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Interactive Cases

SMX Case Catalog

Every case is a real decision, not a reading. Step into the CEO's shoes, face four critical decision points, and get strategic feedback compared to what the company actually did.

8Cases published
3Free with sign-up
+1/wkNew-case cadence
72Target catalog (5 areas)
All Strategy Operations Innovation
Strategy 2007 Free

Netflix: Reinvention and the Streaming Pivot

You are Reed Hastings — 6.7M DVD subscribers and the best retail margins in America.

Four decisions on cannibalizing your own business before a disruptor does it for you. Launch streaming free or as add-on? Split the brand? How much to spend on originals?

Frameworks: Innovator's Dilemma (Christensen) · Self-cannibalization · Strategic pivot
Innovation 2008-2020 Free

Tesla: The Battery Bet That Rewrote the Industry

You are Elon Musk — the automaker is near bankruptcy and the market says outsource everything.

Four decisions that turned a collapsing automaker into the most vertically integrated EV company on earth. A $5B Gigafactory: mistake, or the industry's next moat?

Frameworks: Vertical integration (Fine & Whitney) · Dynamic capabilities (Teece) · Learning curves
Operations 2004 Free

LEGO: The Turnaround That Saved a Brand

You are Jørgen Vig Knudstorp — first non-family CEO after LEGO's worst loss ever.

Four turnaround decisions by subtraction: cut SKUs, return to core, rebuild brand architecture. LEGO became the world's most profitable toy company within 10 years.

Frameworks: Strategic fit (Porter) · Brand architecture (Aaker) · SKU discipline
Strategy 2010

Uber: The Race for Liquidity

You are Travis Kalanick — one app, one city, and the classic chicken-and-egg problem.

Four decisions on scaling a two-sided marketplace without burning cash. Subsidize drivers or riders? Which second city? How to measure success before revenue?

Frameworks: Two-sided marketplaces · Local network effects · Cold-start problem
Strategy 2013

Spotify: The Fight for Survival

You are Daniel Ek — Apple is prepping Apple Music with 800M cards already on file.

Four decisions on defending against a larger incumbent. Bet on data? Defend free tier? License or build labels? Build a moat or sell the company?

Frameworks: Isolating mechanisms (Rumelt) · Data as moat · Freemium
Operations 1964

Benihana in New York: Experience as Product

You are Rocky Aoki — Japanese immigrant, no capital, opening a restaurant in a saturated market.

Four operational decisions that became a Harvard case 50 years ago. Chef as performer, grill layout, menu discipline: when operations stop being cost and become the value proposition.

Frameworks: Operations as value proposition · Service as theatre · Restaurant unit economics
Marketing 2014

Cristiano Ronaldo: The CR7 Business Empire

You are the strategic advisor — turn short-horizon athletic capital into a long-horizon empire.

Four decisions on the architecture of brand CR7: the Nike lifetime deal, the product spinoffs, the athlete-to-platform transition. The most profitable personal brand in sports.

Frameworks: Keller brand equity pyramid · Personal brand verticalization · Licensing
Strategy 2007

M-Pesa Kenya: The World's Largest Mobile Payments Network

You are a Safaricom executive — a microcredit pilot that became a country's economy.

Four decisions that started as a loan-repayment tool and created the most-used mobile payments system on earth. Strategy in a market where 80% of people have no bank.

Frameworks: Bottom-of-pyramid (Prahalad) · Physical agent network · Financial inclusion

Catalog in active expansion

SMX is building a target catalog of 72 cases across five areas: Strategy, Marketing, Operations, Personal Development, and Finance. New cases are added weekly. Sign up and we'll notify you on each release — no spam.

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