The entrepreneurial beach vendor industry is culturally vibrant on the famous beaches of Zona Sul, including Copacabana Beach and Ipanema Beach, in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro (commonly known as Rio). Vendors, who mainly reside in low-income working-class districts known as a favelas, sell a variety of goods and services to locals and tourists from around the world. In addition to the numerous characteristics associated with Rio’s beach vendors, four key insights can be highlighted as being particularly noteworthy: the highly entrepreneurial and largely informal industry; the value created for consumers, vendors, and supply chains; the unique challenges; and the addition to Brazil’s economic and cultural fabric.

The insurance industry’s potential for growth in India has attracted numerous organizations, each armed with their most efficient strategies. India’s life insurance market is undergoing a transformation, marked by fierce competition and changing consumer preferences. Public and private life insurance companies and emerging insurtech (insurance technology) companies coexist, intensifying the competition for coverage in a rapidly expanding market. This comprehensive case study delves into the complex world of India’s life insurance distribution, examining the strategies employed and challenges faced by all contenders as they strive for market share, customer loyalty, and sustainable growth. The study critically evaluates the performance of existing distribution channels, raising questions about their relevance and effectiveness in this dynamic environment, in order to gain insights into the intricacies of India’s life insurance sector and shed light on the strategies and innovations required to realize the vision of the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India’s (IRDAI) Insurance for All by 2047.

Stablecoins represent digital assets whose value is pegged to that of a fiat currency, commodity, or financial instrument. As non-volatile assets that enable relatively easy cross-border transfers and minimal price fluctuation relative to the reference asset, stablecoins are especially useful as a medium of exchange.

This note is about tokenization and tokenized assets. Tokenization refers to the process of creating a representation of a particular asset on a blockchain via digital tokens. Tokenized assets typically derive their value from the value of the underlying asset. This note explores the benefits and risks of tokenization, as well as use cases. Moreover, it explores Security Token Offerings, considerations for tokenized asset issuers, and the Howey Test. It concludes with a consideration of how possible future trends may affect tokenization.

This technical note provides introductory to intermediate accounting and finance students with an introduction to the construction of a discounted cash flow analysis. The scenario is a plausible and moderately complex “real-world” managerial decision of whether or not a business owner should purchase labour-saving farm equipment. This decision includes tax implications and long-lived assets. One of the greatest challenges that managers face is understanding exactly what type of problem they are facing. Before we can learn to invoke and apply the appropriate structure, we have to identify the essence of the problem. The next step is to identify the required information to make the right decision, after an appropriate framework has been applied.

Entity-Relationship (ER) data modelling is a critical technique used by data experts to help design new systems, utilize existing systems, and replace old systems. This note describes the different levels of data modelling, as well as its objectives and benefits, provides a brief history of graphical modelling approaches, and focuses on a particular graphical rule set for creating logical data models called Barker notation.

This note highlights how machine learning is being used to decarbonize (reduce GHG emissions) several key sectors including electricity, transportation, building, industrial processes, and agriculture -- and how machine learning is being used to accelerate efforts to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (carbon removal).

This note explores the concept of a "moral compass" for making difficult decisions in leadership roles. It argues that the standard view of a moral compass as a simple, internal guide is inadequate for complex situations. Instead, it proposes that our true moral compass is our personal moral wisdom, which helps us answer four fundamental questions when facing hard choices: What really matters? What is my responsibility? What will work? And what can I live with as a person and professional? Ultimately, we learn what is right by deciding what is right. Our final, elusive moments of decision resemble black boxes. Because we don't know what happens inside them, it becomes especially important to personally answer the four fundamental questions and shape what goes into the black boxes.

An important metric that plays a pivotal role in marketing is customer lifetime value (CLV). Given the constraint of limited marketing budgets, a company can enhance the return on its marketing investment by strategizing to allocate marketing resources based on the anticipated value of different customer segments. This technical note provides a contemporary explanation for what CLV is, focusing on its conceptual underpinnings and why it matters for marketers. In the digital age, the analysis of CLV has experienced a profound transformation driven by the wealth of available customer data and the emergence of advanced analytics tools, and it continues to evolve. This technical note provides an accessible, intuitive introduction to CLV as applicable in a wide range of scenarios. We recommend pairing this with another note that provides examples of empirical applications of CLV: "Three Empirical Methods for Calculating Customer Lifetime Value" (UVA-M-1056).

