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• Case | HBS Case Collection | October 2019 (Revised August 2020)

  Souqalmal: The Choice Is Yours (A)

  V.G. Narayanan and Alpana Thapar

  This case describes how Ambareen Musa, Founder and CEO of Souqalmal, a Dubai-based online comparison aggregator of banking and insurance products launched her business in 2011 and rapidly grew it over next couple of years. However, by 2017, the Mauritian entrepreneur observed the emergence of other aggregators in the market and wanted to be ready for the price war that could ensue. To date, Musa had grown Souqalmal’s business by focusing on driving positive unit economics and had refrained from entering a price war. However, she wondered whether she now needed to switch gears and focus on defending her market share by counter discounting. Souqalmal had almost run through the $1.5 million it had raised in seed and series A fundraising from U.K.-based Hummingbird Ventures and angel investors, and was seeking to raise $10 million in a series B round later in the year to fuel geographic growth and team expansion. Musa imminently needed to prepare a forecast for prospective investors, which would be dependent on the retaliation strategy she chose. What should Musa do?

  Keywords: unit economics; Finance; Accounting; Competitive Strategy; Financial Statements; Insurance Industry; Middle East;

  Citation:

  Narayanan, V.G., and Alpana Thapar. "Souqalmal: The Choice Is Yours (A)." Harvard Business School Case 120-028, October 2019. (Revised August 2020.)  View Details

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• Supplement | HBS Case Collection | August 2020

  Souqalmal: The Choice Is Yours (B)

  V.G. Narayanan and Alpana Thapar

  Keywords: Accounting; Insurance Industry; Middle East;

  Citation:

  Narayanan, V.G., and Alpana Thapar. "Souqalmal: The Choice Is Yours (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 121-023, August 2020.  View Details

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• Article | American Heart Journal

  Are Cost Advantages from a Modern Indian Hospital Transferable to the United States?

  R. S. Kaplan, F. Erhun, V.G. Narayanan, B. Mistry and K. Brayton, et al

  We use time-driven activity-based costing to estimate the cost of personnel and space for an elective coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery at two U.S. hospitals, Intermountain and Baylor Heart, and Narayana Health (NH), in India. All three hospitals use modern management methods to achieve excellent patient outcomes. We use variance analysis to remove the effect of differential prices paid for personnel and space at the three hospitals. NH, even at U.S. price levels, retains a cost advantage over the two U.S. hospitals by shifting tasks to less-credentialed and/or less-experienced personnel, supervised by highly-skilled personnel, a practice facilitated by NH’s high annual CABG volume. NH offsets some of its task downshifting cost savings by having lower-skilled employees spend more time counseling patients and their families for in-hospital and home recovery. NH’s cost-saving practices could be captured by U.S. hospitals by relaxing hospital and health professional licensing regulations, encouraging greater family participation in inpatient care, and performing complex surgeries in high-volume regional centers of excellence.

  Keywords: Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Health Care and Treatment; Cost; Organizational Structure; Performance Efficiency; India; United States;

  Citation:

  Kaplan, R. S., F. Erhun, V.G. Narayanan, B. Mistry, and K. Brayton, et al. "Are Cost Advantages from a Modern Indian Hospital Transferable to the United States?" American Heart Journal 224 (June 2020): 148–155.  View Details

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