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The world's leading Thai agribusiness corporation and largest agribusiness investor in China, CP Group, is facing another crossroads in China as the country starts to undergo rural reform. The issues at hand for Chairman Dhanin Chearavanont is how CP can balance its place as a key investor in China's burgeoning agriculture market with its unstated obligation to also provide guidance and expertise in food safety, technology, as well as jobs for rural farmers while still competing against the growing cadre of international and domestic companies vying to grab share from its operations in China. Was rural reform going to help or hinder CP's position in China and was CP doing all it could to take advantage of these changes?

Ricoh, the Japanese copier manufacturer, is committed to reducing its environmental impact to one-eighth of its 2000 levels by 2050. It has already introduced three stages of environmental awareness to its operations, and its recycled copier business broke even in 2006. The company developed environmental accounting methods and produces annual environmental and sustainability reports, but Ricoh is concerned that investors may not take these efforts into account.

In 2001 Accenture took the bold step of separating from its parent, Arthur Andersen. The new firm that emerged had a bright future ahead, but it also faced the challenge of building a new IT infrastructure that could support a global organization that consults on leading-edge technology. Accenture's CIO at the time, Ed Schreck, knew that becoming a master of your own trade was not an easy task. Frank Modruson, Schreck's successor and the person responsible for carrying forward the IT transformation challenge from 2002 on, had ambitious plans for the new technology infrastructure that was to replace Arthur Andersen's legacy systems. Difficult decisions had to be made. Should the firm continue with a decentralized approach to managing technology platforms, in which each country chooses its own IT platforms and has autonomy to run them? Or should the firm take a mixed approach, in which the same standard applications would run throughout the enterprise but would be managed independently by individual offices? Or should Accenture espouse a "one-firm" approach and boldly shoot for a centralized implementation of its most critical systems, with all its offices interconnected on the same "instance" of a software platform? Furthermore, should the firm retain its traditional conception of IT as cost center, or should it migrate to a scheme that recognizes IT as a service provision center that generates measurable value for the organization? These questions and many others drove Accenture's CIO team to undertake one of the most remarkable IT transformations in a global organization in recent years.

This case is designed to allow two integration teams, each representing one of two very different companies, to construct a joint post-acquisition-integration plan: Titan Products, Inc., a large, publicly traded, North American multinational (approximately $3 billion in annual sales); and Franz Schuler GMBH, a smaller, family-owned and -operated European company (approximately $500 million in annual sales). Some of the issues addressed by this role-play case include (1) organization of Schuler, (2) staffing of management positions, (3) joint-distribution channels, (4) resolution of culture conflicts, (5) focus of strategic and operational decisions, and (6) performance metrics for assessing the success of the acquisition. The role-play requires about 60 minutes of team preparation, 30 minutes of negotiation, and a normal class session (85 minutes) to debrief. The instructions and assignment questions for the case are self-contained.

Toll Brothers has lost focus on what it does best. This is the surprising story of a dominant luxury home builder whose volatility during the housing boom and bust has nearly devastated the company. Students use this case to analyze business stress, decline, and how to respond. The case is complementary to an excerpt from "How the Mighty Fall: A Primer on the Warning Signs" by Jim Collins. Toll Brothers is also included in Module 3: Sources of Business Stress of the course Business Thought & Action.

In 2008, the U.S. financial system was in a state of crisis and Lehman Brothers went from a major Wall Street investment bank to an insolvent institution. It was a swift end for a firm that had its beginnings over 150 years prior. What would be the firm's legacy? And how, if at all, had its activities changed the course of American history?

Describes Google's history, business model, governance structure, corporate culture, and processes for managing innovation. Reviews Google's recent strategic initiatives and the threats they pose to Yahoo, Microsoft, and others. Asks what Google should do next. One option is to stay focused on the company's core competence, i.e., developing superior search solutions and monetizing them through targeted advertising. Another option is to branch into new arenas, for example, build Google into a portal like Yahoo or MSN; extend Google's role in e-commerce beyond search, to encompass a more active role as an intermediary (like eBay) facilitating transactions; or challenge Microsoft's position on the PC desktop by developing software to compete with Office and Windows.

