Case Studies

The Erb Institute publishes a variety of business cases and course materials. Some of these are highlighted below. Additional Erb and William Davidson Institute co-sponsored case studies are available from Global Lens using the keyword search: “Erb” or “sustainability.”

New: Enter the New Sustainability Case Competition

The Erb Institute is offering a new prize for the best sustainable enterprise teaching cases published each year by the William Davidson Institute’s Globalens division.  Cases published by February 28, 2013 will be entered in this year’s competition.

The competition aims to recognize and promote the creation of key teaching materials within the global sustainability and social impact topic areas. The competition is sponsored by the Erb Institute’s Strategic Advisory Council. Winning cases and authors will be recognized by the deans of the Ross School of Business and the School of Natural Resources and Environment in a ceremony to be held on or around Earth Day – April 22, 2013.  Click here for details

Search Case Studies:    

Environmental assessment of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles using naturalistic drive cycles and vehicle travel patterns: A Michigan case study

April 30, 2013

Environmental assessment of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles using naturalistic drive cycles and vehicle travel patterns: A Michigan case study (html)

Authors: Brandon M. Marshall, Jarod C. Kelly, Tae-Kyung Lee, Gregory A. Keoleian, Zoran Filipi

Publication: Energy Policy
Publisher: Elsevier

Highlights:

  • Travel patterns from survey data are combined with naturalistic drive cycles.
  • More realistic PHEV energy modeling using these synthesized real-world drive cycles.
  • Methodology is demonstrated for PHEVs in Michigan but applicable for other regions.
  • Energy and emissions findings have major implications for PHEV standards and policy.

Read more: Environmental assessment of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles using naturalistic drive cycles and vehicle travel patterns: A Michigan case study (pdf)

Building a Scalable Business with Small-Holder Farmers in Kenya: Honey Care’s Beekeeping Model

April 9, 2013

Building a Scalable Business with Small-Holder Farmers in Kenya: Honey Care’s Beekeeping Model (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study # 1-429-313) – published 02/2013, 20 pages.
Developed by: Erb faculty affiliate, Ted London

Description: It was late September, and Madison Ayer, chief executive officer of Honey Care Africa (HCA), was visiting a small-holder farm in Kakamega, Kenya. Together with an HCA technician, he was inspecting five beehives being harvested for the first time on the farmer’s property. Just one year ago, HCA had launched its reworked business model under Ayer, who had become the company’s CEO two years ago. This new model transitioned HCA from obligating farmers to maintain their own hives to providing hive management services. Ayer believed that by taking the maintenance component out of the equation for many of its BoP producers, HCA could secure a stronger aggregate supply of honey, reduce side-selling, and produce more income for each household. While the initial results were promising, the new strategy was not yet working quite as well as Ayer had hoped.

Teaching Points:

In examining this case, students will be able to:

  • Gain a deep understanding of the opportunities and challenges in building enterprises that source goods or services directly from BoP producers.
  • Explore strategies to reduce side-selling.
  • Holistically assess the impacts of an enterprise on BoP producers and their families, with a special focus on children age 8 and under.
  • Identify opportunities to generate greater impacts and enhance the enterprise’s value proposition.

Business Model Innovation at TutorVista: Personalization and Global Resource Leverage

April 9, 2013

Business Model Innovation at TutorVista: Personalization and Global Resource Leverage (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study # 1-428-916) – published 12/2012, 24 pages.
Developed by: C.K. Prahalad, M.S. Krishnan

Description: How do you convince American parents living in the Midwest to hire tutors from India? How do you convince them to hire a tutor that they and their children will never meet in person? Can you build a personal connection between students and tutors when they are separated by thousands of miles and come from vastly different cultures? These are questions that faced Krishnan Ganesh as he began thinking about remote tutoring. A year later he found TutorVista, an internet-based remote tutoring services company. So far, the remote tutoring firm seems to have the right answers to all of the questions above.

Teaching Points:

After discussing this case study, students will be able to:

    • apply critical concepts from earlier learning to define a solution to the case,
    • successfully articulate data and information in support of the solution proposed,
    • critically analyze and discuss other responses and solutions to the case,
    • draw lessons from the case analysis,
    • generalize the learnings of this case to other business challenges and decisions in organizations other than the one analyzed in this case study,
    • demonstrate leadership and scholarship in analysis.

