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By Benjamin C. Esty, Lauren G. Pickle, Daniel P. Gross. 2017
In September 2014, Tom Montgomery (SVP of strategic initiatives at the De Beers Group) and his team launched a pilot…
program in the United States to explore the $1 billion diamond market for pre-owned (recycled) diamonds. According to Montgomery, the motivation for the pilot program was to improve the consumer reselling experience and to enhance "diamond equity". Somewhat paradoxically, consumers typically received very low prices when they tried to sell diamonds (5-20% of the original retail price) leaving them reluctant to purchase diamonds in the future and making them into ambassadors of ill will. At a meeting scheduled for November 2015, the De Beers Executive Committee would have to decide whether to end the pilot program, extend it for another year to gather more information, or convert it into a new standalone business unit. Because De Beers had historically focused on producing rough diamonds (the "upstream" business), yet the new business unit offered an opportunity to enter and enhance the market for polished diamonds (the "downstream" business), the decision was particularly noteworthy.By Lauren H. Cohen, Grace Headinger. 2022
Karl Naim, Co-Founder and CEO of Purpl, embarked on a venture to lower remittance costs for his native Lebanon. Since…
October 2019, the Lebanese economy had entered a free fall as its banking sector collapsed and large swathes of its population were plunged into poverty. As a repeat technology entrepreneur, Naim alongside his two co-founders decided to launch a new remittance aggregator to improve access to low-cost remittances, which acted as a lifeline for most local families. By becoming a fiat-to-fiat aggregator and eventually leveraging stablecoin technology, he expected that in the first phase he could cut remittance fees in half from 9-12% to 5-6% -- and eventually up to 1%. With the Lebanese population's trust in financial and banking institutions shattered, could Purpl succeed in its mission? How could it convince its potential users, the broader Lebanese public and the 20 million-strong Lebanese diaspora around the world, to adopt a different way of sending and transacting with digital cash? For primary remittance users, who only needed to reliably receive a monthly $100-$200 for basic goods and other necessities, could Purpl convince them both to change their habits and to trust the financial system that had put them in this situation in the first place? Moreover, given Purpl's ultimate goal to upend the current establishment, would its "playing nice" with current established institutions haunt the firm's "anti-establishment" credibility from ever materializing?By David G. Fubini. 2022
A major, NYC-based, global investment bank is looking to rethink its Systems strategy amid a rapidly evolving digital landscape. Your…
firm has served the client across most of its major geographies on a range of substantial Systems and IT efforts, but is facing competition from two other leading firms who have also supported the client. As you work to develop a proposal, your firm must balance voices from a number of Senior Partners, each of whom has supported the client and has a unique perspective, incorporate the right specialists with technical expertise, and chart a way forward. How should your firm organize to win the work?By Ethan S. Bernstein, Cara Mazzucco. 2022
Frustrated by the current system's shortcomings, including failing to provide clients with the teams they needed for increasingly advisory work…
and affording junior consultants an opportunity to adequately apprentice, Murphy was worried that the current compensation system was holding RRA back from executing on his growth strategy intended to help RRA-a top 5 search firm-recapture market share lost to its competitors since the great recession. He had tried many attempts, over multiple years, to change the culture through other means, but only with tepid success. Now he had to decide whether to pull the trigger on a large-scale effort to adjust RRA's discretionary bonus system after hearing concern-and even anger-over the proposal from some of his top 20 consultants. To permit students to analyze the situation, they have access to detailed, real performance and compensation data for all RRA consultants in 2015 (in the supplementary (C) case spreadsheet), along with the modeling RRA did to forecast the effect of the compensation system changes on each person. Students can therefore analyze how a more collaborative approach to compensation might positively impact some consultants and adversely impact others, assessing the benefits and risks of the dislocation. By asking students to decide whether Murphy should move forward with the new compensation system, or whether an alternative might be better, students will wrestle with the role of compensation systems in driving intended behaviors, such as collaboration, and thus in supporting or warping organizational culture, performance, and growth. By analyzing the dislocation to employees' variable compensation due to a change, students will learn the challenges of changing and calibrating compensation systems.By Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Catarina Martinez. 2022
