Workshop on Management Games

Term III, AY 2019-20

Industry: CXXXX Company Name: XXXX

Group Members:

Name Registration Number

Sidharth P Jacob 0401/58

Prajapati Jaivin Bhadreshkumar 0402/58

Rahul Chauhan 0403/58

Aakash Umesh Verma 0404/58

Aditya Jef 0405/58

Slide# 1
Contents
Slide-wise answers to below-mentioned questions

1. Please state the objectives that you set out to achieve at the beginning of round 1, also
tell us why?
2. What was your strategy to achieve these objectives and tell us the operational decisions
that you took (round-wise), that you thought, would help you achieve these objectives?
Which decisions helped you achieve success through the rounds, and which did not work
and why?
3. Mention unexpected events that took place over the rounds. Did you change your
objectives at this point of time, if yes, did those work?
4. Name the competitor(s) who you were most alert about in different segments, functional
areas and financial parameters, why?
5. Please mention decisions that changed in the competition round when compared to the
practice Round (Mention specific decisions.).
6. Any other observations that you want to discuss.

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1.
Please state the objectives that you set out to achieve at the beginning of round 1, also
tell us why? (You can mention segments that you intended to focus, your strategic choice for
each segment and financial objectives that you wanted to achieve thereof.)

Some Management Games 1 Learning powered objectives: Cumulative Profits:~$68 M

• Generalist manufacturer (Focus on all the product segments)
• Maximize profit margins by focusing on optimizing production automation, HRM, and TQM
• Building products by planning the parameters according to customer buying decision
Implementation Layout: Pizza teams, Following the journey of a startup round-wise implementation plans .
R&D Price Promo/Sales & Production Finance
Huge capital expenditures in For traditional we wanted to Selling some capacity in R1 so We wanted to have at least
early rounds to build up start our pricing as close as to we can finance Automation in $10-20k cash at year end just
automation our competition and undercut initial rounds are gain to make sure we do not enter
if possible. competitive advantage an Emergency Loan crisis
We planned to keep MTBF for For low end, we wanted to We planned to spend a We preferred to issue
all our products to the have the lowest price we can maximum of $2000 on maximum stock followed by
maximum amount we can. afford without going below promotions and marketing as long-term borrowing and
40% in our contribution Diminishing returns are avoid short term loans to
margin. And without realized after the same as per avoid huge interests.
sacrificing demand. our learnings from term 1
We wanted to increase For high end, performance Automation goal: Traditional We planned to keep extra cash
performance and reduce size and size segments, we wanted 10, Low End 10, High 6, Size & in hand for improving our cash
as much as you can without to place price the highest Performance 7 - considering positions for further rounds as
the revision date reaching July. possible. diminishing returns a safety blanket

Slide# 3
 2.
What was your strategy to achieve these objectives and tell us the operational decisions that you
Took (round-wise), that you thought, would help you achieve these objectives? Which decisions
helped you achieve success through the rounds, and which did not work and why?

• Round 1:  Increased Automation to level 7.

• Round 2: Focused on optimizing production through conservative forecasting
• Round 3: Increased expenditure in R&D to upgrade product to compete with rivals
• Round 4: Improved on traditional segment product as it was lagging behind in the market
• Round 5: Sold production capacity of a few products to help fund R&D & Marketing costs
• Round 6: Financed operations more through long term loans & avoided short term loans.
• Round 7: Shifted focus to marketing and selling products and invested less in R&D and
produced more than required in this round to have good inventories for the 8th round
• Round 8: Sold the production capacities of many products. Decrease pricing for low selling
products to clear inventories and maintained premium pricing for products that were doing
well to maintain margin. Achieved a record profit of $31-32 M in this round.

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3.
Mention unexpected events that took place over the rounds. Did you change your
objectives at this point of time, if yes, did those work?

• Round 5: We had scaled up production and were too aggressive in production coupled with
some marketing dysfunctional decisions that led to around null profits in this round.

• The major mistake that led to this event is we implemented aggressive R&D movements that
were taking the revision dates for the new products to next year. This was a blessing in
disguise for other teams, specifically Digby, to gain some leaps and bounds over our better
performing segments.

Recuperations of this mistake:

• Industry Leader: We lost the pole position to Digby and thereby lost some competitive
advantages gained till now by increasing margins and a focussed R&D spent in previous
rounds
• Lapse in R&D makeup: We had lost a full year without R&D for some segments because
of an aggressive R&D in round 5 that led to a revision date only implementable by next
year.
• Change in strategic positions for re-gaining a normal breathing in round 6

Slide# 5
4.
Name the competitor(s) who you were most alert about in different segments, functional areas
and financial parameters, why? (Please state here specific decisions made by competitors that
hurt your business and you were not expecting them.)

• Digby was our sole competitor since round 1 as it was following a similar R&D strategy,
maintaining similar product prices and having comparable profit margins

• Eerie was another competitor in the low-end and traditional segments for us that had
gained significant market share in these domains in the later stages of the game

• Baldwin was a core-competitor for us in low end segment as it had specialized low end
segment by introducing 2 products in that space and had a relatively higher age for its
products which is the chief buying criteria for the customers

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5.
Please mention decisions that changed in the competition round when compared to the practice
Round (Mention specific decisions.). Discuss whether you opted for similar segmental focus and
financial objectives, and how would your operational intents be different?

● From the results we obtained in practice round, we shifted our overall strategy with a more
aggressive approach in competition rounds.
● In terms of improvising the products, best possible improvements were made for each
product.
● In initial phase, we remained complacent about the best selling products. But that changed
when we witnessed stale profits for those products and started investing in R&D, Promotions
and even automating those products to the full extent.
● We even understood the importance of automation during the earlier stages and invested
heavily in the automating products.
● We weren’t too much focusing on the extra capacity that we had for some products in the
earlier stages. We started increasing and decreasing capacities as per the need from there on.
● Along with that, we continuously kept a check on the inventory and sales numbers for each
product while making a decision for production

Slide# 7
6.
Any other observations that you want to discuss.

• Importance of TQM and HRM expenditures

• Significance of optimizing automation in initial rounds

• The benefits of following a start-up like journey in our strategy

• Benefits of having a clear R&D strategy from the onset

• Diminishing returns to scale for promo/sales marketing budgets if set too high

• Compensatory effect of increasing margins/reducing costs in absorbing losses

Slide# 8
Thank You!

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