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This paper aims to first, identify the external and internal factors that a company needs to analyze when formulating its digital platform strategy. Based on the framework of PESTNPG (political economic social and culture technological population and globalization) and internal analysis a company should analyze both internal and external factors to formulate its digital platform strategy. For companies from emerging markets the institutional-based market created by national or local governments is important for digital platform strategy. Second dynamic capability theory and its linkages to digital platform strategy. The dynamic capabilities view is considered as a primary theoretical lens in the strategy literature to analyze a company’s strategies to achieve sustainable competitive advantages. To carry out a successful digital platform strategy companies need to build strong dynamic capabilities to capture or create opportunities and reconfigure their resources simultaneously. Third the advantages and disadvantages of different digital platform strategies (i.e. an independent digital platform and online–offline integration platform) and the possible consequences and risks of different strategies. It is important to evaluate different types of digital platform strategies that require different capabilities in terms of business structure product structure revenue structure organizational structure and technology architecture. A company needs to link these capabilities to a digital platform strategy to enable the integration (or separation) of online business with offline business. It also increases the accuracy and efficiency of online business. Fourth key points of digital platform strategy implementation. Companies need to identify key profit models for their digital platform to promote business growth and financial returns. It is equally important to increase customer value by leveraging its digital exhibition platform and to learn to use digital technology to foster organizational dematerialization.

Zhejiang Meorient Commerce & Exhibition Inc. (hereinafter referred to as “Meorient”) was a leading company in the exhibition industry in China. The unexpected outbreak of COVID-19 plunged Meorient into a state of emergency that forced it to fight for survival. Further, China had launched a national strategy of Digital China, which created new market opportunities for Meorient. As a result, Meorient gradually developed and launched its digital exhibition services in 2015. Meorient suffered significant losses in 2020 due to COVID-19 and had to formulate a new strategy based on a digital exhibition platform in 2021. Chairman Pan Jianjun had two options. One was a purely digital platform strategy without the original offline exhibition business. The other one was an online and offline integration strategy. Which option was the best way forward for Meorient? Pan had to make a choice. Some of the top management team members believed Meorient should completely transform into a digital platform company and provide comprehensive online digital exhibition services. Over the previous 20 years, Meorient had accumulated a large amount of data from domestic and foreign exhibitors and professional buyers and had gradually developed a digital exhibition platform. It was one of the companies that pioneered digital transformation within China’s exhibition industry. More conservative thinking held that Meorient's strategy should focus more narrowly on the integration of online and offline exhibition businesses. Toward the post-pandemic era, China’s national strategy of “Digital China” accelerated the development of digital infrastructures. During such critical transitional period, Meorient had to choose wisely if it was to sustain its profits or even survive.

The case is aimed at students in undergraduate, MBA, short course executive, EMBA or other executive education programs, especially where digital transformation is featured subject matter.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS 11: Strategy

This case was based on secondary data that included various websites, news and academic articles, social media posts and press conferences before, during and after the World Cup. Multiple sources were examined to ensure the accuracy and credibility of the information presented in this case. The goal was to gather relevant information on the Moroccan soccer team, its performance in the FIFA World Cup and the leadership strategies used by Walid Regragui.

“We are the dreamers, we let it happen: Morocco’s soccer team leadership story” explores the transformative journey of Morocco’s soccer team in the 2022 World Cup, highlighting the exceptional leadership of coach Walid Regragui and the power of shared values deeply rooted in Moroccan culture. The instructional manual provides faculty with a compelling case study to inspire discussions on leadership, followership, team dynamics and cultural identity. The case emphasizes the importance of harnessing cultural roots, building trust and unity within a diverse team, strategic vision and tactical brilliance. It demonstrates that with authentic leadership, belief in shared dreams and the strength of cultural values, extraordinary achievements can be realized. The case aims to inspire and educate students, encouraging them to embrace their own cultural heritage, foster teamwork and pursue their dreams with unwavering determination.

