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In 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, EPIC (a not-for-profit organization) decided to replace its usual in-person conference with a virtual conference. After outlining the challenge, the case recounts the history of EPIC and its conferences (including earlier pricing changes and their impact), the progression of the pandemic in early 2020, the process resulting in the March 30 decision to go virtual, and the efforts launched in late April to decide how to price a virtual versus an in-person conference. Various factors and considerations are presented, including the conference's pricing changes over the years, other conferences planned for 2020 that had been changed to a virtual format or cancelled, and a survey of EPIC members to determine their price sensitivity. Excel spreadsheets of the survey data are provided for students and professors.

This case revolves around a private hospital in Hong Kong. The hospital suffered a huge net loss during the preceding fiscal year, and the board of directors would like to improve cost management. Dr. Harris Pang, a prominent endocrinologist in the hospital, was appointed to review the existing costing model and to pinpoint opportunities for cost reduction. The case commences with an introduction of the "dual-track" system of the Hong Kong healthcare financial model. It then provides a brief background explanation of the hospital through four lenses: positioning strategy, organizational culture, financial structure and management, and the existing costing. The background information is intended to instill a key message: While the hospital focused on the value of operational excellence and patient-centered care, it failed to capture such value from patients due to inaccurate cost information. While considering the aforementioned case background, Dr. Pang began to design an alternative costing model that would improve the accuracy of cost information. He proposed adopting activity-based costing (ABC). Various costing systems have different results in terms of accuracy and administrative efficiencies. Based on the explanation of the costing methodologies, students are required to (1) compare the individual patient costs of different clinical considerations through the original and proposed costing models, (2) propose potential areas of application, and (3) acknowledge the embedded limitations.

In late November 2017, Roark Capital Group (Roark) must decide on a last, best offer to purchase Buffalo Wild Wings (BWW) in a leveraged buyout (LBO) for $157 per share. That bid had followed a series of offers that began in August 2017, at $150 per share, after a protracted proxy fight by activist investor Marcato Capital (Marcato) ended with the resignation of BWW's longtime CEO, Sally Smith. Marcato had accumulated a sizeable stake in BWW and several board seats as part of the proxy contest and had been pushing BWW's board to seek a higher price. Roark must now decide if the returns to its investors merit the $157 per share offer. This case is meant to follow cases in which the topic of residual cash flows and LBOs have been introduced. We typically assign it after teaching an earlier case that introduces that material and how private equity (PE) sponsors typically evaluate LBOs, such as "DuPont Corporation: Sale of Performance Coatings" (UVA-F-1709) (DPC). DPC provides an opportunity to evaluate an LBO from a company's and sponsor's perspective, but the cash flows and debt structure are simplified to focus on the conceptual differences in how the parties might view the deal. BWW focuses on the sponsor's (Roark's) perspective and includes a richer set of operating synergies and a more complex debt structure. The debt structure features existing debt that must be refinanced and multiple tranches of debt. As such, the case introduces students to several types of debt that are commonly used to finance LBOs and their related terms. It also introduces students to the pros and cons of LBOs of franchise-model businesses, an area of strong PE investor interest. We also typically assign a technical note, "Valuing Late-Stage Companies and Leveraged Buyouts" (UVA-F-1846), to be read in conjunction with cases that cover LBOs. The note provides a basic overview of the primary sources of financing and the metrics used to gauge LBO capital structures and a step-by-step example

After US materials science company Dow decided to renew its focus on inclusion and diversity (I&D), it opted to use its Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to enable its staff to embrace this cause and effect a cultural change across its locations worldwide. As this case focuses on Dow's efforts in Asia Pacific, it delves specifically into how Dow's ERGs in Greater China, Japan, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand have helped raised staff awareness about I&D issues in these locations. In particular, Dow staff were educated on areas such as disability, gender equality, mental health, inter-generational workforce, and the marginalised in society through the various activities organised by the ERGs.

In 2016, US firm Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc. (Aerojet) had been developing and manufacturing propulsion systems for rockets and armaments for long-range weapons systems for over 70 years. It also owned 4,634 hectares of land and an investment portfolio worth more than its stock's market capitalization-but it had a large amount of debt and an underfunded pension plan. Aerojet's stock had fallen over 30 per cent to US$16.30 under new executive leadership, and a hedge fund manager at Royal Capital Management LLC had to decide whether to wait for Aerojet to take off. After valuing the firm's various assets, he concluded the stock was worth $35 based on the sum of the parts, but he needed to consider some of the parts, including its significant debt and a pension plan underfunded by $637 million, which were still cause for concern.

