Henry Tam, the logistic director at 7-Eleven’s Combined Distribution Centre (CDC), is considering how to tackle a high employee turnover rate. This challenge is partially the result of a shortage of labor in Hong Kong. Over the years, Henry has taken several steps to address the issue. These include collaborating with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to train and employ disabled workers; adjusting the use of cold storage for perishable goods; how to handle bakery products; how bulk goods are packed and distributed; and adopting new technologies to improve employee productivity. Moreover, Henry offers the staff three hours of overtime per day, allowing them to earn more. Henry doesn’t know what else he can do to decrease the high turnover and retain his employees.
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TSL is a family business in a traditional jewelry industry in Hong Kong that is being driven to change by many external and internal factors. This scenario, which is faced by many businesses, can be challenging when perceived from a conventional corporate mindset. To design a future for TSL, the management team needs to embrace an entrepreneurial mindset and build the “new company” by starting from basic principles, then completely re-think how to focus on providing value to new as well as existing customers through innovative products, service, and operating procedures.
The case is set in early 2016, when TSL was facing increased competition, new price sensitivity among its customers, and industry changes. Issues raised in this case are quite broad and could be useful in a wide range of courses, including Strategy, Marketing, and Organizational Behavior. The case could be used as part of a discussion on innovation, strategy, business development, change management, family businesses, company culture, branding, or similar topics.
The students are asked to take the viewpoint of Annie Yau Tse, the new Chairman, on how to move forward in this environment. Remarkably, Annie is the daughter-in-law of the patriarch/founder, and had little experience in the industry. Her background and training is in information technology. She brought a fresh viewpoint and the courage to institute dramatic changes in the management of operations.
This case describes a hypothetical situation faced by a fictitious international conglomerate, ICL, that intends to enter the retail grocery market in Hong Kong. The conglomerate’s interest in the Hong Kong supermarket industry was initially kindled by the plan of Hutchison Whampoa, Ltd. (HWL) to sell its leading supermarket chain PARKnSHOP in August 2013. However, in October 2013, HWL reversed course and decided not to sell PARKnSHOP, saying that the sale would not deliver maximum value to its shareholders. Before embarking into new territory, ICL wanted an in-depth understanding of the Hong Kong grocery market environment, competitors, and potential barriers to entry. The conglomerate was aware that the new Competition Law, which was expected to take effect in 2015, might have profound implications on the grocery market landscape in Hong Kong.
In this series of case studies, students learn to identify, assess, and control the risks of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks in a real-world situation. PopVote was the electronic voting system used by the Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong.
This case consists of cases A, B, and C. Case A gives the background on POP and PopVote. It describes the development history of PopVote, including past voting events, past cyber-attacks, and the evolution of its IT security infrastructure. Students are asked how to identify and assess potential security risks and how to prepare PopVote for an upcoming high-visibility voting event.
The case is based on the inventory situation faced by Arome Bakery, one of the leading bakery chains in Hong Kong. Sarah Cheng, assistant operations manager, wants to increase the bakery’s competitiveness by improving its operation. A key goal is to reduce the number of unsold products that are returned to the central baking factory for disposal. Sarah is looking for a systematic method to determine the optimum order quantity, so as to minimize product wastage while balancing stock-out risk.
This case study focuses on how Huawei had developed and used Huawei Innovation Research Program (HIRP) as its open innovation platform, showing how the company has changed its role from a research fund provider to a research collaborator, bringing mutual benefits to university-enterprise research collaborations. The case features the challenges of managing open innovation projects, such as looking for suitable external research partners, keeping the research projects on track, and evaluating research outcomes. It also shows how Huawei has tackled the problems common to open innovation projects, including the Not-Invented-Here syndrome, intellectual property protection, industry-university communication difficulties and research output evaluation.
As a global company based in Hong Kong, Techtronics Industries (TTI) is sitting on top of the world. Since its incorporation in 1985 as an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM), TTI grew into a leading producer and brand-owner of power equipment and floor-care products in North America, Europe and Australia. At an investors meeting in 2015, it boasted of an unbroken 4-year growth of sales revenues and double digit net profits. TTI attributes its success to its passion for product innovation, manufacturing excellence, and unwavering devotion to specific markets.
To sustain its growth, TTI was convinced that the Asian region would be its next frontier. How should it go about deciding which countries to target? What are the challenges and risks in introducing TTI’s premium products to emerging markets?
The Chevalier case demonstrates how a family-controlled and publicly listed group can make use of a listed company’s idle assets and turn them into a private equity-like endeavor generating better returns for all shareholders.
Founded in 1970, Chevalier Group was a Hong Kong-based conglomerate operating a wide range of businesses. It was a negative change in the fortunes of the IT products distribution business that had inspired Oscar Chow, Executive Director and son of the group’s founder, to enter the food and beverage (F&B) business in 2005. The purchase and subsequent sale of Pacific Coffee in June 2010 were landmarks to revitalize Chevalier Pacific Holdings Ltd under Chevalier Group.
While parts of the business showed strong growth and recorded healthy profits, others had reached their peak and were showing signs of decline. By late 2011, Oscar was devising a long-term strategy leveraging the group’s core competencies. What should the plan be and how should he implement it?
This case is designed as the second part of a two-part case study on Cathay Pacific’s cargo operations, but it can be used separately on a stand-alone basis. The objective of this case is to demonstrate the implementation process of e-freight solution at Cathay Pacific, which involved multiple stakeholders along the air cargo supply chain in multiple countries. Students are expected to step into the role of the cargo service manager in charge of the implementation project, and come up with a detailed plan to resolve the issue.
Cathay Pacific Airways Limited, a leading international airline providing both passenger and cargo services, had been operating under a collaborative arrangement with HATCL, the largest air cargo terminal operator in Hong Kong, since the opening of the new airport. Demand for Cathay Pacific’s air cargo handling services outgrew the terminal’s capacity of the operator. There were on-going discussions between the two partners on opening a new terminal, but no agreement had yet been reached on the service fee paid to HATCL.
As a last resort, Cathay Pacific would need to consider the possibility of building an air cargo terminal for captive use. Peter Lee, a senior executive at the airline, was put in charge of the feasibility study. Although Peter had experience in leading special projects in the past within the company, this particular one was completely different given its scale and the amount of investment involved. Perceptibly, fundamental business elements such as targeted capacity, return on investment and competition had to be included in the study. Other soft issues like management expertise future cooperative relationship with HATCL should also be studied. Peter wondered what other considerations he should include in addition. He wanted to be sure that by tackling these issues from all angles, it would allow him to come up with a recommendation to the board: whether Cathay Pacific should build its own terminal.