Category Archives: Competitive dyn/Game thry

A Blanket Theory of Market Share

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Every wonder why hospital receiving blanket always look the same (pink & blue stripes)? Medline’s “Kuddle-up” line has a near complete market share of the hospital receiving blanket business. The company started in 1910 making butcher’s aprons for the Chicago meatpacking industry. They entered the receiving blanket business in 1950’s and now sell more than 1.5M blankets/year. A recent article in Quartz notes: “The Kuddle-Up blanket was entwined with the institutionalization of childbirth. Just as we began to standardize the process of birth, we began to standardize the post-partum experience, too, such that the newborn photo in the Kuddle-Up blanket is, at this point, an instant signifier. Thousands of new parents, and even grandparents, were themselves swaddled in such a blanket when they were born; that same pattern spans generations.” In a strategy course, one might ask how could a company gain and sustain such an advantage virtually unchallenged for over 60 years? Was there a substantial cost advantage? If so, what are the limits to scale advantages? Why isn’t there a stronger market for a differentiated product? That certainly is the case in related baby care product markets. Will this post make potential entrants aware and help to erode the advantage?

Contributed by Peter Klein

Love Triangle Goes Hostile

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Few things are more dramatic than a good hostile takeover attempt. Dollar General has been trying all summer to break up the planned nuptials between Family Dollar and Dollar Tree. They have offered $600 million more for Family Dollar than the preferred suitor. Two things may be preventing Family Dollar from switching partners: 1) concerns that a Dollar General deal would be thwarted by anti-trust regulators, and 2) the Family Dollar CEO would lose his job if Dollar General takes over. Of course, they say the second issue is not on their minds. This makes a great “ripped from the headlines” case (here is a small packet of news articles). There are many directions that the discussion can go which, I think, makes for a nice introductory case to frame the rest of the semester. Here are a few:

  • What is an industry? The anti-trust argument assumes that the industry is defined as small discount stores (in other words, Wal-Mart is not really a player).
  • Corporate governance: How much should it matter what the Family Dollar CEO’s preferences are?
  • Cost advantages: Do any of the players have a cost advantage? At what point do the advantages of scale diminish?
  • Industry structure: What, if anything, makes this an attractive industry?
  • Competitive dynamics: What will be the next competitive move? What has driven the past moves?
  • M&A Synergies: The news packet includes an estimate of the synergies and suggests that Dollar General could create more value. Do you buy this analysis?
  • Scenario planning: How might this unfold? To explore this, I have created a simple decision tree and added financials draws from a SeekingAlpha analysis in the news packet. Here is the spreadsheet (which uses the Precision Tree Excel add-in).

Contributed by Russ Coff

Fail to Pivot: Battleship v. Lighthouse

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Sometimes no matter how strong your resources are, you still can’t win. In those cases, it’s critical to avoid conflict so you can fight another day. This classic video depicts a battleship demanding that a rival change course to avoid collision. This might be useful for competitive dynamics (game theory), entrepreneurship (failure to pivot) or strategy process (cognition & stubbornness) where it may be critical to know when to change course. Guoli Chen, Crossland, & Luo’s recent SMJ article on CEO overconfidence is a nice academic complement to this. Of course there is a large literature on escalation of commitment that is also relevant.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Stuck in the Middle Blues

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Samsung’s profits are down by a whopping 25% and they put the blame firmly on Chinese competitors entering with cheaper smartphones (see this NYT article). Companies like Xiaomi and Huawei have increased market share in China over the last year as they sell good products at break-even prices. Now, they have turned their sights on western markets that eat into Samsung’s bread and butter. Pressure on Samsung to respond with lower prices? Perhaps but Apple continues to compete effectively at the high end. It’s proprietary operating system keeps rivals from fully imitating many of the most important product attributes. For now, Samsung is signalling that it will accelerate efforts to differentiate their products — an innovation war more than a price war. The real winner may be Google which gains as Android dominates growth in this market. As you can see, this “live” case allows one to explore the complexities of how different strategies play out in the market. It also pushes us to explore how a sequence of strategies might unfold leading to a longer term competitive advantage. This case might go nicely with the HBS case on Samsung’s dual (cost/differentiation) advantage in memory chips and the threat of Chinese rivals. Of course, in the race for new features, one wonders what they will think of next…

Heard Through Michael Leiblein

Strategy on the High Road

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The recent legalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington State offer an unusual view of industry emergence. In anticipation of pent up demand, entrepreneurs scramble to assemble resources. Scarce resources get bid up — one example in Washington is licenses to grow and sell. The second video in the sequence below features an entrepreneur seeking to sell his business to cash in on the license he has. Markets for complementary products and services are booming as well (from tourism to private security and ways to store cash that cannot be deposited into federally regulated banks). Who will win out in the scramble to exploit the opportunity? The results so far in Colorado suggest that many in the state will benefit from the boom — $11M in taxes were raised in just the first 4 months of business. The setting is bound to get students’ attention and it is a nice context to examine entrepreneurship, resource scarcity, ethics, and industry structure (among other things).