Since its inception in 1994, Sterlite Copper (Sterlite), a subsidiary of UK-based mining and metals conglomerate Vedanta Resources plc, had encountered many controversies. Sterlite's difficulties included accusations of manipulative compliance practices, legal issues arising out of land acquisition, gas leaks, and the depletion of the environment around its plant in Thoothukudi (also known as Tuticorin) in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Sterlite planned to expand and double its copper production, but various stakeholders raised concerns regarding alleged misconduct by the company and the adverse impact of its actions on the lives of the community surrounding the plant.<br><br>In May 2018, these agitations took a violent turn. The public protest led to the death of 13 citizens, and the events attracted negative media exposure. As Sterlite awaited Madras High Court's ruling which was due in August 2020, the possibility of the plant's permanent closure seemed likely.<br><br>While Sterlite Copper had been an organization of national importance, contributing to the GDP and creating employment, it suffered from adverse community opinion of allegedly being unethical while remaining in the realm of legality. The entire incident had Sterlite fighting more for its image than its environmental and legal positions. What had gone wrong for Sterlite by August 2020?

An actuarial intern at World Reinsurance Company was casually checking his e-mail and noticed that he had received a request from his manager to develop a quote for an upcoming request for proposal from one of World Reinsurance Company's larger clients, Ontario Life. The request for proposal would have to contain a quote for an excess-of-loss policy to reinsure Ontario Life's 10-year-term life insurance policy, consisting of 100 high-risk policyholders, for retention limits over CA$250,000 on a per-loss basis. The quote was to be submitted for review by the end of the day, so the intern had to get started on it immediately.

When seasoned entrepreneur Glen Tullman founded the chronic health care startup Livongo in 2014, it was personal. His son lived with diabetes, and Tullman knew firsthand how taxing it could be to manage such an unrelenting disease. Livongo set out to empower people with chronic conditions to take control of their health through better behaviors, and in the process save money for themselves, their employers, and healthcare providers. In the years to follow, he and a motivated team of technologists and medical professionals built a purpose-driven organization that in turn created an easy-to-use mobile experience that was medically sound to deliver on that promise. "Members" (the individuals Livongo served) loved the product, and by 2020, Livongo had contracted to provide its services to nearly a third of the Fortune 500, and the company was doubling in size annually and went public. But as Livongo grew, leadership recognized that Members also needed virtual access to medical professionals, or telehealth. After an intensive search, the company confronted a major new opportunity: whether to merge with telehealth behemoth Teladoc, with the prospect of becoming one of the largest digital health companies in history. But despite the strategic appeal, Livongo and Teladoc were very different companies. This divergence raised important questions for Tullman and Livongo's leadership: could Livongo live up to its potential, and retain its distinctive and passionate culture, if it joined with Teladoc?

In February 2021, the owner of Anwal Gas Traders, a liquefied petroleum gas distribution company based in Sakesar, Khushab District, in the province of Punjab, Pakistan, was considering whether to invest in expansion. It would be the first significant expansion for the company since its founding in 1998. Based on data provided by a consultancy firm performing capital budgeting techniques, the company would integrate backward to take advantage of perceived market potential. The owner needed to determine whether this investment was worth making and how various scenarios would affect his decision.

Set in 2021, this case describes the Certis Group's transformation journey from a traditional physical guarding service provider to an advanced provider of integrated operations technology services for security, facilities, visitor management, and other types of monitoring related businesses. Certis started in 1958 as a Singapore government unit for auxiliary police, and restructured into a private commercial entity in 2005. They grew to a US$1.1 billion multinational with an overseas presence in six countries and territories, while leading their home market. Their digital transformation was enabled by a platform created for orchestrating Internet-of-Things sensor streams with Artificial Intelligence-enabled analytics, centralized command and control, and workforce coordination and communication. This new "Security+" approach to delivery made it possible for Certis to scale beyond prior limits, integrate across multiple service lines, and offer new types of services. They began rolling out Security+ solutions in 2018 starting with Singapore's iconic Jewel Changi Airport, a 10-storey megamall, and expanded to other large multi-use facilities and industrial zones. Paul Chong, President and Group CEO since 2004 was keenly aware that competitors saw the success Certis was having with its digital transformation and platform-based approach. What could be their path forward for developing their next generation of delivery capabilities to drive further growth locally and overseas?

