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The Carvajal case is based on interviews with four family members and executives of Carvajal S.A., one of Latin America's leading family businesses. The case focuses on how, over the span of 120 years, the Carvajal family built a holistic family enterprise to govern both its business and its family ownership structure. The system includes the typical governance attributes of a large family enterprise - including a family council, shareholders' assembly and family constitution - and in addition, it puts special emphasis on entrepreneurship and social and economic welfare. Yet, with the family expanding in size and scattering geographically, the Carvajal family must continue to innovate and adapt their family enterprise model. The case explores the particular challenges related to family governance, ownership and CEO succession. It details how Carvajal established NextGen programs and fostered entrepreneurship as a "glue" to bind the family together. It also shows how Carvajal achieved collective impact by aligning the purpose of the business with the purpose of the family foundation, the family council and the wider family enterprise. From a broader perspective, the case illustrates how to manage family governance issues in a multi-generational family enterprise by understanding and applying the mechanisms that are available, and by maintaining a healthy balance between family leadership and independent governance.

The Blue Hill case follows the journey of Dan Barber, one of the world's leading chefs. Having understood the limitations of the "substitution" model of sustainability, he redesigns his restaurant as an innovation lab for the food industry, seeking to win stakeholders' hearts and minds and embed it in the local ecosystem. The case provides an inside view of the innovation process and how, in collaboration with the local ecosystem, Dan reimagines the architecture of the food industry - its economics and operational activities - to create a "regenerative system", i.e., one that replenishes rather than depletes resources. The principles of regenerative design include (i) redesigning the system from beginning to end, (ii) giving as much, or more, than it takes, (iii) paying attention to interconnectedness, (iv) creating change through awareness, agency, and affection. Although set in the food industry, the lessons apply to all sectors of business.

The executive director of Meals on Wheels London (MOWL) was struggling with a lack of volunteers to deliver meals to the not-for-profit organization's customers. MOWL provided nutritional support for adults with disabilities and older people who required short-term or long-term assistance. Several options were under consideration to mitigate the volunteer issue. These included using new, state-of-the-art computer software to allocate volunteers more efficiently; running a volunteer recruitment campaign; and hiring paid delivery drivers to supplement MOWL's volunteers. The executive director needed to make a quick decision to present at a fast-approaching board meeting where any necessary funding would need to be approved.

In February 2022, Sudhir Kumar Singh, head of human resources (HR) at Tata Steel Limited (Tata Steel)-one of India's oldest and largest steel producers-was meeting with the vice president of HR to discuss how a unique pilot project to employ transgender people at the mine could be rolled out across the entire company. The long-term objective of the initiative was to improve diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and contribute toward achieving a 25 percent diverse workforce by 2025. Although the pilot project had been successful, how could the HR team now scale up the transgender initiative across Tata Steel? Singh understood that to overcome these challenges he needed to adopt a multi-stakeholder approach, plan holistically, and integrate all the learnings from the pilot project to create a clear, consistent, and comprehensive plan that could be discussed with the vice president of HR.

The product recommendation website BeM was launched in 2020 in Brazil to explore the significant and untapped potential of the country's online reviews market. Inspired by US models, BeM's webpages featured expert-generated reviews of products in four categories: air fryers, headphones and earbuds, Bluetooth speakers, and irons. Its revenue model centered on participating in affiliate marketing programs: BeM's website included links to various online merchants' pages, and the group earned commissions when users made purchases through these links. After a year of operations, BeM had attracted 186,000 visitors to its webpages, but sales conversion remained a challenge. While over 80% of customers who read BeM's reviews clicked on affiliate links, under 1% completed a purchase immediately or shortly after. The field-based case study features BeM's executive director, Josiane Schunck, as she prepares to discuss the start-up's future with its four cofounders. The key question the group needs to address is whether to keep growing the BeM website or move on to another venture, where they could apply the learnings from this experiment. Should they embrace Silicon Valley's "fail fast, learn faster" mantra, or make adjustments and double down on the BeM bet? If they decide to continue growing the business, what could be the most effective strategies to enhance BeM's financials, reducing costs and boosting revenue generation? Could partnerships with media groups, retailers, or manufacturers help BeM build alternative revenue sources, or would it be better to keep operating independently? And which product categories should BeM focus on next, not only to attract more users but also to improve its sales conversion rates? This case is appropriate for use in an MBA, executive education, or undergraduate course on entrepreneurship, marketing, innovation, digital disruption, or digital businesses.

