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In May 2017, Hulu CEO Mike Hopkins announced the launch of Hulu Live TV, a new offering that would "change the way people experience TV." The new service would allow consumers to bypass traditional cable and satellite delivery and use the Internet to access live streams of more than 40 popular broadcast and cable networks along with Hulu's existing suite of on-demand programming. Priced at $39.99 per month, Hulu Live TV offered consumers a tremendous savings over traditional cable program packages and allowed subscribers to watch programs on Internet-connected televisions and a wide range of mobile devices. Hopkins also announced that the company would make a major push into the production of exclusive, original programming, one of the industry's most competitive areas. Hulu's new initiatives occurred during a major transformation in the TV industry as the Internet had revolutionized every aspect of the business. Industry observers wondered if Hulu could successfully compete against the entrenched cable, satellite, and telephone companies (known as Multichannel Video Programming Distributors, or MVPDs). Was $39.99 per month a sustainable price point for Hulu's new virtual MVPD (vMVPD)? How big a war chest would the company need to succeed in the original programming arena where competitors annually spent billions of dollars? Could Hulu navigate potential conflicts with the individual business plans of its owners: Comcast, 21st Century Fox, Disney, and Warner Bros., some of the most powerful companies in the entertainment business?

The case examines how Marriott should respond to the potential threats from new home-sharing platforms and the rise of on-line travel agencies. In 2017 Marriott was the largest hotel chain, with more than one million rooms and 7% of worldwide room supply. In the previous decade the growing ubiquity of internet-based commerce had facilitated the rise of technology platforms such as Expedia and Airbnb. The case enables students to explore the forces that might lead to industry transformation and the appropriate response strategies of a large incumbent.

When Meituan merged with Dazhong Dianping in 2015, the company was no longer the fledgling startup it was in 2010. Founded by Tsinghua alumnus Wang Xing, the newly-formed Meituan-Dianping was valued at US$18 billion, joining an exclusive club of "decacorns," or startup "unicorns" worth at least US$10 billion. Soon, the company's first post-merger fundraising amassed US$3.3 billion, the highest amount the world had ever seen at that point. Our case describes how Meituan-Dianping grew from a simple group-buying website to a diverse online platform that offered products and services ranging from airfare to food delivery. It focuses on Wang's rationale and ethos, particularly how they informed and shaped Meituan and subsequently Meituan-Dianping's strategy. It describes the challenges of entrepreneurship and tech innovation, focusing on management and leadership in a dynamic and intensely competitive environment. It also highlights the considerations behind choosing the right business model during a firm's formative period, illustrating how the firm's positioning (e.g., "Meituan is not a Groupon clone") may influence talent recruitment and even fundraising efforts. Our case is suitable for graduate management/business and executive development programmes that include entrepreneurship, tech innovation, or strategy, as well as those with an international focus, especially on China.

This case was designed to facilitate discussion of how a cyberattack was remediated by a major public university. Students are challenged to think through how to best manage the remediation project, including the application of best practices such as risk management, stakeholder management, communication plans, outsourcing/procurement management, and cyberattack remediation. The Phoenix Project was a success from multiple perspectives, and as such provides a useful example of how to manage an unplanned, mission-critical project well.

The case is written from the perspectives of Larry Page, CEO of Alphabet and Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google. The case focuses on opportunities and challenges faced by Alphabet's largest business unit, Google. Competition in Google's advertising space has intensified, mostly by the way of Facebook. This poses a threat because Google still secures more than 90 percent of Alphabet's profits and revenues. The case also highlights challenges of managing a multi-business conglomerate pursuing an unrelated diversification strategy. As Alphabet continues to implement an M-form structure to administer unrelated diversified, the adjacent business units will have a significant impact on Google. Most notably, the Waymo subsidiary has the potential to enter a multibillion-dollar market. The uncertainty of this venture along with Google's core competencies present new opportunities and challenges to the firm. There is also the question if Alphabet can manage this new structure while securing future growth and profitability.

The Regina Auto Racing Club (RARC) had been operating the Kings Park Speedway since 1967. In 2016, the race track and facilities were beginning to show their age and were in need of costly upgrading. Unfortunately, the club had also been suffering from declining attendance over the past five years, and the associated decline in ticket revenue had led to a shrinking race schedule. At the end of the race season in 2016, the club managed to break even financially and had a modest bank account balance. Although RARC was a non-profit organization, the continued financial viability of the club was at risk, and action was required to increase revenue. The club needed to decide among four non-mutually exclusive business strategies. Should it repair and rebuild the facilities to renew the appeal of the venue and attract more spectators? Should it increase its advertising and promotion activities to improve awareness of the club and events? Should it increase the number of race classes and special racing events, or should it introduce non-racing events to the facility to take advantage of other revenue-generating opportunities?

This case considers the association between a financial crisis and regime change. The setting for this case is 1861, when Virginians debate the question of secession from the United States, and when northwestern Virginians contemplated secession from Virginia. The proximate financial crisis was the panic of 1857.