The academic level of this case can vary depending on the specific course or program in which it is being used. It is suitable for graduate levels in various fields such as leadership studies, sports management, organizational behavior, cultural studies, or international business. The case provides a comprehensive analysis of leadership, team dynamics and cultural identity, including faith and spirituality, making it adaptable for different academic levels and disciplines. Instructors can adjust the depth of analysis and additional readings or activities to align with the specific educational level and learning objectives of their course.

This case can be used in marketing management as well as consumer behaviour courses.

This case is suitable to use in advanced undergraduate levels, MBA and MSc in marketing courses that cover topics related to market segmentation and marketing mix strategies.

This case highlights the dilemma of an entrepreneur and a manager of a restaurant who were to take a decision about the sustainability of their restaurant business. Balqis Restaurant was owned by Danny who was a retiree from Telekom Malaysia. He wanted to open a restaurant business after he came back from his long holiday trip. He conducted market research to find a suitable place to open his Arabic restaurant. He assigned Waleed Masood Abdullah as the manager of Balqis Restaurant. Finally, in June 2010, he opened his long awaited restaurant at Gombak, Kuala Lumpur. The restaurant was known as Qasar before the name was changed to Balqis in 2015 because of copyright issues related to Saba’ restaurant at Cyberjaya. The restaurant was well managed under Danny’s supervision for 4 years and successfully won customers’ hearts and loyalty before he decided to give full responsibility to Waleed in March 2014. Danny trusted Waleed because he taught and trained him. However, under Waleed’s management, Balqis started to lose its customers. Waleed also started to branch out the restaurant to different places in different states; one in Ipoh, and the other in Perak. He invested much money on renovation for all three branches, but one of the restaurants closed down in September 2014. This is because of the fact that they could no longer bear the cost of operations for the restaurant. However, he failed to learn from the mistake; they set up another restaurant, which was in Kuantan, in the same month. The sales were not that encouraging but it did show gradual improvement; yet, they once again sold it to another Arab businessman. Waleed realized his failure in managing the restaurant business in August 2015. He again opted to open another new branch which was questioned by Danny. He was in a rush to open it by the end of December 2015 to ensure that the additional profits from the current restaurants could cover the variables costs if the new restaurants were launched. Based on that, the owner had to make a decision about whether a new branch should be opened or whether they should just retain their restaurant in Gombak.

The learning objectives of using this case are as follows. 1. Knowledge enhancement: to help students in understanding the problems faced by a restaurant in expanding its market; to make students aware that a properly blended marketing mix is the key to business success and to broaden students’ views and understanding in targeting the proper market segment in formulating an effective marketing strategy. 2. Skills building: to be able to identify the best marketing strategic decisions to manage the restaurant business for its survival and to develop students’ ability to analyse the existing situation to come up with a viable and effective solution. 3. Attitudinal: to help the students to have intellectual openness in accepting different ways of finding solutions for a particular problem and to assist students in making the right move at the right time.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 8: Marketing.

“Starting up a new company” and “development of technology-based venture”.

The target audiences for this study are advanced business or non-business undergraduate students and MBA students taking courses of entrepreneurship, management of innovation and organization theory and design.

Yeayyy.com was a private limited company based in Bandar Baru Bangi, Selangor, a township located about 30 km south of Kuala Lumpur. It was founded by Mr Hazmin in early 2010 with a seed funding of RM150,000 (about US$50,000). By the end of 2014, its core businesses include developing mobile application (app), software and website, as well as conducting information technology (IT) training. The company had developed its own animation cartoon, Oolat Oolit, and had commercialized several mobile app inventions. These mobile apps include a Jawi (traditional Malay writing system) app, mobile games and Facebook apps which were compatible with most mobile operating systems. Since its inception, Yeayyy.com had aspired to follow the footsteps of the internationally acclaimed Malaysian home-grown animation production house, Les’ Copaque, which had produced the popular Upin Ipin series. Similar to Les’ Copaque, Yeayyy.com also planned to commercialize its in-house characters into TV series and to market related merchandises, along with its collaborative partner, CikuTree Studio. However, by the end of 2014, the company’s seed funding had depleted, thus forcing Mr Hazmin to strategize for the company’s future.