Contributed by Russ Coff

French Connection (in Mexico)

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Daimler and Renault-Nissan have entered into a new alliance to open a new joint plant in Mexico. As the video below indicates, they intend to achieve economies of scale that neither partner could accomplish on their own while maximizing differentiation between the two brands. What are the tradeoffs in trying to achieve these competing goals? How will consumers perceive the arrangement? This could spur some nice discussion on alliance management — an opportunity, perhaps to apply the “Four C” alliance framework or the Resource Pathways framework to assess the opportunities and risks. If you are looking for a complementary exercise, this case would go nicely with the Global Alliance Game.

Contributed by Aya Chacar

An Apple A Day Kills Profit?

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This quick Zack King video shows what happens to profit in the healthcare industry when patients are healthy. You might talk about healthcare policy and strategy when good strategies reduce profit. Here, an important distinction might be made between industry and firm level profit. This might also trigger some interesting discussions of ethics. Here are more Zack King videos.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Beaten: An Alliance Out of Tune

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Beats by Dre has a newly told story of an alliance partner that did most of the work but lost everything in the process. Monster, a father and son business (Noel and Kevin Lee) came up with the technology but was severely out negotiated by ts more experienced partner. A great cautionary tale for the study of alliances. I use the “Four C” alliance framework to teach alliances:

  • Complementarities. Monster had the engineering chops to design the path-breaking audio. Interscope and Dr. Dre had the marketing expertise and contacts to make them a fashion item. Clearly these complementary capabilities were strong.
  • Congruent goals. While they had a strong interest to cooperate, their interests diverged on the issue of who would own the intellectual property, brand, and on how the value would be split.
  • Compatibility of the Organizations. The larger and professionalized Interscope had a team of experienced lawyers. Kevin Lee had a BA in engineering. They could work together but not necessarily understand each other.
  • Change. Over the course of the alliance Interscope needed Monster less and less. Once the first products were designed and produced, they could hire other expertise to keep the products fresh (much of that was around fashion rather than new technology). This allowed Interscope to shut out Monster altogether.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Taking Strategic Risk for a Spin

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Individuals and firms have different tolerances for risk. This video certainly captures fearlessness (and maybe stupidity). This might lead to a nice discussion on how such different attitudes might affect competition (for example between small and large firms). It also might seed a discussion of how decisions are made or human capital.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Google/Apple vs. Their Employees?

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Google and Apple must pay a total of $324 Million to current and former employees in a class action lawsuit that they lost. This highlights the multiple arenas on which competition and cooperation play out. Is it surprising that strategic alliance partners might agree not to actively poach employees from each other? Such trust seems like a prerequisite to a productive alliance. And yet, fierce competition in product and intellectual property markets makes it hard to imagine close coordination to collude in strategic factor (human capital) markets. This brings together a nice discussion at the intersection of factor markets, alliances, diversification, game theory, and rent appropriation. The video below gives an idea what Google employees do all day…

Contributed by Russ Coff and Aya Chacar

Graphene with a Kitchen Blender?

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Can a simple “kitchen blender” method of making graphene shake up the electronics industry? The one-atom thick sheets of carbon may one day replace silicon wafers and revolutionize computing and electronics. For example, recent findings suggest that electricity can be generated by running salt water over graphene. Samsung may soon use graphene to make ultra thin hard cases for it’s phones. A fun thought experiment in class might be to develop scenarios for how this disruptive innovation might alter the dynamics of the industry (and adjacent industries).

Contributed by Russ Coff

Coopetition: Shaping up your strategy

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This exercise is a simplified version of the Global Alliance Game. That is, there are resource complementarities created among teams. However, this one emphasizes (to a greater extent) that the teams are in direct competition to complete the same tasks. As such, it is a nice exercise to explore coopetition and alliances with competitors. Introduce the exercise as an experience with the use of resources needed to accomplish a task that have been distributed unequally. Form the groups. Groups should be placed far enough away from each other so that their negotiation positions are not compromised by casual observation. Distribute an envelope of materials and a copy of the accompanying task sheet to each group. Explain that each group has different materials, but must complete the same tasks. Explain that groups may negotiate for the use of materials and tools with other teams. The first group to finish all the tasks is the winner. Give the signal to begin. When the groups have finished, declare the winner. Then conduct a discussion on using resources, sharing, negotiating, competing and using power.