Note on Corporate Social Responsibility: A Debate

April 9, 2013

Note on Corporate Social Responsibility: A Debate (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study # 1-429-177) – published 09/2011, 10 pages.
Developed by: Erb Faculty Affiliate, Aneel Karnani, Pietra Rivoli, Sandra Waddock

Description: This note is a summary of the articles originally published in the Winter 2011 issue of the California Management Review, vol. 53, No. 2. Professor Aneel Karnani from the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business debated against Professors Pietra Rivoli from Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business and Sandra Waddock of Boston College’s Carroll School of Management. They debated the definition and value of corporate social responsibility (CSR), otherwise referred to as corporate responsibility (CR). Corporate social responsibility is commonly defined as operating a business in a manner that takes into account its social and environmental impact. This may include a company actively taking measures to reduce its negative social and environmental impacts, or a company going further by aiming to create a positive social or environmental impact, either through a corporate foundation or by integrating social and environmental impact into its core business.

Teaching Points: Students will gain an understanding of two distinct perspectives on corporate social responsibility  This conceptual note can be used in conjunction with a variety of CSR or social enterprise case studies found on GlobaLens.com.

Movirtu’s Cloud Phone Service: Funding a Base-of-the-Pyramid Venture

April 8, 2013

Movirtu’s Cloud Phone Service: Funding a Base-of-the-Pyramid Venture (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study # 1-429-162) – published 01/2012, 18 pages.
Developed by: Erb faculty affiliate, Ted London

Description: Who are the right investors for a for-profit company targeting the world’s poor?

Before this start-up spends hundreds of hours pursuing venture capital (VC), Movirtu must decide whether a profit-oriented VC investment will fit its vision for both growth and social impact. Movirtu’s “Cloud Phone” software is designed for the nearly one billion people who cannot afford mobile phones and, as a result, borrow phones from friends and family. Movirtu provides phone sharers with a private number that sends and receives calls. Movirtu already secured two seed-round impact investors, Gray Ghost Ventures and Grassroots Business Fund. For its next round of financing, Movirtu was approached by TLcom Capital, an experienced VC. Students must decide: will having TLcom as an investor allow Movirtu to not only survive but achieve maximum financial and social impact?

Teaching Points:

In examining this case, students will be able to:

  • Analyze the role that subsidies can play in BoP venture development.
  • Evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of using impact investors as a source of BoP venture funding as compared to other potential investors.
  • Explore how venture leaders can manage investors with differing expectations.

Building and Scaling a Cross-Sector Partnership: Oxfam and Swiss Re Empower Farmers in Ethiopia

April 8, 2013

Building and Scaling a Cross-Sector Partnership: Oxfam and Swiss Re Empower Farmers in Ethiopia (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study #1-429-185) – published 03/2012, 22 pages.
Developed by: Jonathan Doh and Erb faculty affiliate, Ted London

Description: Winner of the 2012 Oikos Foundation Casewriting Competition. Swiss Re, a large global reinsurance company, has partnered with Oxfam America, an international relief and development organization, to provide the poor with risk reduction support. The partnership’s evolution shows students many common inter- and intra-organizational challenges. For example, the need to overcome internal biases, adapt to organizational differences, and build the capacity to learn from one another. Students will experience what is required to maintain this type of relationship, as well as understand adjustments needed when partnerships scale. 

While many cross-sector collaborations reach the pilot stage, scaling offers a new set of challenges. Oxfam’s next step is to ask for Swiss Re’s long-term commitment to an ambitious vision of scale. Oxfam wants to expand substantially in Ethiopia as well as enter three new countries in the following years.

Teaching Points:

    In examining this case, students will be able to:

    • Evaluate the challenges inherent in cross-sector partnerships.
    • Identify the unique benefits and risks for each sector involved in a cross-sector partnership.
    • Evaluate the challenges and opportunities associated with scaling a partnership’s initial pilot.

REI Rentals

April 8, 2013

REI Rentals (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study #1-429-202) – published on 01/2013, 20 pages.
Developed by:  Mary Fritz and Rich Grousset under the supervision of Damian Beil and Wallace Hopp

Description:  Kirk Myers, REI’s Manager of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), twirled his pen around his thumb and forefinger. Staring out the window toward misty Mt. Rainier, Myers thought hard, recalling a conference call with his boss, CSR Director Kevin Hagen, and Retail Operations Manager Teresa Mueller several weeks before. At the end of the conversation, Myers was tasked with an assignment outside his usual realm of responsibility—find a way to optimize the rental program across REI retail locations to maximize financial benefits while minimizing environmental impacts. Myers had collected data from a few representative stores, and found that the managers were not exaggerating: rental availability was at times a major problem. Now he just had to figure out what to do about it. Myers had formed a team to develop a plan, including Retail Operations Associate Steve Taylor, Logistics Associate David Martin, and CSR associate Emily Walsh.

