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The case describes the position of Marks & Spencer (M&S), a leading high-street retailer in the UK. The retailer decided to enter China's retail market in 2008 is based on perceived synergies between the company's products and an increasingly affluent Chinese middle class. Upon entry, M&S encounters myriad challenges that are not part of its original strategic calculations: errors in basic shop keeping, an evolving Chinese retail environment, and the emergence of e-commerce. M&S's difficulties in China among foreign retailers are not unique, however. Numerous high-profile retailers, such as Tesco, Best Buy, Home Depot, and Asos, find China's retail market inhospitable, leaving shortly after entry. Although M&S experiences challenges similar to those these firms faced, it also encounters a shifting retail landscape that even some experienced local retailers find difficult. After eight years in China experimenting with different business models and deteriorating financials, M&S faces a key decision: should it stay or leave?

Buying a company is a high-stakes and complex process, and involves an in-depth review of hundreds of pages of legal documents. This white paper gives a full listing of these important documents and what each document should detail - along with practical guidance on what relationships, responsibilities, and information these documents will spell out. In addition, there are recommendations on which aspects of these documents warrant closer scrutiny, and practical suggestions to keep legal fees from escalating needlessly.

In April 2018, the De Beers Group launched a pilot project called GemFair to create a new supply of ethically and environmentally sourced diamonds from artisanal and small-scale mines (ASM) in Sierra Leone. Whether this project would yield a meaningful supply of rough diamonds for De Beers, improve its ability to track diamonds accurately from African mines to consumers around the world, and simultaneously improve both the working conditions in mines and the prices received by local miners remained to be seen. This case is intended to be used in conjunction with and to follow another HBS case: The De Beers Group: Exploring the Diamond Reselling Opportunity (HBS #717-430).

The a2 Milk Company (a2MC) became the most valuable company listed on the New Zealand stock exchange in 2018 by capitalizing on a biochemical discovery related to the protein composition of cow's milk. Because many people find the A1 protein difficult to digest, and that protein may be related to other health problems (e.g., diabetes), a2MC sells dairy products containing the A2 protein only primarily in Australia and China. With sales of NZ$730 million in 2017 and a desire to grow, a2MC formed a strategic relationship with Fonterra, the world's sixth largest dairy company, in February 2018. But one month later, Nestle, the world's largest dairy company, confirmed that it had begun selling A2 infant formula in China and people speculated that it would start selling A2 products in Australia and New Zealand later in the year. a2MC's retiring CEO Geoffrey Babidge and newly appointed CEO Janyne Hrdlicka must decide how to respond to Nestle's entry. Can this successful entrant become an incumbent with a sustainable competitive advantage?

The case discusses attempts by Singapore Press Holdings Ltd (SPH) to transform its core media business, which was battered by digital disruption. Revenues from SPH's core media business (newspaper subscriptions and advertising revenues) had fallen year after year, as had its share price. What strategy should SPH adopt for its media business and what challenges could it expect? Would digital reinvention be the best course of action and the only way to go? Was SPH mired in a "do-or-die" predicament? The case also provides a concise description of the digital reinvention of the Washington Post, New York Times and South China Morning Post.

The case opens in 2013 as Amine Benkirane, founder and CEO of the leading Moroccan furniture company KITEA, contemplates the loss his company has incurred for the first time in its 20-year history. The case then describes KITEA's origins and provides a detailed overview of the business plan that enabled Benkirane to bring affordable modern furniture in flatpacks to the Moroccan market, which had previously been dominated by unorganized artisans. At the beginning of 2010, KITEA was a market leader with a robust market share of 24%. However, Benkirane read about rumors that IKEA was planning to enter the Moroccan market. The case explores in detail KITEA's efforts to prepare for the increased competition. In 2013, KITEA found itself in a difficult situation, facing a downturn in the economy, a slowdown in sales, a delayed store opening, and souring creditor sentiment following the news about IKEA's entry. Would KITEA be able to bounce back and remain competitive when IKEA entered the market?

