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When the founder of iStockphoto.com started the company in 2000, his objective was to share his vast collection of stock photography with graphic designers worldwide, and, in the process, help others do the same. By 2002, the organization was a respected and successful online community, but the founder and his partners now had to consider the profitability of their company. iStock was founded on community and collaboration - not commerce. Should the model change and if so, what would it take to make a significant culture change work? The case examines the culture and business opportunities for this start-up. It demonstrates the challenges of generating profit from an online community, as well as the key factors needed to build a community that can be turned into a profitable business.

In 2003, 3M initiated contact with Yunnan Baiyao Group Co., Ltd. to discuss potential cooperation opportunities in the area of transdermal pharmaceutical products. Yunnan Baiyao (YB), was a household brand in China for its unique traditional herbal medicines. In recent years, the company had been engaged in a series of corporate reforms and product/market diversification strategies to respond to the change in the Chinese pharmaceutical industry and competition at a global level. By 2003, YB was already a vertically integrated, product-diversified group company with an ambition to become an international player. The proposed cooperation with 3M was attractive to YB, not only as an opportunity for domestic product diversification, but also for international diversification. YB had been attempting to internationalize its products and an overseas department had been established in 2002 specifically for this purpose. On the other hand, YB had also been considering another option namely, whether to extend its brand to toothpaste and other healthcare products. YB had to make decisions about which of the two options to pursue and whether it was feasible to pursue both.

Anduro Marketing is a Canadian company that sells technical services to companies wanting to improve their search engine website rankings. Though small, Anduro has attracted several major clients in both Canada and the United States, and expects steady profitability and growth. Anduro believes it can generate substantial additional profit by developing and selling a suite of software products that automate its technical service offerings. Anduro's managers must decide whether Anduro is better off staying with its current safe and profitable strategy or if Anduro should instead pursue a riskier but potentially more profitable software sales model. Several tough questions must be answered to determine whether the risk is worth the reward. The Anduro case provides an interesting description of an Internet technical/marketing services business and contrasts this with software sales.

Dove is one of Unilever's better-known personal care brands. It has significant top-of-mind awareness among women in many countries. In an attempt to increase sales volume by 80 per cent, Unilever re-launched Dove in 2004. The campaign asks the question What is real beauty? and attempts to redefine it in ways that challenge commonly portrayed stereotypes. This case examines the re-launch of Dove, Unilever's well-known international personal care brand, and the marketing issues behind its phenomenal success. It also raises questions about how to maintain the brand's momentum as the next phase unfolds. In 2007, Dove products are still well thought of by consumers and the campaign has attracted imitators, including brands outside the cosmetics and beauty care sector.

Two young entrepreneurs are considering forming a business that provides new and innovative forms of advertising. Students are required to evaluate the venture, including whether the available financing is sufficient or if additional financing will be needed. Students are required to perform both a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the proposed business. Qualitatively, students must evaluate the partners' relevant capabilities as well as the business concept itself for potential success. Quantitatively, students must prepare a projected cash budget and projected financial statements for the first year of operations to gain a better understanding of the operation's cash needs and potential for financial success. This quantitative analysis will also provide students with answers to the partners' ability to make withdrawals from the business, the need for financing and the level of additional financing required, if any.

A non-profit organization, partnered with a microfinance organization would send undergraduate students from a business school to teach entrepreneurship in Third World countries: Kenya, India and South Africa. The case requires students to develop fairly straightforward cash budgets and to consider sensitivity analysis based on exchange rate fluctuations. Students are introduced to the concept of micro financing as an effective tool for improving the socio-economic status of entrepreneurs in Third World countries. Students are encouraged to think about relevant issues in gaining sponsorship for a non-profit venture.