Understanding the process of entrepreneurship and technology-based venture development enables case analysts to apply the concepts in many situations involving business opportunities and company development.

CSS:3 Entrepreneurship.

The Olympic Gold Quest (OGQ) was founded as a Non-profit to support Indian athletes in their quest to win Olympic Gold medals by bridging the gap between the best athletes in India and in the world. The support from OGQ has been instrumental to India in winning its highest number of medals at any summer Olympics. Buoyed by this success, OGQ has set up a target of achieving eight Olympic medals at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. With OGQ relying on donations to support the athletes, the challenge is to market the Olympic cause by creating, communicating, and delivering the right offering for its donors.

Services marketing, Market segmentation, Ethnography.

Postgraduate programs, Master in Strategic Marketing and Master in Business Administration.

One of the signs of an increase in religion awareness of Indonesian society is a high demand on Musholla in public area. While other shopping malls just provide a normal standard room for prayer, Senayan City has become a pioneer in introducing an excellent facility of a prayer room. In services marketing, one of the substantial matters to consider is physical evidence, or in other words service setting or servicescape. Musholla is one of the intangible aspects, which depicts services in shopping malls in Indonesia. There are three variables that distinguish visitors' types, such as time spent, liturgical compliance level and concerns for cleanliness/hygiene.

The objective of this case study is to give deeper comprehension about services marketing to students in a practical way. This case study illustrates that a company is capable of creating a strong brand by acknowledging consumer needs and providing extra benefits. Besides, students are also required to analyze diverse consumer needs as each segment has its own needs. The use of ethnography as an approach shows that such a contemporary method can capture dynamic behaviours and deeper insight on consumer needs.

Teaching notes are available.

In early September 2008, in the midst of the subprime crisis, a manager with the student-run Darden Capital Management fund, wants to evaluate whether Comerica Incorporated, a regional bank based in Dallas, Texas, is a good candidate for inclusion in his portfolio. He needs to perform a valuation of the bank to assert whether the bank seems to be undervalued by the market or whether a further decline in value might be possible. He must account for all the factors that affect bank valuation, both as related to the bank itself as well as to the current market conditions. The case can be taught to: a) examine the valuation of a bank during turbulent times; b) understand the key accounting statements (balance sheet and income statement) for a bank and how they may differ from those for an industrial company; and c) understand the key value drivers of bank value (metrics for profitability, credit quality, liquidity, and capital).

Abelha et al. (2018). “Transformational Leadership and Job Satisfaction: Assessing the influence of Organizational Contextual factors and Individual Characteristics” Review of Business Management, Volume 20 No 4, pp. 516–532. Avolio, B. J., Zhu, W., Koh, W. and Bhatia, P. (2004). Transformational leadership and organizational commitment: Mediating role of psychological empowerment and moderating role of structural distance. Journal of Organizational Behavior: The International Journal of Industrial, Occupational and Organizational Psychology and Behavior, 25(8), pp. 951–968. John M Alexander and Jane Buckingham, “Common good leadership in Business Management: an ethical model from Indian tradition”, Blackwell Publishing, 2011, UK and USA. Angus Corbett (2016). A systems approach to regulatory excellence (pp. 255–270), Achieving Regulatory Excellence, Brookings Institution Press, retrieved from http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/PBRLit/Corbett.pdf. Cary Coglianese (2015), Listening, Learning, Leading- a framework for regulatory excellence, Penn Program on Regulation, sourced from https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Listening-Learning-Leading_Coglianese-1.pdf

First, skills: to help students to apply their knowledge in transformational leadership; to help students to apply their understanding of impact of transformational leadership on organizational excellence in not-for-profit organizations. Second, knowledge enhancement: to understand the various components of transformational leadership; to enable the students to understand the different components of organizational excellence with a special focus on not-for-profit organizations and government regulators; to enable the students to understand the process of impact of transformational leadership on organizational excellence and its relevance in emerging markets context. Third, attitude development: students should understand the importance of leadership and its impact in emerging markets.