Alibaba's Rural Taobao initiative had been launched in 2014 as a public service initiative to increase e-commerce adoption in China's remote rural areas. In the first two iterations of the initiative, dubbed "1.0" and "2.0", Alibaba had partnered with local businesses and young returnees to operate village stations. Village stations served as logistical and educational hubs to help villagers make online purchases. Despite significant growth in sales through village stations, the business model was operating at a loss, and competitors JD and Pinduoduo were growing quickly, threatening to challenge Alibaba by claiming the rural e-commerce markets. Bill Wang, the head of the initiative, was tasked with designing and implementing the next model for Alibaba's future expansion into rural areas. The decision centers around whether Alibaba should copy the successes of competitors JD and Pinduoduo, escalate commitment to its original value proposition (hands-on service to villagers), or embrace an entirely new model. The case highlights the competing pressures of financial performance, CSR and corporate mission, government relations, and long-term competitive positioning that are common to major strategic decisions.

Pat Chan and Nicky Caxton, a married couple and co-owners of Chan & Caxton Booksellers, faced a difficult decision. Seven months before, they had changed their channel strategy, moving from their home-based business to a shared retail space to increase revenue and decrease lower-margin consignment sales. This new strategy was not generating the expected increase in sales; however, the space offered them both low cost and flexibility to deliver special events for their customers. Were these problems merely growing pains, or were they evidence that the bricks-and-mortar retail channel wasn't working out? Pat and Nicky thus found themselves pondering several options: staying in their current location, moving their business back to their apartment, renting an office space, or finding a stand-alone retail space in a better location. Each option had different potential implications for their business model, channel strategy, and their family life. This case is appropriate for upper-year undergraduate and graduate business courses or workshops in small business, small-business development, entrepreneurship, or family business. It explores the ongoing issues of managing and adjusting when a strategy fails in a context of small business and constrained resources. We use the business model canvas (Osterwalder & Pigneur, 2010) and the Diamond-E framework (Crossan, Rouse, Rowe, & Maurer, 2016)to illustrate the interrelationship between the industry environment, management preferences, and business model alternatives. As such, the case explores the role of management preference in a small family business.

In January 2016, Silvio Elías, co-founder and CEO of Veritas, Catalonia's leading organic supermarket chain, headed to a meeting with the company's board to present the alternative options to enter in Madrid. At that time, Madrid was thriving like no other Spanish region and stood out as an attractive market for expansion. Most of all, operating in the nation's capital accounted for an instrumental step forward on the path to accomplish Elías' overriding vision: turning Veritas into Spain's organic food leader. Nonetheless, Spain's organic food retailing landscape was changing very rapidly, with increased, fierce competition from a diverse range of players. Against this competitive backdrop, Elías wondered if Veritas should approach Madrid by opening their own stores, following the same strategy it had used to rise as industry leader in Catalonia. Eroski, a conventional supermarket chain, had also reached out to Elías to offer Veritas an opportunity to display some of its private label products at Eroski's stores in Madrid as they did in Catalonia. Elías needed to make the final decision on his recommendation to the board.

The author-the Chief Economist at the Creative Destruction Lab-argues that recent developments in artificial intelligence constitute advances in prediction. Prediction occurs when you use information that you have to produce information that you do not have. In a wide-ranging interview, he says that importantly, this is all machine learning does. It cannot establish causal relationships and therefore it must be used with care in the face of uncertainty and limited data. As a result, he explains why workers will be making more complex decisions going forward, and why there will always be a role for human judgment in every organization.

If you trace the origin of any creative breakthrough, it is possible to find the point where someone changed the question. The author-who co-wrote The Innovator's DNA with Clayton Christensen-shows that questions can do amazing things: Knock down the walls that have been constraining your thinking; remove one or more of the 'givens' in a line of thinking; and open up space for inquiry that had been closed off by narrow framing. He provides a three-step framework for asking better questions and re-framing issues, showing that if you can properly phrase a question, the answer is the easy part.

The high degree of change in today's environment demands that organizations adapt their strategy to new situations much more frequently than ever before. Yet in a world of 'transient advantage', too many companies are obsessed with traditional industry analysis and continue to define their most important competitors as the other companies within their industry. In a wide-ranging interview, the author shows that this is a very dangerous way to think about competition right now. In more and more markets, we are seeing industries competing with other industries, business models competing with other business models - even within the same industry - and entirely new categories emerging. She describes the new mindset required to thrive in an age of transient advantage, explaining the roles of 'continuous reconfiguration', healthy disengagement and more.

