Five Shades of Emerging Business Cases

Foreword

Navigating the VUCA World

Volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity – these four elements form what is known as the VUCA world. This phrase has found a new meaning with the onset of COVID as it somewhat captures the pulse of the emerging world, which is tormented especially by the uncertainty and volatility. These are not normal times, these are times when we are recalibrated towards survival, so building a brand becomes more challenging during these times. It is during these times that the entire dynamics of the businesses need to be revamped. Also these are the times when emerging businesses have seen new-found focus. Five Shades of Emerging Business by two emerging authors Kaushik Ghosh and Mayukh Mukhopadhyay couldn't have come at a better time.

The need of the hour for business, especially the emerging kind are two-fold: one needs to be strictly academic and the other strictly corporate. The essential elements need to be studied from both these lenses to get a holistic picture of how the VUCA world is evolving.

Let us see the five shades which are selected carefully keeping in mind the relevance in the VUCA world:

• Shade 1: Blockchain and cybersecurity
• Shade 2: Bibliometrics and computational complexity
• Shade 3: Healthcare analytics
• Shade 4: Merger, acquisition and restructuring
• Shade 5: Operations and logistics

Organizationally, today technology has become the backbone, especially with the COVID. So every business decision by a leader has to be backed by data, rather big data, if possible. Small wonder AI/ML has become a necessity rather than a luxury. This has also resulted in a sea change in the business metrics that CXOs keep a close watch on.

The choice of explaining each shade in the form of case studies has made the pedagogy appealing to both management students as well as practitioners. These case study approach has given the research of the authors a practical perspective and that is a want in today’s education system. There is a need for pedagogy to be more and more outcome and application oriented and this book is a step towards that direction.

One case that caught my attention the most is the one on NFT or Non-Fungible Token, which is a multi-million-dollar industry. The case study is balanced and explores both the positives as well as the vulnerabilities of NFT. It also mentions the checklist that needs to be followed if one decides to invest in it. So the writing has been done keeping in mind the user, which makes it relevant.

The style is more biased towards academics but is a good read, supported by data and examples. I will recommend this book to management students as well as corporate executives who are keen to understand the emerging businesses in depth.

Prof (Dr) Mahul Brahma
Author, TEDx Speaker, Communications Leader
Dean & Professor of Crisis Communications, Adamas University

Mayukh Mukhopadhyay

Mayukh Mukhopadhyay is an assistant consultant at Tata Consultancy Services. He has more than a decade of experience in designing complex data pipeline to generate customer insights and securing revenue assurance in agile telecom projects. He has authored the book Ethereum Smart Contract Development that has been catalogued by Stanford University Library, Michigan Ross Library, IIM Bangalore Library, Toronto Public Library, National Library Board Singapore and is a prescribed reference at City University of Hong Kong for CS4389 and University of Mumbai. He has also served as the technical reviewer of Ethereum Cookbook. He has a master’s in software engineering from Jadavpur University and MBA from VGSOM IIT Kharagpur. He is currently pursuing PhD from Indian Institute of Management Indore, an AACSB-AMBA-EQUIS accrediated public business school. He is an active Professional Member of Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and peer-reviews various blockchain research papers for Scopus-indexed journals. He is a Microsoft Azure Solution Architect, Google Cloud Professional Data Engineer and Professional Scrum Master. He has been conferred the badge of Quantum Consultations and Enterprise Design Thinking Practitioner by IBM.

Kaushik Ghosh

Kaushik Ghosh has more than ten years’ experience in Defence Production Sector. He has worked with one of the leading arms and defence equipment manufacturers of the globe. He has worked in cross-functional areas of Governance, IT, Finance and Procurement. He has several Economics, Policy Information Technology and Finance related papers published on international journals. He has served as an Officer at Department of Defence Production, Ministry of Defence, Govt. of India. He has worked as a subject matter expert of Finance at an online education portal. The author is an MBA from VGSOM IIT Kharagpur. He has keen interest in Mathematics & Computing, Computational Finance, Mathematical and statistical modelling, Finance, Macroeconomics and Policy, Cyber-risk quantification and Cyber-economics. He has pursued an array of global certifications across various domains. He is an active Professional Member of Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). He is currently pursuing PhD from Indian Institute of Foreign Trade. He has been conferred the status of top 10% of Authors on SSRN by total new downloads on several occasions by Elsevier.

