Knowledge@wharton

Retailers are in a tough situation locked between rising product costs and a limited ability to raise their prices. Even cost-savvy market leaders such as Costco are having a difficult time. But Wharton faculty say that handled carefully the current inflationary period may actually be a business opportunity for some companies. The key: Forgetting some of the old rules of retailing. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Managing the forces arrayed against them -- hostility against Islam in the Western world resistance to change among Muslims and hostility to the West among Muslim populations -- is no easy task for Muslim women in positions of leadership. As one of the participants in a recent leadership conference noted: ”A Muslim woman must prove not just that she is as good or better than a man but as good as a Western woman.” Two Wharton leadership experts were among the presenters at the three-week event. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Many public funds don’t adhere to basic norms of modern money management and most don’t even appear to make an effort to match their investment strategies with their future financial obligations. ”As [sovereign wealth funds] have grown they appear to be demonstrating an increasing risk appetite very little transparency and virtually no clarity of objectives ” write three researchers including Wharton professor of insurance and risk management Olivia Mitchell in a soon-to be-published paper titled ”Managing Public Investment Funds: Best Practices and New Questions.” See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

After the U.S. Supreme Court declared in 2005 that Internet file-sharing sites Grokster and StreamCast had illegally aided their customers’ efforts to share pirated copies of copyrighted music and video files many commentators predicted the demise of businesses that depended on online file-sharing. But new start-ups say they have found ways to make peer-to-peer (often called P2P) file-sharing legal and perhaps profitable. Still their business plans need tweaking according to a paper published recently by Wharton professor Kartik Hosanagar and two University of Washington colleagues. One suggestion: The networks should sometimes be willing to pay more than they get for content. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Despite warnings of a bubble investors and entrepreneurs see long-term promise for firms that make efficient technology and alternative energy. Unlike the vaporware of the tech bubble that burst in 2001 these technologies are up running and proven say participants at a recent conference sponsored by Wharton’s Mack Center for Technological Innovation. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

These days when the U.S. Department of Defense buys a fighter jet from Lockheed Martin it doesn’t simply pay Lockheed for the physical product. Instead the government has a ”performance-based contract” with the defense supplier according to Serguei Netessine professor of operations and information management at Wharton. This contract says in effect that the government’s reimbursement to Lockheed hinges on the jets’ performance -- that is how often the planes are able to fly. In this interview Netessine describes how performance-based contracts are becoming more common in a variety of industries. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Gasoline at more than $4 a gallon has proved to be the price point at which U.S. consumers make big changes in their driving habits. With SUVs and pickups suddenly out of favor in the world’s biggest automobile market Asian manufacturers who invested heavily in fuel-saving technologies -- and European car makers who sell to markets where expensive gas is nothing new -- are better positioned to meet new consumer demands. Just how dire is the situation for U.S. auto manufacturers and is there any relief in sight? See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

The stock market’s June swoon has carried into July with key indicators pointing to a bear market weighed down by rising oil prices the credit crisis and more bad news from Detroit as the Big Three auto manufacturers reported substantial losses. Meanwhile the G-8 gathered in Japan to discuss global warming and the economy but didn’t include the two largest emerging economies -- China and India -- in the talks. Knowledge at Wharton spoke to Wharton finance professor Jeremy Siegel about these developments and others. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Companies spend too much time worrying about the burdens brought by global warming -- the possibility of carbon taxes and greater regulation of emissions -- and ignoring the potential commercial upside according to participants in a recent Wharton conference titled ”Winners and Losers in Green Technologies ” sponsored by the William and Phyllis Mack Center for Technological Innovation. To showcase a proactive approach to the issue two companies -- DuPont and NetJets -- shared their tales of ”going green.” See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