WeWork, a fast-growing but unprofitable real estate firm headquartered in New York, which leased shared office space around the world, announced in September 2019 that it was cancelling its plans for an initial public offering (IPO). In late 2020, as the company weathered the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, several special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) approached WeWork, offering an increasingly popular alternative method for the company's shares to become publicly traded. In January 2021, WeWork's new chief executive officer (CEO) was considering an offer from BowX Acquisition Corp., a "blank check" corporation. The CEO and the WeWork board needed to understand the benefits and disadvantages of a SPAC merger.

By June 2020, the entrepreneurial, client-focused funeral home company Families First Funeral Homes & Tribute Centre (Families First) had expanded to four branches in the Windsor-Essex region of Ontario, Canada. Families First had served families across the region for nearly 25 years as it manoeuvred through the information era and dealt with changing dynamics in the funeral services industry; changing regional demographics; cultural elements; and the needs of its different stakeholders, including people planning their own future funerals and bereaved family and friends planning final goodbyes for their loved ones. The company recognized the need to enhance its technology, particularly in light of the changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, which had heightened the need for greater technological features in the funeral services industry. Now, Families First had to consider how to continue providing value to customers and develop a strong customer management and communication plan with the use of technology, incorporating advanced technological features into its customer relationship and growth strategy.

Dave Balter and Jim Myers co-founded Mylestone, a death tech startup that applied technology to transform how grieving people memorialize the dead. The startup addressed a cultural problem and promised to solve a pressing need in the antiquated, multi-billion dollar death industry. But despite a well-defined market and positive response to the idea, Mylestone made little headway in the funeral industry during its first eighteen months. In response to a series of obstacles, the company made a number of pivots. All startups pivot. But recent changes felt more fundamental. The company had moved away from its initial purpose, business model, and early team. Now, user demand suggested the startup should pivot again, away from death tech to produce custom photo books. The company had pivoted so much already that it barely resembled the venture they founded. Had they pivoted to an entirely new business? With each major change, the passion both founders felt when they started Mylestone waned. Did they want to continue leading the company in the new direction? Balter believed that the new direction would limit the startup's growth capacity and, to complicate matters further, Balter and Myers recently discovered a mutual interest in cryptocurrency. They started a side project in crypto trading that showed signs of taking off in a way Mylestone never would. If they harbored doubts about Mylestone, should they inform investors, close the company, and focus their energy on founding a venture based on their side project? What legal and ethical obligations did they have to Mylestone's investors and employees?

It was April 17, 2020, the night before the vote, and Kelsey Wirth, co-founder and board chair of Mothers Out Front, a non-profit climate justice organization, wondered if its Massachusetts chapter had garnered sufficient support from its members to ratify their proposed new charter. It is essential to have our members bought into this, thought Wirth. The members have to feel like they own this next step in our evolution of Massachusetts. The charter development team, dubbed Path to Power (P2P), had tried to address all the outstanding issues and concerns that had led to the initiative, but questions about decision-making authority, accountability, and representation remained unresolved. When each chapter's delegates gathered for the State Assembly, two-thirds must vote yes if the charter were to be adopted. It wasn't perfect, but if the charter did not pass, Wirth worried about how they would overcome the challenges facing the Mothers Out Front in Massachusetts. The case goes on to detail the challenges which led the organization to undergo a months-long effort to develop a charter-namely, the need for a clear decision-making and leadership structure. Mothers Out Front had grown organically from a Massachusetts-based grassroots effort into a national organization, but its structure had not evolved to keep pace and as a result, tension began to build within the organization. Members began to question decisions made by the leadership team; the leadership team felt disempowered and lacking the authority to make strategic decisions. Without a clear structure and process, the organization lacked coordinated, strategic thinking driving decisions. The lack of clarity around decision-making and structure made it difficult for its volunteers to carry out the work of the organization. Mothers Out Front leaders hired a team of consultants to guide them through the process of re-designing its structure in a way that engaged staff and volunteers throughout the organization.