The spring of 2002 had been grueling for the owner of Pet Care Veterinary Services, a small-animal veterinary practice with two clinics in Southwestern Ontario. Everything seemed to be going wrong at Pet Care's Avery, Ontario location. Profitability was disappointing, medication had disappeared, and the owner had serious concerns about her associate veterinarian's quality of animal care. The owner wondered what would be her best course of action. She could afford to keep the clinic open for another year and try to either fix the operational issues or leave things as they were and see if the problems resolved themselves. The owner wondered whether it would be best to sell and avoid future problems. What price would she ask for the clinic if she chose to sell? Whatever her choice, she knew she had to make a decision quickly, because the uncertainty and stress of running two clinics were beginning to take their toll.

Three business partners had finally secured the $15-million purchase of the Meadowlark Shopping Centre, a struggling mall located a few minutes away from West Edmonton Mall. The 60-day due diligence period, during which the partners had to decide whether to go through with the deal, was about to commence. If they were to go forward with the purchase, the partners had to consider changing the concept of the mall, demolishing a portion of the mall, demolishing a portion and changing the mall's concept or keeping the mall's current strategy.

Geotech Telecom (Geotech) is a small but successful 14-year old company that provides telecom consulting to two main clients, Rogers Telecom and Bell Canada. The company is facing the upcoming transfer of a large multimillion-dollar telecom contract from one of its largest clients, Bell Canada, to another provider. Geotech's president doubts whether Geotech will be able to compete for the project and, hence, a potentially disastrous future lies ahead for the company. At the same time, the widow of the company's founder wants to sell the company, and Geotech has received acquisition offers from larger telecom consulting companies. The president needs to decide what steps to take next.

The City of London was expropriating a portion of Springbank Drive as part of a project to widen the road between Wharncliffe Road and Wonderland Road. The owner of Canning Consultants Inc. was retained by the city to assess the resultant property value loss for the affected residents. The consultant had assembled a database of residential sales along with various property attributes, and had to determine how to proceed in calculating appropriate compensation for the taking. This case is appropriate in a module on multiple linear regression models.

As a small retailer of green energy, Selectpower was at a critical point in its growth. The chief executive officer (CEO) was developing a cohesive strategy for the firm's multiple business units. Revenues were expected to increase significantly in the coming year; however; limited resources also were forcing the CEO to make some tough decisions about two important investment opportunities: its growing wind-derived electricity business; or the nascent geothermal business. Both options offered clear environmental benefits to customers, although the strategic value and immediate financial return to Selectpower were less clear. The CEO was also not certain to what extent Selectpower's strategy should emphasize environmental objectives relative to traditional financial metrics. Finally, evolving customer expectations, fluctuating energy prices, and changing government regulations further complicated planning.

GVM Exploration Limited's (GVM) $2 million environmental assessment project at Grizzly Valley was disrupted by a road blockade set up by a small group of local First Nation people. How GVM handled this situation would not only affect the progress of the Grizzly Valley project but also other ongoing projects. The case challenges students to address an emergent situation. Students will need to think through the short-term and long-term implications of the potential project delay or legal actions. They must assess the issues, alternatives, and decision criteria before selecting the actions to be recommended. The case introduces stakeholder management and corporate social responsibility (CSR). However, the case provides a fairly inclusive scenario where a stakeholder or CSR perspective alone does not dictate strategic directions. Students will need to take into account both stakeholder and business imperatives.

The founder and chief executive officer of Air Deccan, India's first low-cost airline, ponders the imminent launch of the airline. His mind goes back to his passion and vision of empowering every Indian to fly, a bold dream in a country of one billion people who travelled predominantly by buses and trains. Would Air Deccan fly?

The transfer of perinatal services at St. Joseph's Health Care Centre (SJHC) to the Women's and Children's Services at London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC), included the relocation of clinical programs, 500 staff and about 40 physicians. SJHC's perinatal program had been among the hospital's premier programs and was recognized as a world-class tertiary perinatal program for more than 30 years. The hospital's comprehensive care for newborns included providing care for very sick infants and extremely premature babies. The move to LHSC was a source of much concern to key stakeholders, leading scientists and specialists with much negative impact on recruitment, retention and staff morale. The vice-president, acute and ambulatory care at SJHC and the vice-president, women and children's clinical business unit at LHSC were appointed to help prepare leaders throughout all stages of the restructuring. On their agenda were the following issues: culture, safety procedures, team conflict, excessive turnover, structure, leadership orientation, among others. Where should they start; and how could they get physicians, patient care leaders and staff to think past six months, given that there are numerous issues that keep them busy on a daily, weekly and monthly basis?