Introduction

This book explores five shades of emerging business topics that can be used in Management Schools as Case Studies. Each topic comprises of three case studies where some cases resemble a traditional narrative, while others will sound like a monologue, and again there are those that sounds like a hypothesis drawn from a research topic. Each case was either personally or collaboratively written by the authors.

For novices, the first encounter to case studies can be frustrating and unnerving. A case apparently appears to be quite straightforward, but when you finish reading it, you may ask yourself questions such as:

• What point is the case trying to make?
• Is it trying to make a point at all?
• What am I supposed to do now?

The case method allows for answers that are objectively wrong or dubious because they are part of learning. The case method allows you to fail often and learn from them.

So, say out loud your thoughts while analysing the cases, to accentuate the decisive individual in you. More importantly, lean into the discussion instead of waiting to make the perfect comment.

"The case method is so organic that you can easily end up in some land mines that you weren’t prepared for... those moments are actual gifts...to understand and unravel the nature of that land mine...in the end, everyone learns."
- Tsedal Neeley, Professor, HBS

DOWNLOAD

The fsebcbook is available as individual chapters that you can freely download as Elsevier SSRN working papers. Each chapter is shared under a Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND license.

The copyright of this book has been licensed non-exclusively to ELIVA Press. All inquiries regarding rights should be addressed to Eliva Press SRL, Moldova, Europe .

We will be making improvements based on community feedback and this digital companion site will remain publicly available.

The print paperback version is now available. You can buy it on Amazon.

Outline of Fsebcbook

Shade 1: Blockchain and Cybersecurity

1. A Curious Case of Cryptokick
2. Identification and Quantification of Cybersecurity Risk
3. Market Microstructure of Non Fungible Tokens

Shade 2: Bibliometrics and Computational Complexity

4. A Managerial Perspective of P vs NP Problem
5. Consumer Studies in the 21st Century: A Bibliometric Case Study
6. Demystifying algorithmic complexities of the 'h'-index

Shade 3: Healthcare Analytics

7. Beta Chemical's Journal Budget Dilemma
8. Risk and Opportunity of Telemedicine in Healthcare Management
9. Ventilator Pricing Decision at ICS Hospital

Shade 4: Merger, Acquisition and Restructuring

10. ABB India Corporate Restructuring Process through Slump Sale
11. Review of Company Law on M & A in India Using SCP Paradigm
12. Tatas' Plan to Acquire a Stake in GMR - in Pursuit of Synergy Gain

Shade 5: Operations and Logistics

13. CruiseLiners in the Time of COVID
14. Panama Papers: How Data Science Fought Corruption
15. The Subtle Art of Hosting a Postponed Olympics

Appendix

About Authors - Mayukh Mukhopadhyay and Kaushik Ghosh

Errata

We are interested in all forms of feedback including, but not limited to:

• errors
• improvements to chapter presentations
• typos
• areas that are confusing
• critical topics that are missing
• ideas for examples, notes or exercises

Please file issues on GitHub or email us at fsebcbook (at) aol (dot) com.

• GitHub

BLOCKCHAIN AND CYBERSECURITY

In 1921, during the era of second industrial revolution, Professor Clinton Biddle, published the first Harvard Case Study named The General Shoe Company. A century later, our book starts with a Case study on how Blockchain and Non fungible tokens is helping Nike, a shoe company, in the fight against counterfeit.

As we move on to information age, the virtual world poses unique risks and threats. The Zero-day attacks are now common phenomena. The second case study identifies the requirement of quantification of cyber security risks and further delves into risk quantification methods by proposing approaches for calculating cyber-risk.