This case is based on the situation that Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) had been facing in 2021 as the world economy attempted to return to normal in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. To get a better sense of crisis that the company was facing, a year earlier SMIC had received tremendous scrutiny from the US government due to concerns that the company's increasing dominance in this industry threatened US interests. Through the discussions of the SMIC case, students will learn how to analyze the competitive situation of a company given the prevailing geopolitical factors as well as how to determine a company's strategic positioning in its respective industry and then use this analysis to evaluate future strategic moves.

The impact investing industry seeks to create a positive impact beyond financial returns. Nonprofits like Habitat for Humanity (Habitat), an organization involved in return-seeking investments alongside its charitable donation-based operations, face unique considerations to discover how to make social impact dollars go the furthest over time. In early 2020, Patrick Kelley, global vice president of the Terwilliger Center for Innovation in Shelter, puzzled over these considerations with a team of program professionals at Habitat. In particular, he set out to learn how the team could scale its in-house, donation-based impact fund, the Shelter Venture Fund (SVF), and draw investors beyond philanthropists to help effectuate Habitat's social mission and prove the fund's financial viability. A core question emerged: Should Kelley scale SVF by going back to donative capital or by raising private money in a fund?

This case explores the dynamic allocation approach to investing, an approach that would time the market based on factors' relative valuations. Research Affiliates created a RAFI Dynamic Multifactor US index that dynamically allocated five factor strategies: value, quality, momentum, size, and low volatility. In this course, students will utilize various information presented in the case to discuss why Research Affiliates decided to launch the strategy, how Research Affiliates times it, and what has been its performance relative to the Russell 1000 Index and other competitors. Students will also assess the strategy's performance and some of the limitations of its dynamic strategy.

The case tracks the evolution of FreshWorld, a unique mobile fruit and vegetable vending (FnV) startup in India. It gives a snapshot of the dilemmas faced by the entrepreneur Rajiv Rao during the initial years. This is against the backdrop of the evolving FnV retail domain in India, which is moving from the informal to the formal sector, from roadside vendor and mom and pop stores to organized retail, from technology independence to technology dependence. The case sets the stage for discussing how a startup needs to understand the market, the customer, and the competition. It provides students with an opportunity to examine a startup using the lens of the lean startup methodology. Having surmounted various challenges that were directly related to the way in which FreshWorld was conceived of as a solution; Rao must decide what to do next. He could share his plan and request more funding from his investors. Alternately, he could accept a buyout offer from a leading online retailer. The task before the students is to examine FreshWorld journey and identify where the entrepreneur is in his endeavor? What can he do? How would he decide? This case can be used in a course on entrepreneurship or social entrepreneurship.

The case discusses the opportunity for Thulasi Pharmacy to develop an online sales model, thereby transitioning from a sole store format to omnichannel retailing. Thulasi Pharmacy was most prominently present in the state of Tamil Nadu in South India, with 69 stores and an annual turnover of $16.5 million. With the advent of e-pharmacy in India, riding on growing internet penetration and a positive change in consumers' preferences toward online shopping, Thulasi was contemplating on whether extending their services into e-pharma was the next step in expansion. The case also introduces change management in the context of organizational changes required to build a hybrid business model. It describes the situation at Thulasi Pharmacy, challenges students to understand an industry in-depth, and explains the importance of core competencies to a retail organization. While discussing how a company can leverage digitalization to move into omnichannel retailing, the case encourages the students to think about the various new stakeholders and organizational changes required to bring synergy between the offline and online business models.

This case follows the journey of Amagi, founded by three entrepreneurs, as an Indian company founded in 2008 with a technological solution for the media and entertainment (M&E) industry. Amagi was set up as a technology company that leveraged its geo-targeting technology to work with broadcasters and advertisers to reach audiences regionally and globally. The company started facing challenges due to the inherent market structure along with various other external forces, posing questions about the existing business model and the need for diversification. The M&E industry, at this point, was also rapidly transforming on account of technological evolutions as the linear broadcasting businesses were being overtaken by the incoming OTT players providing video-on-demand services both in terms of customers and advertisement dollars, further pushing Amagi to rethink its strategy. The case outlines the geo-targeting business model and its evolution during the journey of Amagi over the past decade. It also highlights the various challenges the company was facing in the existing set-up along with laying down the management's expectations from a successful business. The case also outlines the evolving industry structure, business landscape and the value chain where Amagi was playing within the industry and how different players were responding to the changes in the market scenario. The case shows what firms need to consider while evaluating future business strategies; and how their activities, ideologies, and core capabilities influence the firm's choice of path.