegiant Travel, GameStop, and Western Union. Information is provided that would support a variety of bond pricing analyses, with a focus on uncovering possible mispricing and the drivers of that mispricing.

Student spreadsheet to case UV8001