Dell Inc., with its vaunted Direct Model, defined success in the personal computer industry for more than a decade. Starting in the mid-2000s, however, the company fell on hard times. In 2009, Michael Dell and his management team must figure out why the Direct Model has faltered and what they can do to revitalize the company.

To grow Phirbol, a telecom retail franchise chain in Delhi, India's underdeveloped markets, its founders were exploring ways to offer more value to the franchisees. In mid-2009, the Phirbol franchise was comprised of some 150 franchisees that had converted their small "mom-and-pop" shops into Phirbol-branded stores. Entrepreneurs Meghna Modi and Glenn Wong had launched the franchise in 2007, two years after they founded Go Mobile, a company-owned mobile retail chain. While Go Mobile stores were located in higher-income neighborhoods and focused primarily on selling phone handsets, Phirbol stores could be found in less-developed areas-most were not accessible by car-and focused on selling service connections (SIM cards) and recharges. Phirbol added value to the franchisees by streamlining some of their business processes, offering them a consistent product supply, sales support and incentives, and providing them with education on the constantly changing dynamics of India's mobile market. But as the founders looked towards expanding, they knew they would have to enhance their offering to franchisees in order to recruit some of the more established "mom-and-pop" stores they planned to target as franchisees. In addition, they would need to adjust their business model such that more responsibility was delegated to franchisees and staff. Looking forward, what should Modi and Wong do to ensure Phirbol's success?

This two-page case demonstrates how to unbundle the cost of credit extensions from product prices by observing the price of a credit default swap. It also explores how credit default swaps work, and how trade creditors are treated under U.S. bankruptcy law. Finally it provides a quick overview of the bankruptcy of General Motors Corp.

This case describes how an IT director identified an opportunity and implemented an innovative business solution designed to enable line managers and executives to convert data to information to insights. The case also details how the company partnered with an emerging technology start-up, Netezza.

Shurgard, a U.S.-based firm that rents storage facilities to consumers and small businesses, is considering financing options for rapid expansion of its European operations. Five years after entering Europe, Shurgard Europe has opened 17 facilities in Belgium, France, and Sweden. Along the way, Shurgard has encountered skepticism from both European consumers and investors about the unfamiliar self-storage concept and internal debates on how much to adapt the U.S. business model to European lifestyles. Wall Street analysts also do not value the impact that the European expansion could have on Shurgard's U.S. performance as a publicly traded Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT). As an alternative, to finance this expansion, Shurgard received a proposed deal from a consortium of banks and other investors where they would provide private equity financing spaced over the next few years plus a line of credit. In return, the investors would receive a large share of Shurgard's equity and control of its board, which could force a public offering in less than two years. The decision focuses on whether Shurgard Europe should accept the conditions and valuation of the proposed deal or seek another deal at a later point in time. Students must assess whether the self-storage business model can deliver the growth rate in Europe that the company has promised its potential investors. Involves calculating some basic estimates of the company's value from financial exhibits (enterprise value using an EBITDA multiple). Main focus is to assess this as an entrepreneurial venture. Students do not need to be familiar with REITs.

In June 2008, the Kimpton Hotels' area director of revenue management (director) for Washington, D.C. was trying to process the most recent customer information report from Priceline.com (Priceline). In an attempt to improve revenues during periods of low occupancy at the hotel, the director had recently been using Priceline's "name your own price" bidding format. While using this sales channel had limited success, the director was wondering the best way to maximize the revenue coming from Priceline without cannibalizing existing sales or tarnishing the Kimpton brand. His challenge was to create a pricing strategy that would determine the optimal posted price for rooms in the Washington, D. C. hotel as well as the number of rooms that should be provided to Priceline.