Managers often express a grave concern about how fast artificial intelligence is unfolding - so fast that they become afraid of committing to any one supplier or standard. But precisely because we are living in a world of accelerated change, it is critical to stay in the know. The author describes some of the key concepts that every manager should be familiar with in the 'second machine age'. In the end, he shows that companies can no longer claim conventional advantages by virtue of being 'vertically integrated'; instead, they will be under tremendous pressure to match smaller players that are able to deliver customized solutions in real time as orders are made. In other words, in the second machine age, big companies need to act small.

The most innovative organizations realize that the best strategy in the world will get you nowhere unless you relentlessly make it happen. They show that the relentless execution of innovation has five key characteristics: clarity, focus, commitment to change, acceptance of failure and close proximity to customers. In the end, they show that getting things done with a relentless can-do attitude demands a degree of bravery that few organizations demonstrate; and that, as indicated by the stories of Amazon, Netflix, Haier and many others, fortune truly does favour the brave.

In the digital economy, scale is no guarantee of continued success. After all, the same factors that help an online platform expand quickly--such as the low cost of adding new customers--work for challengers too. What, then, allows platforms to fight off rivals and grow profits? Their ability to manage five aspects of the networks they're embedded in: (1) Network effects, in which users attract more users; (2) Clustering, or fragmentation into many local markets; (3) The risk of disintermediation, wherein users bypass a hub and connect directly; (4) Vulnerability to multi-homing, which happens when users form ties with two or more competing platforms; (5) Network bridging, which allows platforms to leverage users and data from one network in another network. When entrepreneurs are evaluating a digital platform business, they should look at these dynamics--and the feasibility of improving them--to get a more realistic picture of its long-term prospects.

Despite heavy investments to acquire talented data scientists and take advantage of the analytics boom, many companies have been disappointed in the results. The problem is that those scientists are trained to ask smart questions, wrangle the relevant data, and uncover insights--but not to communicate what those insights mean for the business. To be successful, the author writes, a data science team needs six talents: project management, data wrangling, data analysis, subject expertise, design, and storytelling. He outlines four steps for achieving that success: (1) Define talents, not team members. (2) Hire to create a portfolio of necessary talents. (3) Expose team members to talents they don't have. (4)  Structure projects around talents.

At the end of 2018, international markets were no longer paying a premium for Ecuadorian roses. Despite globally recognized product quality, mainly attributed to a longer vase life, Ecuadorian rose growers found it extremely difficult to achieve attractive levels of profitability. A multi-year analysis of US-based data showed just how pronounced this trend was (see Exhibit 1). Being one of Ecuador's chief exportable products, and generating more than 100,000 jobs, the industry needed a change. How could this small Latin American country reimagine how it competes in this global market?

After experiences in managing a clothing business and a family-run sugar mill, Edgard Corona (hereinafter "Corona") had a ski accident that wound up changing his life. He founded Smart Fit - a fitness center based on a value-oriented model that has achieved remarkable growth in a short period. The company, established in Brazil in 2009, by the end of 2017 had more than 1.5 million members in six Latin American markets and ranked as the absolute industry leader in the continent and the fourth largest gym chain in the world. Smart Fit's mission was to provide everyone with access to high-level physical activity - "to democratize high-end fitness". However, the model seemed easy to copy - so Smart Fit management decided to develop a package of customer features and expand rapidly. In addition, Smart Fit faced new competing business models, for example, a new smartphone platform that gave users entry to clubs located in Latin America, Europe and United States. Corona feared that intense and rapid expansion might risk customer satisfaction. Indeed, overseas expansion strained the company's financial and managerial resources. However, the question remained: Should Smart Fit devote continued efforts to sustain its high-growth path in Brazil and abroad?

The e-payments industry has experienced rapid growth in recent years, especially in Asia, driven in part by technology developments such as the high adoption of smart phones and the boom in e-commerce. The digital innovation of e-payments adoption and diffusion requires the creation and sustaining of an ecosystem. This case describes the e-payments ecosystems of China and Singapore which differ in their development trajectories as well as their resulting configuration, raising important issues for discussion regarding ecosystem design and evolution.