This technical note describes an important rationalization process called moral disengagement that helps explain why and how people make decisions that stray away from the values they claim to hold. This reading explains what moral disengagement is, how to identify it in the words and rationales people provide to explain their choices, and why it is such a pernicious problem facing leaders. At the Darden School of Business, this technical note has been taught in the second-year "Defining Moments" course, as well as many executive education formats. It would also be suitable for class discussion about making values-driven decisions.

This technical note provides the foundation for a discussion of the measurement and accounting for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. It provides an executive-level summary organized around there questions: (1) How are GHG emissions measured? (2) What are the options for disclosing GHG emissions? (3) What are the options for managing and communicating emissions targets?

This note provides an overview of the regulatory documents the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) requires of public companies in the United States. Specifically, an S-1 filing is required by any security that meets SEC criteria before shares can be listed on a national exchange, and thereafter, the SEC requires Form 10-Q or 10-K quarterly. The note provides details about these three primary communication disclosures, plus links to other resources where students can learn more. It is meant to be a quick reference guide for business or commerce students.

Many executives are under pressure to develop successful data center strategies that work for their organization, according to industry-specific criteria. While data centers have been in use for decades and began as largely in-house centers for proprietary data, they have evolved. In the 2020s, they are more likely to be remote facilities or networks of facilities owned by cloud service providers housing virtualized infrastructure for the shared use of multiple companies and customers. This note offers an overview of the types of data centers, including enterprise, cloud, and colocation; a brief history of data centers; and data center statistics, including especially costs and energy efficiency. With the rise of artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things, and edge computing, among other innovations, data centers are in high demand and evolving to meet it. This note includes video of Jim Miller, a tech industry executive and an expert in the field, discussing hyperscalers, the early days and evolution of data centers, and what's involved in scaling a data center. Along with related notes, this technical note is updated regularly in response to changes in the technology and industry. At the Darden School of Business, it is taught in an MBA course on "Digital Operations."

When looking to fill a position above entry level, companies have two choices: transfer/promote an internal candidate, or hire from the outside. Anecdote and research alike show that external hires are usually offered a higher starting salary than internal candidates.

Firms and investors alike are beginning to recognize the importance of tracking how revenues from existing customers are evolving over time and to appreciate the value in understanding what might explain changes in these revenues. Consequently, in addition to looking at measures such as the retention rate to assess customer base health, they have begun examining a quantity called Net Revenue Retention, or NRR, which measures the fraction (or percent) of revenues expected from a cohort of customers that were actually generated during the period. In this note, we formally define the NRR metric, show how it can be broken down to pinpoint the type of revenue changes taking place, i.e., in what way(s) existing customers are spending differently, and explain NRR's potential role in guiding customer management decisions. The framework presented further highlights how knowledge of NRR can help avoid issues that arise when revenues from newly acquired customers are blended with those of from existing customers, as well as how NRR relates to other customer management metrics, such as retention rate, CAC (customer acquisition cost) and CLV (customer lifetime value). The note provides several concrete examples to illustrate the main ideas presented and the relevance of NRR in practice.

This note introduces interest-rate swaps, financial contracts wherein two parties agree to exchange interest-rate cash flows, typically in the form of an exchange between fixed-rate payments and floating-rate payments. Interest-rate swaps are valuable risk-management tools for entities seeking to alter the composition of their interest-rate exposure, as swaps enable them to hedge against fluctuations in interest rates. This note covers how these swaps are priced, the understanding of which is essential for effective risk management and corporate financing decision-making. At the Darden School of Business, this technical note is taught in the first-year "Valuation in Financial Markets" class; it would also be suitable in a module covering interest rates in a derivatives elective course.

Channels of distribution are a critical component of a firm's go-to-market strategy. A company may elect to sell its products directly to customers (DTC) without the assistance of any intermediaries or, alternatively, it may seek several channel partners to help it reach various customer segments at various locations. Regardless of the route(s) taken to make products and services available to customers, a company needs to understand the pricing implications of its chosen channel structure. This note covers several key concepts, frameworks, and analyses any business should master in order to effectively link efforts to deliver value (via its channels strategy) and efforts to extract value (via its pricing strategy). In particular, the note covers situations where the channel players apply a margin (or markup) to determine their price, as well as settings where they leverage information on market demand to maximize profits. Sources of pricing friction between manufacturers and retailers are highlighted, such as double marginalization, and ways to mitigate these frictions are featured. Furthermore, a number of key pricing practices that channel members engage in are covered, such as MSRP (manufacturer suggested retail price), MAP (minimum advertised price), pass-through rate, and consignment selling. To help illustrate the key ideas, the note provides multiple examples and intuitively explains the steps involved in setting prices in light of the channel structure.