Teaching Points:

  • Model a queuing system (particularly one in which servers move to customers instead of the other way around), using the variability, utilization, and process time (VUT) equation to quantitatively evaluate the impact of resource capacity on responsiveness.
  • Appreciate the power of pooling, by seeing explicitly how satisfying two sources of demand from a common stock reduces the amount of inventory required to achieve a target service level.
  • Model a rental process as a series of single period inventory problems, computing appropriate underage and overage costs for a rental system, using the Newsvendor model to set appropriate stock levels.
  • Assess the environmental benefits of a rental business model and determine how rentals can be more cost effective to the customer, more profitable to the retailer, and more resource efficient. The effectiveness of a rental model can be further enhanced by pooling rental inventory.

Constructing a Base-of-the-Pyramid Business in a Multinational Corporation: CEMEX’s Patrimonio Hoy Looks to Grow

April 8, 2013

Constructing a Base-of-the-Pyramid Business in a  Multinational Corporation:  CEMEX’s Patrimonio Hoy Looks to Grow (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study #1-429-202) – published on 03/2012, 22 pages.
Developed by: Erb faculty affiliate, Ted London

Description:  This case continues the story from the revised 2006 case study “CEMEX’s Patrimonio Hoy: At the Tipping Point?” This case describes CEMEX’s Patrimonio Hoy in 2012, which is a startup initiative designed to help low-income customers construct their own homes. Israel Moreno, Director of Patrimonio Hoy, must present his recommendations to CEMEX’s top management that outline a growth strategy for the initiative and its expansion into new markets. 

Teaching Points:

    After discussing this case, students will be able to:

    • Explain the concept of the Base-of-the-Pyramid (BoP) and surface implicit assumptions about the poor.
    • Discuss the core concepts in the BoP domain.
    • Assess CEMEX’s Patrimonio Hoy initiative and analyze whether or not it has developed native capability.

ABT Associates: Scaling Indoor Residual Spraying for Malaria Prevention in Africa

March 25, 2013

ABT Associates: Scaling Indoor Residual Spraying for Malaria Prevention in Africa (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study #1-429-272) – published 02/2013, 36 pages.
Developed by: Erb faculty affiliate, Ravi Anupindi and Erb alum, Colm Fay (’12)
*Co-published by Ross School of Business and Global Lens

Description: In the summer of 2011 Abt Associates was awarded a contract to implement indoor residual spraying (IRS) in up to 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa based on successes the company had with its IRS program in Uganda. The company had come a long way since it took over the Uganda project in 2009 from the previous contractor. Abt Associates implemented a number of changes in supply chain management after the first spray round of the Uganda project, including getting community buy-in and involvement, as well as tracking of equipment and supplies—all with excellent results. The procurement process for the new sub-Saharan project had come to a close, and Abt Associates had to present a work plan to the client in just four weeks. Abt Associates Portfolio Manager Susan Scribner decided to visit with Chief of Party of the Uganda office J. B. Rwakimari in Kampala to examine how to best apply lessons from the Uganda project on a larger scale.

Teaching Points: After discussing this case, students should be able to:

    • Examine how Abt Associates improved its Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS) program by obtaining community buy-in and involvement, as well as better tracking of equipment and supplies.
    • Analyze how the IRS program can be replicated, and if lessons learned in supply chain management would prove equally effective in countries with different cultures andhealth care infrastructures.
    • Examine how to best apply lessons from the Uganda project on a larger scale.

A123 Systems Powering A Sustainable Future: Strategizing in the Advanced Battery Market

March 15, 2013

A123 Systems Powering A Sustainable Future: Strategizing in the Advanced Battery Market (pdf abstract)

Purchase the full report on (Case study #1-429-302) – published 02/2013, 24 pages.
Developed under the supervision of Andrew Hoffman by graduate students Matthew Rife, Miguel Sossa-Mardomingo (Erb ’13), Lukas Strickland, James Weng and Ye Yue

Description: A123 Systems successfully went to market with new technologies that had the potential to revolutionize both the energy storage and electric battery industries. It had drawn critical acclaim from President Barack Obama and Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, the automotive industry, the environmental and scientific communities, and Wall Street investors. After opening the largest hybrid vehicle battery manufacturing facility in North America, CEO David Vieau needs to evaluate the road forward, which is fraught with uncertainty. Should he try to gain a foothold in established commercial battery markets or pursue the company’s current mission of being the top supplier for grid storage and hybrid vehicles? Was he expanding too fast or not fast enough? Was Asia a potential avenue for future growth, a source of menacing competition, or both?

Teaching Points: After discussing this case, students should be able to:

  • Analyze the risks associated with clean-tech start-ups and the battery industry
  • Evaluate the role that the U.S. government and regulation plays in incentivizing the industry
  • Identify the vulnerabilities related with buyer/supplier relationships
  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4