In 2005, the vice-president of Lundbeck, a Danish based central nervous system (CNS) pharmaceutical firm, needed to decide what to do with one of his most promising subsidiaries, Lundbeck Korea. Over its short lifetime, under the leadership of the country manager and the Asia regional manager, the subsidiary had grown well beyond the original goals set for it. The vice-president wanted to create a reporting structure and management mix that would balance the local demands that Lundbeck Korea required for growth with Lundbeck's overall strategy of specialization, speed, integration and results. While focusing on Lundbeck Korea, the case also traces Lundbeck's internationalization efforts in Asia over the past 20 years. Over that time, the company has grown from pure licensing arrangements to establishing its own country level subsidiaries. This case introduces the dynamic tensions between taking advantage of local management expertise and executing a corporate strategy developed for an entire global group. In addition, it illustrates the importance, but difficulties, of being sensitive to local management goals, while promoting a global corporate culture.

A real estate developer decides whether to enter into a public private partnership with the government of West Bengal to develop a township on farmland. The decisions include whether to expand operations from the company's base in Kolkata to Bardhaman, 100 km away; whether to subdivide and sell raw land lots or follow the developer's vision and build a planned township; whether to enter into a public private partnership with the government of West Bengal, led by the Left Front and the Communist Party of India as equity partners; or whether to also accept a private equity firm into the project, what to build, and in what sequence.

The case describes the formation of Indus Towers, the largest telecom tower company in the world which has a joint venture created to build and manage the passive infrastructure of wireless telecom operators by bringing together three competitors in India's tough telecom market-Bharti AirteI, Vodafone Essar, and Idea Cellular-and merging their tower holdings. It focuses on the issue as to how do you collaborate with your competitors in setting up towers but engage in a brutal competition with them in the market place?

Global climate change is an increasingly prominent political and business problem. Design of market-based systems to reduce carbon emissions has proven difficult. More broadly, national attempts to comply with the provisions of the Kyoto Protocol present both governments and firms with significant challenges. The design of international institutions that will be useful for managing change after the Kyoto period is a challenge both for Kyoto ratifiers and for countries like the United States that have not ratified the agreement. Creation of a post-Kyoto treaty on climate change requires agreement by China and the United States, the world's largest carbon emitters. The case summarizes the science and economics of climate change and encourages readers to contemplate the strategic and risk management problems that it presents to government officials and to business leaders in developed countries and in the developing world.

The Sun Life Financial cases allow students to take a cross-enterprise leadership approach in examining Sun Life's effort to re-enter the Indian insurance market. Set in March 1999, a vice-president in Sun Life's international team is looking at international expansion options. In its domestic market, Sun Life, relative to its peers, has had below average financial performance. With the domestic insurers demutualizing (i.e. converting from a policy holder-held mutual company to a public company), Sun Life needs to find avenues of growth. In addition, there are rumors that the domestic insurance industry will be opened up to competition from the Canadian banks, whose market capitalization dwarfs that of the insurance industry. The (A) case, Sun Life Financial: Planning for the Future, product #907M45 lays out the macro issues and describes in general the various insurance markets around the world. The (B) case, Sun Life Financial: A Potential Indian Life Insurance Joint Venture, product #907M46, hones in on Sun Life's decision to re-enter the Indian insurance market.

The director of Acute Care Information Management at University Health Network is thinking about how to form a steering committee and several working groups to manage the implementation and ongoing operation of the Medication Order Entry and Medication Administration Record module. This initiative would be the most challenging and complex the IT department had ever undertaken. She would need to address the concerns of administration, physicians and nurses.

This case explores project management in a large organization through the eyes of a young project manager, Mike Morris. Morris is tasked with leading a project within the overall merger integration effort at Bank of America. Morris encounters difficulties with managing stakeholders, setting requirements, and reporting progress.