Case Studies

The purpose of this case is to illustrate why Napa Valley wine producers find it both irresistible and challenging to enter the growing Chinese wine market. Over the course of the 2000s, China went from being the 51st largest wine importer in the world to…

Orb, a tiny Silicon Valley start-up, came up with a breakthrough technology. Before anyone else was doing it, Orb developed software that enabled every type of media on a PC (including music, photos, and videos) to be streamed remotely to any mobile…

Xiaomi, the Chinese smartphone company founded in 2010, had quickly become an industry leader in the Chinese market. By 2016 it had started to expand internationally, and this case lays out the company’s globalization strategies and challenges moving…

The Laura and John Arnold Foundation (LJAF) was established in 2008 to improve the lives of individuals by strengthening our social, governmental, and economic systems.  Cofounders Laura and John Arnold sought to deploy the majority of their wealth, time…

Established in 1999, the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation aims to transform the lives of children living in urban poverty through better health, education, and family economic stability.  Initially focusing on Central Texas, the foundation rapidly expanded…

This 2016 case describes how Bare Escentuals used innovative product design and marketing to transform itself from a local San Francisco retailer into one of the leading cosmetic companies in the United States. In 1995, the company launched bareMinerals…

Tristan Walker was a 32-year-old entrepreneur. A visionary thinker and GSB graduate, Walker had accomplished much in his short career, and had worked briefly at Twitter, Foursquare, and Andreessen Horowitz before founding his own company, Walker & Company…

Noam Angrist cofounded Young 1ove with the promise of connecting young Africans to proven life-saving information.  By massively scaling sexual health information campaigns that were previously shown in randomized trials to have significant impact, he…

Psaltry International Limited was an agricultural processing company located in rural Nigeria.  The company refined cassava into high-quality food-grade starch, which was used in many consumer products.  As of 2016, Psaltry had 300 employees and operated…

In 2015, Federica Marchionni left her position as the president of the high fashion company Dolce & Gabbana USA to become the CEO of Lands’ End.  She came with a mandate to drive the $1.4 billion iconic American clothing company into the next era. This…

The purpose of this case is to look at Autodesk’s cultural and technological challenges as the company faces a changing industry. With various innovations such as the cloud, the Internet of things, and various new manufacturing processes affecting every…

This case describes how eBay Inc. CEO John Donahoe, leading a multibillion-dollar global technology company in a highly competitive and changing environment, embraced design thinking as a key ingredient of culture change and a catalyst for growth and…

500 Startups continued its expansion of accelerators and venture capital to cover a global footprint for underserved entrepreneurial markets between 2014 and 2016.  As investment returns began to occur, the organization looked to grow and expand beyond…

Since 1996, the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies (CES) at the Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) has conducted a series of studies on the performance of search funds.  These studies endeavor to gather data and gain insight into all known search…

Lending Club follows the path of founder and CEO Renaud Laplanche as he scales his successful P2P lending company both pre- and post-IPO. From debating with bankers on the proper valuation metrics for the company, to managing customer acquisition costs as…

The SkinSpirit case tells the story of Lynn Heublein, an entrepreneur who started her career during the technology boom of the 1990s and eventually achieved success as a pioneer in the medical spa industry. In 1993, Heublein cofounded Catapult…

Data centers represent the heart and lungs of the information technology industry, and typically include three major infrastructure components: servers, networking, and storage.  Servers are organized into cabinets, and connect to each other, to storage…

In 2016, the €75 billion French multinational energy conglomerate ENGIE was massively transforming its strategic and operational imperatives toward renewable energy. The 200-year old company owned Europe’s biggest natural gas pipeline and was a major…

David Dodson started the septic company roll-up Wind River Environmental after mixed results in his previous entrepreneurial ventures.  This case tracks three difficult situations faced by Dodson during his tenure as CEO and Chairman of the company.  In…

The Lucky & Baker case examines several managerial challenges that Mary Chowning encountered during her first year as chief financial officer (CFO) of the fictitious company. Through Chowning’s tribulations, the case provides an opportunity for students…

“Mesosphere: Creating Lasting Value on Top of Open Source Software” explores the challenges associated with building a company on top of open source software.  In 2013, Florian Leibert, Ben Hindman, and Tobias Knaup founded Mesosphere.  By combining…

Faced with declining fisheries and ineffective government solutions, environmental organizations turned to market solutions in the mid-1990s to promote sustainable seafood. Broad-reaching, innovative leaders used a combination of consumer education…

The FreeMobility case describes the fictional story of Sara Chen and Michael Conroy, graduates of Stanford Graduate School of Business (who also happen to be in a romantic relationship).  The two take on the role of co-CEOs of a power wheelchair company…

“Keyssa: Unraveling the Laws of Physics” explores the challenges associated with growing a start-up around a brand new technology.  In October 2012, Eric Almgren became CEO of Keyssa.  Founded in 2009, Keyssa reinvented the physical connector, an…