This background Note introduces the implications of climate change (global warming) for American cities. In the U.S., partisan political divides…
and unaddressed economic and racial disparities in climate vulnerabilities can inhibit action. The two main fronts for action are mitigation (reducing emissions) and adaptation (preparing for change by building resilience). The Note reviews main sources of emissions - energy, buildings, transportation, waste - and examples of mitigation actions, showing differential costs and impact. Adaptation actions depend on geographic location and specific climate hazards, with resilience of infrastructure and institutions a major factor. The most risk-prone are often the least prepared. Crises tend to propel action, and foundations have facilitated adaptation capacity, but leadership challenges require cross-sector goal-setting and collaboration.By David J. Collis, Dan Simpson. 2021
By William A. Sahlman, Michael D. Smith, Nicole Tempest Keller. 2022
By Boris Groysberg, Katherine Connolly Baden, Evan M S Hecht. 2022
Buddy Valastro, celebrity baker and business owner, inherited his father's bakery-Carlo's Bake Shop of Hoboken, New Jersey-at the age of…
seventeen. He had willed the shop to survive and gone on to fame through his television show, "Cake Boss"-the name most people now called him. Its popularity allowed Valastro to launch many additional ventures in the worlds of TV and food, including additional locations of Carlo's Bake Shop. Valastro's businesses had remained profitable throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and he and has team had learned a great deal while managing through the crisis. Valastro felt like he was at a turning point and could build upon the lessons of the pandemic to scale his business. Moving into the future, how could Buddy leverage data and digital offerings? Did he even need brick-and-mortar bakeries? Did he have the infrastructure and team necessary to operate his company now and realize his vision for the future? Was Valastro overextended? How important was Valastro to the brand and to the company? Could they outlast him in the long-run?By Thomas R. Eisenmann, Olivia Graham, Lindsay N. Hyde. 2021
Six months after the August 2018 launch of Troverie, a U.S.-based online retailer of luxury watches, the average cost of…
acquiring a customer is much higher than originally projected, and the startup is incurring a substantial loss on each sales transaction. Could customer acquisition costs be reduced through optimization of marketing messages and channels, or did high marketing costs presage a fundamental problem with Troverie's business model? Troverie was an authorized retailer of 17 luxury watch brands, and had partnered with brick-and-mortar jewelry retailers that would drop ship the watches from their inventory in exchange for a share of Troveries's revenue. The brands were authorizing online sales for the first time, to combat "grey market" outlets that sold their watches without the manufacturer's warranty.By Matthew C. Weinzierl, Christine Keung, Reggie Smith. 2021
By Lauren H. Cohen, Richard Ryffel, Grace Headinger. 2022
Anthony Scaramucci, Managing Director of SkyBridge Capital, considered whether he should officially greenlight the launch of SkyBridge's own NFT platform…
- Flatter NFT. He had led the investment firm to push first into Bitcoin and then Ethereum to make SkyBridge a central node in the crypto industry. He further believed SkyBridge could differentiate itself from OpenSea and other platforms by tying non-fungible tokens with fungible experiences. The technology behind the platform was solidly proven. However, in his head he weighed the tradeoff between launching a full platform versus other ways of investing in the space. With a potential announcement of the platform pending for the September 2021 SALT NYC conference, Scaramucci believed now was the time to make a decision. The NFT space swelled in users and value by the day. Should SkyBridge jump in or move on to another venture?By Laura Huang, Katie LaMattina, Charanya Kannan. 2022
By V. Kasturi Rangan, Courtney Han. 2021
In the wake of George Floyd's killing in May 2020, and widespread protests for social justice in the United States,…
OneTen was formed by a coalition of 40 large companies to provide one million jobs for African-Americans in 10 years. The case describes the background of the labor market in the U.S. and specifically the disparity in opportunities for Black Americans, which was further exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. It describes the effort by government agencies and particularly a nonprofit-YearUp-to address the labor market gaps. The case asks students to analyse the underlying problems and formulate recommendations. The case allows students to understand and distinguish between a system level problem and one that manifests itself at an organizational level. It calls for action planning at an organizational level but one calling for considerable coordination and collaboration across the entire labor supply eco-system.By Laura Huang, Sarah Mehta. 2022