In July 2017, Dr. Brian M. Alexander, president and CEO of the AGILE Research Foundation, was preparing to launch a new type of clinical trial-an adaptive platform trial-to study potential therapies for glioblastoma (GBM), an aggressive form of brain cancer. Alexander believed that the standard way in which new cancer drugs were tested-the traditional randomized controlled trial (RCT)-was limited in many ways. While statistically rigorous and still considered the "gold standard" in clinical research, traditional RCTs were time-consuming, costly, and limited to testing just one new drug at a time. Adaptive platform trials, by contrast, facilitated simultaneously studying multiple therapies for a given disease and promised a number of efficiency improvements. They also used statistical techniques to allow more patients to access promising therapies. As such, they had the potential to fundamentally change the clinical research process, making clinical trials for new cancer drugs more efficient, more accessible to patients, and more ambitious in scope. For the past three years, Alexander had been working closely with a group of like-minded oncologists, statisticians, and clinical trial strategists to design an adaptive platform trial for GBM in the hopes of identifying effective therapies more quickly. By mid-2017, Alexander and his colleagues had completed a master protocol for the trial. But now the research team faced several design and operational challenges as they prepared for the trial's launch. Most pressing, how should Alexander and his colleagues finance the trial?

In 1976, a growing crisis in Southern Africa drew the attention of United States Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger. White Rhodesian leader Ian Smith's refusal to accede to black majority rule threatened to widen into a regional conflict involving apartheid South Africa and newly independent leftist African states. Kissinger and others feared that the region was on the brink of becoming a new battleground in the Cold War. In light of these developments Kissinger decided to intervene, seeking a negotiated solution that might bring about a peaceful end to minority rule. The account in this case carefully describes-but does not analyze nor draw lessons from-these challenging circumstances.

Should the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament gamble most of its player budget on superstar player Rafael Nadal, even after the event's previous two editions saw Nadal and Roger Federer pull out at the last moment due to injury, leaving the tournament without any top-five players? That is the question that Richard Krajicek, former Wimbledon champion and current tournament director, is debating with Jolanda Jansen, the director of the venue that hosts the event. It is June 2017, and earlier in the day, Nadal won the French Open ('Roland Garros') for a record tenth time. Krajicek's plan for the upcoming edition was to focus his recruiting efforts on five exciting, mostly younger, players, and assemble a group of top-20 players around them-but after Nadal's record-breaking performance Krajicek is now considering pursuing the Spanish superstar for the 2018 tournament after all. What is the best course of action?

This is a condensed version of the cases EBX Group (A): Eike Batista and the X-Factor/EBX Group (B): Autopsy of a failure. It describes the boom and bust of the EBX Group and its founder, Eike Batista. The first part traces the history of the Brazilian conglomerate from its origins as a small gold-mining operation in the early 1980s to 2012 when it has become a diversified national and global player in multiple industries. It examines Batista's personal drive, motivations and choices, and how these influenced the strategy deployed by the company. Known for his huge 'risk appetite', Batista had an extraordinary ability to exploit gaps in the market when starting new businesses. The second part of the case recounts the "historic" downfall of the 'X Empire' which was of a magnitude and speed never seen before in the history. Batista's personal net worth of US$30 billion - making him the seventh wealthiest person in the world and the richest in Brazil - had plummeted to US$200 million as debts piled up and the stock price went into freefall. In January 2014, Bloomberg reported that Batista had "a negative net worth".

Frédéric and Fiona Bonner follows the relationship and careers of an investment banker and a tech entrepreneur as their personal and professional lives unfold. It hinges on the dilemma they face ten years into their marriage and with two young children, as job opportunities pull them to different sides of the United States. The case invites students to explore their opinions about Frédéric and Fiona's life and careers to date, their successes, failures and trade-offs, and their options going forward. By doing so it creates a space for students to reflect on and discuss their experiences and expectations of "managing" the interplay between work, love, and family in their lives. The case challenges students to examine how they define success professionally and personally; how, with, and for whom they make major decisions; whether they can "have it all" and what that might look like.

On 30 May 2017, Amazon shares traded at a record high - above $1,000 - surpassing the share price of Google parent Alphabet. Started as an online bookstore 22 years earlier, Amazon has achieved uninterrupted growth by becoming the largest internet bookstore, the largest online marketplace, a media company, and the most successful IT service provider. Amazon recently expanded into the bricks-and-mortar retail business, launching Amazon Books across the US and beta-testing Amazon Go in Seattle. As of May 2017, Amazon was ranked the world's most innovative company and the fourth largest company by market capitalization. The case explores Amazon's path to growth and its successes and failures along the way. Successful strategic moves include Amazon Marketplace, Prime, Amazon Web Services, and Kindle. Failures included Auctions, A9 Search Engine, Endless, and the Fire Phone. Identifying commonalities and differences among them, the case shows the causes and consequences of Amazon's at-once stellar performance and severe setbacks. It applies Blue Ocean Strategy concepts to analyze its market-creating logic for future growth. The case comes with teaching note, a one-page summary and lectures slides. Teaching materials can be downloaded from https://www.blueoceanstrategy.com/teaching-materials/amazon/ The case is also available in Chinese and Korean.