This case encapsulates the challenges faced by Jegan Damodaraswamy in extending the core competency of quality and customer service for the renowned Hotel Annapoorna, in Coimbatore, India. In addition, he had to figure out how to overcome the hurdles after his grandfather's death and retain the organization's legacy. Damodaraswamy was a third-generation entrepreneur who took over the business as chief executive officer in 2023. Since taking over, he has introduced many changes and instilled business ethics in the organization. The organization bloomed under his leadership. However, COVID-19 caused a slump in the organization. They were unable to employ a full staff, and sales plunged drastically. How would Annapoorna rebuild its brand and reposition itself? Would Damodaraswamy re-envision his grandfather's aspirations and strengthen the brand value? Should he drive toward transforming the organization and redefining its vision? The case illustrates change management in an organization and the trade-off between expanding a sustainably profitable core competency and growth to its other verticals.

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, most foreign backpackers could no longer travel to Hong Kong, a trend that continued well into 2021 and adversely affected the operations of a local hostel in the Sham Shui Po neighbourhood. The own and founder of Wontonmeen, Patricia Choi, was exploring the feasibility of repositioning to attract new customers. To explore the repositioning decision, an online survey was conducted along with consumer interviews to better understand a new market opportunity. The data provided useful information about the feasibility of repositioning the hostel to attract local Hong Kong based consumers. Using the data, Choi had to explore the risks and benefits and make a decision on how to position her beloved hostel.

In November 2023, top of mind for Kristen Siemen, chief sustainability officer at General Motors (GM), was how to increase consumer adoption of electric vehicles (EVs). After committing to be carbon neutral by 2040, the automotive giant has its work cut out for it: while EV purchases increased to 14% in 2022, consumer concerns, such as range anxiety and cost sensitivity, are limiting adoption. Kristen Siemen must consider how the marketing, sustainability, and communication teams should continue to work collaboratively to address this slowdown in market penetration and how to optimally position GM to reach its goal of carbon neutrality.

In March 2023, the Adani Group experienced a sharp decline in market value, losing over $150 billion. This downturn followed allegations from US short-seller Hindenburg Research, which accused Gautam Adani of inflating his net worth to $120 billion over three years, mainly through a dramatic rise in the stock prices of the group's key companies. The Adani Group disputed these stock manipulation allegations, citing a misunderstanding of Indian laws, highlighting also their consistent debt reduction over the past decade. The challenge for the Adani Group now lies in regaining stakeholder confidence and managing the crisis, which may include re-evaluating its corporate governance practices and revising its communication strategy to restore its image.

Street Business School (SBS) employed an innovative social-franchise model aimed at providing entrepreneurship training to one million impoverished women worldwide. Originating as BeadforLife, a non-profit organization that connected women in Uganda who produced recycled paper jewellery with international markets, SBS developed a tailored entrepreneurship program while working with small groups of bead producers. With aspirations to expand globally and impact more women, SBS adopted a social franchising model and certified other organizations to implement its valuable approach and curriculum. However, generating earned income proved challenging, and SBS relied heavily on funds raised from individuals and philanthropic organizations. In addition, the organization faced the dilemma of balancing its focus on scalability and global expansion with the depth of impact it aimed to achieve. In January 2023, the chief executive officer (CEO) wondered what she should recommend to the board as the most appropriate business model for scaling SBS's impact.

CenturyPly India Limited (CPIL), a large wood panel products company with a supply network spread across India, had four main product lines, including laminates. In April 2020, the company's laminates range was a growth focus for management on account of its profitability and expected growth. Despite the availability of capacity, good demand, a range of designs, and inventory at the distribution centres, CPIL's order fill rates were less than satisfactory. The management team decided to look at its supply chain and identify solutions that could help. Based on the available data on sales, inventory, and lost sales, the management team needed to identify crucial insights that would help them take the best decisions. One important question was, How could the company adjust its current make-to-order supply chain to ensure it could meet order demands in a timely fashion and avoid losing potential sales?