A new global middle is rising up in emerging economies around the world providing competition for labor and resources along with enormous promise for multinationals eager to sell to the burgeoning ranks of first-time consumers. But don’t expect this new group to act in the same way -- and have the same preferences -- as prior generations of middle-class consumers suggest Wharton faculty and analysts. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Companies like Hewlett-Packard Ernst & Young and Del Monte Pet Foods have more in common than one may think: They are all savvy participants in the growing trend of consumers’ use of social networking technologies to access information and get what they need. According to speakers at the recent Supernova conference in San Francisco too few companies study how people actually interact with the Internet and utilize online collaborative tools and are therefore not using the social networking phenomenon to their advantage. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

When are investors like termites? When they are trying to avoid government rules. And that is one reason a host of new regulations won’t prevent a crisis like the subprime housing mess from happening again according to a speaker at the recent annual financial risk roundtable held by the Wharton Financial Institutions Center and the Oliver Wyman Institute. He and others focused their discussion on the causes of and possible solutions to the housing and banking crises. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Since 2004 Steven R. Loranger has been chairman president and CEO of ITT a diversified high-technology engineering and manufacturing company that plays a key role in global defense and security. The company had $9 billion in 2007 sales $4.2 billion of which were generated by its defense electronics and services business and it ranks among the top 10 U.S. defense contractors. Loranger recently spoke with Knowledge at Wharton about how ITT has positioned itself for growth despite the economic slowdown the company’s response to environmental concerns and long-term trends for the defense industry. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Managing commodity risk has emerged as a key issue in today’s economy. Consider airlines which have seen fuel costs rise seven-fold over the last few years says Bob Tevelson a partner and managing director at BCG. In this interview Tevelson says commodity risks are associated with both price volatility and supply availability. More and more companies may wish to turn to hedging strategies to manage commodity risk he notes but such strategies can pose risks themselves unless they are properly implemented. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Marshall W. Meyer professor of management at Wharton has made many trips to China to research the rapid growth of its economy and the successes and difficulties it has had in growing so quickly. In this interview Meyer discusses the recent controversy surrounding China’s exports of substandard toys and pharmaceuticals to the United States and the implications for supply-chain management. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Presidential candidates John McCain Republican senator from Arizona and Barack Obama Democratic senator from Illinois are staking out contrasting positions mostly along traditional party lines in their campaign to win election in November as the 44th president of the United States. One thing they have in common: Both offer tax and spending plans that would deepen the deficit. Wharton professors as well as commentators from around the globe weigh in on the economic views of each candidate. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Consumers tend to associate Johnson & Johnson with Band-Aids and baby shampoo but those well-known products are only part of a much larger picture according to William Weldon chairman and CEO. In fact Weldon has the mind-boggling task of overseeing more than 200 operating companies across three sectors including consumer products pharmaceuticals and medical devices. On June 18 Weldon spoke at the 2008 Wharton Leadership Conference about the challenges of running the J&J family of companies. In an interview with Knowledge at Wharton he elaborated on J&J’s decentralized structure and on what he sees as key issues for the health care industry in the coming decade among other topics. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hewlett-Packard Netflix Apple and others want to move content from the Internet to that big flat-screen TV in the living room. Wharton experts wonder if there is a market for this and indeed whether consumers are even willing to accept interactive television. The best advice to companies for now: Hedge your bets. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

According to David Gergen the man elected president of the United States in November will face the most daunting foreign and domestic challenges since Franklin D. Roosevelt in the 1930s. Gergen who has been an advisor to four U.S. presidents and who currently directs the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government equated the presidency to ”feeling a little like Gulliver in Lilliput.... Giant accomplishments are expected” even as presidential powers are not always what they seem. Gergen discussed today’s presidential candidates as well as former presidents at the recent Wharton Leadership Conference. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

What if you visited an investment site and found advertising messages suggesting therapies for your recently diagnosed heart condition? Chances are you would experience what Fran Maier executive director of TrustE a nonprofit advocate of online privacy calls the ”creepiness factor.” Maier and several others discussed the challenges of maintaining online privacy -- amid rising Internet use and plummeting costs of data storage and tracking -- at the recent Supernova conference in San Francisco. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.