The case documents the emergence of Artsy, a digital solution to the sale of artwork. Once the preserve of the elite, the art market has been democratized by the founder Carter Cleveland, who in 2012 created an online catalogue of painting, photography, sculpture, film and video, and design. The curated platform features works by 70,000 artists, including Pablo Picasso and even a drawing by Vincent Van Gogh. How the young Princeton graduate became the go-to art player for museums and major auction houses like Christie's and Sotheby's is attributed to a business model based on a network of gallery owners, museum curators, art fair organizers and auctioneers, and the creation of a unique database that renders artwork accessible. A truly global powerhouse, Artsy offers art lovers a secure portal to the world's leading purveyors of art.

The hotel industry is being disrupted by new digital players who have entered the market and challenge the conventional hospitality approach. The sharing economy in particular, with the Airbnb start-up in the lead, has created a major challenge, if not a threat, to established hotel chains. As a response, AccorHotels, Europe's leading hotel group, is going through a major digital transformation that impacts its corporate culture, organizational structure, value proposition, and overall business model. The goal is to turn the traditional asset-heavy company into an active player in the new hospitality economy, able to compete head-on with the industry's digital disruptors. Learning objective: The case discusses the strategic response of industry incumbents to the challenges coming from digital disruptors. Participants will be asked to compare the two business models from different angles: how do the different approaches deliver on the consumer proposition, and which are the strengths and weaknesses of each business model. Participants will further be asked to assess the strategic options of an asset-heavy incumbent to react to asset-light competitors in a context of digital disruption. The case serves as a basis to discuss the opportunities and challenges of industry incumbents to transform themselves and better compete in an increasingly digital business environment.

On 27 July 2016, Swiber Holdings Limited, a Singapore Exchange-listed provider of offshore engineering, procurement, installation and construction services for oil and gas companies, filed for voluntary liquidation. Two days later, Swiber withdrew the liquidation application and filed for judicial management instead. Swiber's actions shocked its stakeholders and the market. Its total notes payable was about US$437 million as of 27 July 2016; its debts owed to suppliers and subcontractors were about US$264 million as of 31 May 2016. In contrast, Swiber's market capitalization had shrunk to about US$37 million at the close of 27 July 2016. This case chronicles the rise and fall of Swiber's fortunes, describes the company's financing strategy through the years, and discusses the warning signs that heralded the company's collapse during the prolonged downturn in the oil and gas industry.

Safe Boat Trip Private Limited (Safe Boat Trip) of Kerala, India, is planning to launch a hydrofoil ferry service connecting the Port of Kochi, India, with two other ports in the state of Kerala by August 2016, to benefit from the tourism potential of the season in Kerala. The managing director has asked the principal superintendent of Safe Boat Trip to prepare a project plan for the boats to be commissioned into service, following approval from the Indian Register of Shipping (IRS). The principal superintendent must also carry out a break-even analysis of the project investment. With these challenges before him, the superintendent must set out to devise a solid plan of action before the company's next meeting.

This case examines the strategic positioning of Dianrong, one of the largest online peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms in China, in its attempt to become a foundational player in the expansion of the FinTech sector in Asia. Dianrong had recently announced the acquisition of the asset-origination operations of Shanghai-based Quark Finance, augmenting Dianrong's asset management and credit evaluation capabilities across China, as well as a new initiative to develop the first blockchain platform for supply chain finance in China. The goal was to provide capital to smaller suppliers in the supply chain, and provide enhanced visibility and transparency of supply chains for large multinational manufacturers. The company had also made several recent forays into other related sectors, with their creation of "DR Group" as an umbrella corporate structure that included all wholly-owned businesses, joint ventures, and partnerships. This rebranded group structure encompassed the various aspects of "The New Finance," leveraging FinTech innovation to deliver value for borrowers, lenders, and investors. Case protagonist Soul Htite, Founder and CEO of Dianrong, and the former CTO of Lending Club, must decide how to execute on the firm's aggressive diversification plan. Recent advances at the company, while promising, were complicated by the uncertainties in the political and regulatory landscape. How should the company leverage its advantage in technology and position itself in the market? Which sectors within its larger umbrella structure were the most promising avenues to focus on? Was Dianrong tackling too many sectors and problems at once? Htite's view was that in order to truly succeed in China a technology company had to "create" much of the ecosystem and infrastructure oneself, as opposed to in the US where companies could simply "provide add-ons" to existing firms and capabilities. But the reality of trying to excel in so many different areas was daunting.