Just like internet revolutionized the exchange of information, blockchain is doing to the transfer of value. In the third case study, we discuss about a special kind of smart contract, deployed on blockchain, that are unique and not exchangeable, along with its peculiar market microstructure that differentiates it from traditional stocks and securities.

BIBLIOMETRICS AND COMPUTING COMPLEXITY

In 2000, the Clay institute offered One Million dollar each for the solutions to seven key problems in Math, famously known as The Millennium Prize problems. Of the seven problems, P vs. NP was both the most recently conceived in 1971, and by far the easiest one to understand and explain. In this section, we start with our fourth case study, where we postulate a managerial analogy to appreciate the complexity of the P vs NP problem and its implications in interdisciplinary scenarios like decision-execution conundrum.

The fifth case study explores how Consumer studies has evolved in the 21st century by doing a bibliometric analysis on the literature published by a prestigious journal. We use biblioshiny, an open-source R package, and VOS-viewer to capture the thematic evolution and knowledge constructs of consumer studies.

The sixth case study deals with the geometrical interpretation of Hirsh Index. It is primarily an author level metrics to determine the productive and citation impact of a publication. The case observes that determination of the h-index using Euclidean geometric method with Cartesian frame of reference provides a thorough and visual clarification.

HEALTHCARE ANALYTICS

Healthcare analytics is a multidisciplinary approach to analyse healthcare data collected from four areas - pharmaceutical research, clinical studies, patience sentiment and retail behaviour, Mediclaim and cost data - to develop insights among three different stakeholders - researchers, policymakers, and industry practitioners.

In this section, we start with our seventh case study, with the backdrop of First wave of Covid, on a fictional Chemical firm. The marketing department of the firm has to develop a budget allocation model for advertisements in various journal in order to stay relevant to medical practitioners.

The eighth case study is a culmination of mini case studies that highlights various legal risk and innovative opportunities of telemedicine in healthcare management and triage assignment.

The nineth case study explores the pricing dynamics at a fictional Hospital on the ventilator unit and its assignment to patients. Regression analysis have been used to develop various pricing models based on patient attributes.

MERGER, ACQUISITION AND RESTRUCTURING

The process of mergers, acquisitions, and restructuring in India is long drawn, complex and competition commission driven. The process may be initiated through common agreements between the two parties, but the sanction of the High Court and Competition Commission is required for bringing it into effect.

In this section, we begin with our tenth case study, where we discuss a restructuring process through slump sale. In a slump sale, an undertaking is sold without considering the individual values of the assets or liabilities contained within the undertaking.

Our eleventh case study uses the structure, conduct, and performance framework to understand Company law pertaining to M&A activities in India. SCP argues that market structure is a determinant of firm conduct, which in turn determines performance.

The twelfth case discuss how synergy plays an important motivation for an acquisition. The case cites the chronology of events, plausible arguments for the acquisition, and statutory response for the acquisition proposal culminating into the clearance of the case by the competition commission.

OPERATIONS AND LOGISTICS

According to Professor John J. Coyle, "Logistics is about getting the right product, to the right customer, in the right quantity, in the right condition, at the right place, at the right time, and at the right cost".

We begin this section with our thirteenth case by studying the complex logistics the cruise-liners had to employ to disembark redundant crew members to various ports around the world during the Covid lockdown.

The fourteenth case explores the complex data engineering that went into building the foundations of the ICIJ’s (International Consortium of Investigative Journalists) data pipeline used in visualizing the connections from the Panama paper leaks. The same pipelines were used for paradise and pandora paper leaks in recent times, giving rise to data driven journalism.

The fifteenth and final case study navigates through the complex logistical decision Japan had to take to successfully conduct the postponed Olympic games of 2020. This decision model serves as a risk management blueprint in midst of pandemic crisis for future Olympic hosting countries.

Elements

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