Group Materials (Groups may negotiate with each other for the use of needed materials and tools on any mutually agreeable basis):

Nobody Knows the Bubbles I’ve Seen

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We tend to focus heavily on the value of capabilities in strategy. However, the very features that drive willingness to pay (and thus competitive advantage) may ultimately turn out to be a disadvantage. In other words, a core competence can become a core rigidity. When rivals use this against a firm, this might be thought of as a form of “judo strategy.” Below, the animated scrubbing bubbles, the rival’s differentiator, is reframed as “lewd” residue.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Putin Game Theory in it’s Place

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A recent Slate article notes that Vladimir Putin may be trying to create the impression that he is crazy — that it may all be part of a game theoretic ploy. This seems like a great opportunity to discuss game theory on a much larger stage. The article notes, “Consider strategic theorist Thomas Schelling’s concept of the “rationality of irrationality.” This can be illustrated through the game of chicken, in which two drivers are heading for each other at full speed, and the first to swerve is the chicken. A driver who appears crazy enough to prefer dying over chickening out will always have the advantage. It is therefore rational for a player to convince his opponent that he is actually irrational.” Game theory can seem inaccessible when it is only presented using abstract examples (though Dilbert can help there), this offers a concrete example that may bring it to life for the students.

Contributed by (“heard through”) Nicolai Foss

Rival Analysis: A whale of a problem

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Sometimes firms think they are the “hunter” only to find that their rivals are stronger than they thought. Firms may find that they are the prey rather than the hunter. After an especially cold winter, this video may help to drive home that point. In the context of judo strategy, it demonstrates the value of going undetected until you are stronger than rivals expect. Finally, the video is valuable to illustrate the general issue of managing under uncertainty.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Winner’s Curse: Online Edition

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auction-0Gourmet adventures is a very nice exercise to demonstrate the Winner’s curse in class. The key takeaway there is that decision-makers need to try to understand how certain they are in order to figure out how much to shade their bids — something that few managers actually do. If you have an online course or don’t have time to do this in class, you might consider this simple winner’s curse online simulation (by Mike Shor). The Java applet works nicely to simulate bidding competition over a target including an estimate of the private synergies. Note that you may have to turn off popup blockers and lower security settings for the web page to run properly.

Contributed by Russ Coff

Adaptation on Rugged Seascapes?

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We teach strategy formulation in a dynamic world and yet many of our analytic tools may seem more static if we aren’t careful. For example, 5 forces offers an industry snapshot unless students know to explore how the forces evolve. I tend to introduce scenario planning, decision trees, and monte carlo simulations to incorporate the qualitative and quantitative dimensions of strategy formulation under uncertainty. This brief video provides a fairly graphic view of how it feels to managers. Of course, the seascape metaphor is a play on Levinthal’s classic article (adaptation on rugged landscapes)…

Contributed by Russ Coff

Tesla Strategy Sparks Cusiosity

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Melissa Schilling notes that, despite extensive automation (video below), labor usage is quite high. “There are 3000 workers in the plant, and Tesla produced a little over 20,000 cars in 2013. That’s about 7 cars per worker in a year (assuming the workers are full time). However, the GM Lordstown plant made 70 cars per worker last year (thanks Linos Jacovides for this stat), and in the well-known Renault-Nissan HBS case it reports that Nissan’s productivity was 101 cars/worker/year, and Renault’s was 77 cars/worker/year.” Given the automation, the workers are probably highly skilled (and, thus, well paid). Is Tesla at a huge economies of scale disadvantage? What might be the strategy? They are still 3 years away from selling a cheaper model so it will be a while before they can generate volume from a mid-market product. In the meantime, one possible solution may be found in Chinese sales of electric cars.

Contributed by Melissa Schilling

Paper Fight Exercise

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Having a paper fight in class can really shake things up. It also allows you to demonstrate some simple competitive dynamics principles in a very short exercise. I use this with evening, executive and BBA students — generally on the first day of class to shake things up and introduce the topic.

Learning Objectives:

  • Industry evolution and performance targets.
  • Strategic resources & competitive advantage
  • Dynamic capabilities and hyper-competition
  • Competitive dynamics and game theory
  • Improvisation and strategy
  • Shake things up!

Process/Setup (<5 min): Continue reading →

Aventures Gastronomiques: Recursed

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You may recall the Gourmet Adventures exercise on the winners’ curse in M&A. This is a nice exercise to emphasize the risk of overbidding in M&A. Elisa Operti has taken this a step further. She writes: “I love using the Gourmet Adventures exercise in my Corporate Strategy course. I have been teaching in France and Italy in recent years. Thus, I developed a European version of the game (see the Aventures Gastronomiques Instruction sheet). I use a jar with 1€ coins, 10cents coins and 5cents and updated all the references (diameter, labels, etc…). I’ve labeled the restaurant chains after the French hero celebrated on each type of Euro coin. As a final suggestion, I found that, in this context, the game works perfectly with small groups (3-4 students).” The only thing I might add to this is that you may want to use coins from different countries to capture how country risk may increase the risk of the winners’ curse (e.g., it introduces more error/uncertainty into the valuations). Often students have been introduced to the concept of the winners curse. The point here is to emphasize that the strategic aspects of M&A (country risk, diversified targets, synergies, etc.) increase the risk by injecting uncertainty into valuations.

Contributed by Elisa Operti