In February 2007, Diego Papalia, founder and owner of Ottawa Pianos, was getting ready to meet with his daughter, Carmen, to discuss the strategic future of the company. Five years prior, the father-daughter duo had started separate projects within the business. Diego had launched the digital music centre and Carmen had started a piano school, with a plan to reassess which might be the more lucrative endeavour in five years' time. The DMC sold guitars, amplifiers, drum kits, and various other electronic musical equipment; however, there was a high turnover requirement as music technology was constantly evolving. Carmen's piano school had grown to over a dozen instructors and 300 students. The downside was that it took up a lot of space- in this case, the entire basement that could otherwise be used for stock storage-and yielded low profit margins. Diego and Carmen had to decide which of the two projects to retain.

Since its beginning in 2018, Jane Win LLC, a nimble and lean start-up selling amulet jewellery pieces, had seen immediate success. From the company's inception, its founder, Jane Winchester Paradis, assessed the advantages and disadvantages of an expansion strategy. Paradis also assessed the viability of expanding beyond amulet pieces to achieve substantial growth. Although the young company already enjoyed strong brand recognition and offered a meaningful unique selling proposition, there were still many questions about the company's next steps, including which growth strategy would be the most suitable. Did the company have the resources and skilled management team necessary to adequately support and monitor its growth? What legal and financial issues must Paradis consider? What marketing and operational issues were the company likely to encounter during expansion?

The case describes the ascend of EcoVadis in the market for supply chain sustainability ratings as well as its competitive position in 2023. EcoVadis is a platform that allows corporations to get transparency on the sustainability practices and status of their suppliers, and simultaneously allows suppliers to show their sustainability credentials to their corporate buyers. Founded in 2007 by Pierre-François Thaler (INSEAD MBA, 1999) and Fréderic Trinel, it had achieved unicorn status in 2023. The case ends with a review of the key strategy issues that the company is facing in 2023.

Mr. Highfly graduated with an accounting and finance degree in 2023, after which he was hired as an accountant by SG Development Limited (SDL). SDL was listed in the Singapore Exchange (SGX) and had established a reputation as a reliable provider of trading and shipping services in ASEAN countries. It planned to expand its operations to the real estate segment in Southeast Asia. In the first week after Mr. Highfly reported for duty, he was tasked to investigate the accounting treatments for investment properties and their implications on the company's financial statements.

Contrary to the typical practice of cutting operating expenses by compromising on employees' benefits, the chairman of Zentaku Kogyo Company Ltd. (Zentaku), David Wu Chongrang, aimed to improve the standard of living of his staff by steadily raising their salaries and benefits. In fact, the key performance indicator David had set for himself was to raise his employees' salaries regularly to a preset target benchmark. Contrary to conventional approaches, over the past sixteen years (2006-2022) David had reduced Zentaku's revenue by 28 per cent and the number of employees by two-thirds, while raising the annual gross profit per employee to 239 per cent. Zentaku had achieved more with less by transforming itself through the rigorous implementation of lean production, inspired by the famed Toyota Production System, but Zentaku's future leadership now faced challenges in sustaining the success Zentaku had achieved. Were the management methods adopted in the past applicable to the younger generation of workers? How could the current management pass the enterprise to the younger generation while ensuring employees remained fulfilled in the workplace?

Bryan Gilvesy, CEO of ALUS, must create a proposal to spend ALUS' $100,000 marketing budget for their brand "New Acre Project". The brand had experienced good growth in previous years, but sales had stagnated for the past two, creating concerns about the survival of New Acre Project. Gilvesy must invigorate growth and reach sales of $6 million by choosing a target market, whether he should offer carbon credits or not, and at what price. He also had to choose a promotional channel and the messaging New Acre Project would use going forward.

In November 2023, OpenAI, a prominent artificial intelligence (AI) research lab, announced the unexpected removal of its co-founder and CEO, Sam Altman, which sent shockwaves through the AI industry. The case first delves into OpenAI's journey from its inception as a non-profit organization aimed at developing artificial general intelligence (AGI) for the betterment of humanity, to its transformation into a capped-profit entity, along with the value chain and competitive dynamics of the generative AI industry. In the second section, the case documents in detail Sam Altman's sudden dismissal. In the last section, the case concludes with a look into the broader implications for the generative AI industry, including the race for AGI, the ongoing challenges of AI development, and new developments. The case is suitable for MBA, EMBA, and undergraduate students who are interested in competitive strategy, industry value chain, technology and innovation, entrepreneurship, corporate governance, stakeholder governance, and the AI industry. The case can be used in a core strategy course at different levels as it covers various topics.