The general manager of the Wilkins plant in Paso Robles, California has received instructions from head office to reduce inventory by 30 per cent in the next quarter. Although inventory had been accumulating over the past years, this has been seen as a benefit to the company for a couple of reasons. One is that the cost of raw materials has risen in the past year. The second is that the company has a policy of no layoffs, so having inventory in stock allows the company to minimize the use of overtime and temporary workers. The general manager wondered whether revising the production planning process would be enough to solve Wilkins' inventory problems.

ForeFront Wood Products produces high quality wooden door-sets. The company faces capacity constraints and inefficiencies resulting from its processes and culture. As a consequence, it struggles to be profitable. ForeFront's parent company, ForeFront Holdings, plans an initial public offering in 2007. It has recently hired a new operations manager with the mandate to turn the factory around. As the operations manager begins his job he tours the manufacturing facilities to gather information on production processes and factors affecting capacity, cost and conformance. The case describes the firm's manufacturing and managerial processes. Many issues are described, including high costs, low yields, unreported defects and equipment that fails to operate near its rated capacity. Organizational and change management challenges, including high employee turnover, excessive use of overtime and failure of supervisors to observe or report employee errors are also described.

The environmental manager at the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) has finally received the detailed environmental and social risk assessment of Qatargas II LNG Project. RBC was a potential participant in a syndicated loan for a project financing venture in Qatar. The project would extract and process liquid natural gas there and transport it to the United Kingdom market. RBC was among the first banks to use an environmental and social risk assessment process based on the Equator Principles that supported the principles underlying sustainable development. However, environmental non-government organizations further complicated any financing decision; they were only too quick to point out publicly any shortcomings. Moreover, it was not clear if problems might occur in monitoring and enforcing any loan covenants. Two basic questions remained: first, does the Qatargas II Project make sense to RBC as it attempts to balance economic, environmental and social performance (i.e. the triple-bottom line); and second, do the Equator Principles provide a competitive advantage?

The founder chairman and managing director wants to make Biocon, Ltd. one of the top 10 biotech firms by 2015. The company has dealt in low-risk enzymes and generic drugs for many years. In order for the company to grow, the chairman believes that Biocon must enter the riskier business of drug discovery and development. Without making large investments into new capabilities, the company cannot become a top 10 biotech firm.

At the beginning of 2006, the president of Ullman International (Ullman), a leading producer of hybrid chicks for both the American and world egg industry was facing many challenges: his imminent retirement, the threat of the Asian bird flu, zero or negative growth in primary markets, increasing pressure from the animal rights movement and a strained relationship with Ullman's European parent company. 2006 marked the end of an era for this $200 million company as it enters a period of revolutionary organizational and environmental change, the resolution of which will determine its fate for the next decades.

Senior management at 3M Canada's Industrial Business Division (IBD), which manufactures abrasive and adhesive products, faces a dilemma. In the light of a 2006 directive from corporate headquarters, which calls for top line growth, IBD has a goal of essentially tripling its annual rate of sales gain from its current level of three to four per cent to 10 per cent within two years. In IBD's markets, 3M as a product-driven company with strong research and development focus, has historically concentrated on original equipment manufacturers and specialty distributors, but a new channel to market has emerged. Several national distributors of items used in general repair and maintenance are growing at a rapid pace. If 3M Canada wants to participate in the growth, it must seriously reconsider how it goes to market, particularly in sales and logistics. Dealing with this situation demands analysis of the requirements of the new channel, and an assessment of fit with IBD's capabilities and strengths. Significant changes will be necessary for IBD if it is to gain and sustain business in the emergent segment.