The case elucidates the transformational leadership style of AICTE Chairman and his key attributes of humility, high ethical standards, openness to ideas and suggestions and problem-solving attitude. The case also highlights how the transformational leadership style of AICTE Chairman heralded the journey of Organizational Excellence of AICTE – an Indian Technical Education regulator. The case maps the change of AICTE from an inward-looking, controlling, opaque organization to a forward-looking, enabling, transparent organization.

This case can be used in leadership classes for Management in Business Administration (MBA) students and participants in executive development programs. The case focuses on transformational leadership and its impact on organizational excellence in context of emerging markets The case also outlines the various components of organizational excellence in not-for-profit organizations and government regulators and hence provides a fresh perspective for measuring organizational excellence.

CSS: 10: Public Sector Management.

Marketing Management and Economics.

Management courses (MBA level), Courses on Tourism

When in India (WII) is a tour company serving the niche segment of Heritage tourism. WII was incorporated in 2011 with the aim to enable foreign and domestic tourists to experience the deeply embedded cultural ethos and heritage of Old Delhi. Their unique tourism product, “the Wonder Pedicabs”, provides leisure rickshaw rides through the Old Delhi lanes. This teaching case focuses on various managerial dimensions of the operations of WII. The case can be used in courses on Marketing as well as Economics. The case discusses the macro and micro environmental forces operating on WII. It deliberates on the economics of various tours offered by WII. It also educates the participants about the process of decision-making that goes into the selection of a tour operator and a tourism product. Hence, it appreciates the significance of need recognition, search for information, evaluation of alternatives and purchase decision as pillars in the process of decision-making process. The case also attempts to educate the participants about the Indian Tourism Sector.

Comprehend what constitutes a tourism product and types of tourism. Understand consumer decision-making for a tourism product. Highlight the importance of the tourism sector in the Indian economy. Discuss economic concepts pertaining to cost and volume, enabling managerial decision-making.

Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

CSS 12: Tourism and Hospitality.

For discussion of social entrepreneurship in middle-income economies, emerging markets generally and Africa, specifically, Quali Health presents interesting questions about entrepreneurial funding, scaling and the interplay between social entrepreneurial activities and the informal sector.

South Africa’s primary health outcomes do not correspond to the country’s spending on public health, with South Africa ranking among the worst globally in the incidence of tuberculosis, HIV prevalence, infant mortality and life expectancy. In part, this poor outcome can be explained by high inequality in access to healthcare, which reflects South Africa’s grossly skewed income and wealth distributions, with the bulk of the country’s population reliant upon an underfunded, inefficient and poorly managed public health system. This substandard service for the working poor in South Africa’s townships with high population densities offered a profitable entrepreneurial opportunity to provide affordable and effective primary care with vast gains in quality and outcomes improved dignity for patients. After receiving her MBA, physician and entrepreneur Dr Nthabiseng Legoete self-funded the launch of Quali Health in 2017. The business model set out to disrupt healthcare delivery for South Africa’s poorest citizens. Drawing patients from the working poor in Diepsloot, Quali Health’s inaugural site was cash flow positive within five months when the facility hit only 30% of installed service capacity. With quick success, Dr Legoete faced the strategic question of how fast to scale and finance the expansion. She also considered a new micro-insurance product for her clientele.

For discussion of social entrepreneurship in middle-income economies, emerging markets generally and Africa, specifically, Quali Health presents interesting questions about entrepreneurial funding, scaling and the interplay between social entrepreneurial activities and the informal sector.

Teaching notes are available for educators only.

CSS: 3 Entrepreneurship.