Purpose: The biotechnology (biotech) and pharmaceutical (pharma) industries have a lot of similarities, particularly regarding their mission to provide lifesaving and life-improving drugs. However, there are some key distinctions between the two industries. It is these differences, however,...

Purpose: Digitalization is changing businesses everywhere and the healthcare sector is no exception to this (r)evolution. Yet history teaches us that radical innovation rarely comes from within the industry. Big pharma is a potential victim of this rule. Its leaders should be worried. Some are...

Purpose – This article aims to outline how tangible objects can encourage more efficient working practices and how they can be powerful tools for leading change within an organisation. It looks specifically at how Toyota, Haier and IDEO have very powerful symbols and the type of behaviour this...

Purpose – This paper aims to show why public acclaim is not always a guarantee for healthy profits. A low-cost forerunner, Laker Airlines, also discovered this same fact to its fatal cost. A company needs to understand its true value proposition and ensure that customers are willing to pay for...

Purpose – This article examines the strategic option of airlines facing a crisis. It analyses the current troubles faced by Malaysia Airlines (MAS). Having faced major crises in five months in 2014, the company has been saved only by nationalisation and has a very uncertain future. However,...

Purpose – Southwest is the world’s fourth largest airline and has consistently been one of the most admired organisations in the USA. Its founder and Chairman Emeritus, Herb Kelleher, attributes much of this success to the use of strategic principles. This gives a guiding framework for...

Purpose Academics and practitioners are in relative agreement on what drives a company’s fundamental value, primarily it’s current assets and future cash flows. The practice of paying a premium may thus be due to the non-tangible factors associated with perceived value that currently are not...

Purpose According to the Irish writer, Oscar Wilde, a second marriage is the “triumph of hope over experience”. Many mergers and acquisitions (M&As) could be cast in the same light. This paper aims to outline four crucial questions senior managers should ask before embarking on a merger or...

Purpose Between 1985 and 2001, only 45 of 90,480 total European mergers and acquisitions were identified as a merger of equals (Zaheer et al. , 2003). This indicates that there were less than 1 per cent of the M&A deals that could actually be categorized as a merger of equals. This paper aims to...

Purpose The Allianz acquisition of Dresdner Bank was announced as one of the most important deals of the year, in 2001. It was certainly one of the largest. In April 2001, the Munich-based insurance firm, Allianz, bought Dresdner Bank for more than €20 bn. Unfortunately, such optimism was...