This general experience case tells the story of SearchLight Cures, a fictional biotechnology startup. Having discovered a new therapy for…
a rare disease, the company's co-founders find themselves at an impasse over a pricing disagreement.By Linda A. Hill, Sunil Gupta, Julia Kelley, Emily Tedards. 2022
In late 2021, Mastercard CEO Michael Miebach and Chairman and former CEO Ajaypal "Ajay" Banga considered how Mastercard could best…
position itself for continued success in the years to come. Since Mastercard's initial public offering in 2006, the company had grown and transformed, driven in part by a core strategy of "Grow-Diversify-Build" and vision of a "World Beyond Cash." During Banga's recent tenure as CEO, Mastercard had invested in creating a strong culture, recruiting top talent, driving innovation, partnering with would-be competitors, and launching new services. Now, with Miebach at the helm as Mastercard's CEO, the payments landscape was experiencing increasing democratization of the banking system, the rise of blockchain and cryptocurrency, and increasing nationalism, among other shifts. Miebach and Banga needed to identify the most pressing threats and opportunities in the ever-evolving payments landscape and determine how to take advantage of them. As they looked ahead, they asked themselves: Was Mastercard well positioned for the next 10 years?By Laura Huang, Katie LaMattina, Zoe Otedola. 2021
By Thomas R. Eisenmann, Olivia Graham, Lindsay N. Hyde. 2021
Resolves the questions raised in Troverie (A); recounts pivots and efforts to raise capital from strategic investors and sell Troverie;…
and shares the founder's post-mortem reflections on what went wrong and what he might have done differently.By Ethan S. Bernstein, Cara Mazzucco. 2022
Frustrated by the current system's shortcomings, including failing to provide clients with the teams they needed for increasingly advisory work…
and affording junior consultants an opportunity to adequately apprentice, Murphy was worried that the current compensation system was holding RRA back from executing on his growth strategy intended to help RRA-a top 5 search firm-recapture market share lost to its competitors since the great recession. He had tried many attempts, over multiple years, to change the culture through other means, but only with tepid success. Now he had to decide whether to pull the trigger on a large-scale effort to adjust RRA's discretionary bonus system after hearing concern-and even anger-over the proposal from some of his top 20 consultants. To permit students to analyze the situation, they have access to detailed, real performance and compensation data for all RRA consultants in 2015 (in the supplementary (C) case spreadsheet), along with the modeling RRA did to forecast the effect of the compensation system changes on each person. Students can therefore analyze how a more collaborative approach to compensation might positively impact some consultants and adversely impact others, assessing the benefits and risks of the dislocation. By asking students to decide whether Murphy should move forward with the new compensation system, or whether an alternative might be better, students will wrestle with the role of compensation systems in driving intended behaviors, such as collaboration, and thus in supporting or warping organizational culture, performance, and growth. By analyzing the dislocation to employees' variable compensation due to a change, students will learn the challenges of changing and calibrating compensation systems.By William A. Sahlman, Allison M. Ciechanover, Jeff Huizinga. 2021
QuantumScape CEO Jagdeep Singh juggles the many activities required to lead the next-generation battery pioneer. Founded in 2010, QuantumScape's mission…
was to develop new "solid-state" car batteries that would improve upon traditional lithium-ion batteries in key areas such as range, charging speed, durability, cost, and safety. Success, they believed, would accelerate the transition from gasoline-powered cars to electric vehicles. Between 2010 and late 2020, QuantumScape operated in stealth mode and raised venture financing totaling more than $800 million. The team grew to over 200 employees, nearly all scientists and engineers working on the technical challenges associated with creating a solid-state battery that could be produced at scale. By summer 2020 it was clear to Singh and the board that the company required more capital to help fund its commercialization plan. In November 2020, QuantumScape went public by merging with a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC). Now, with that capital in hand, production facilities under construction, and a signed joint venture with Volkswagen, Singh expected to see cars with its batteries on highways by 2025.By Boris Groysberg, Sarah L. Abbott. 2021
Beto Sicupira had joined Americanas, a leading retailer in Brazil, in 1981. 2021 marked forty years since Sicupira's arrival, and…
the anniversary prompted him to reflect on what had been accomplished and on where the organization was headed. Americanas' growth strategy was centered around offering an increasing assortment of products and services through a broad range of channels. Was this the right strategy to ensure Americanas' success going forward?