Project Profiles

Analysis of Acquisition Target Uncovers Unexpected Risk

After a pilot project, management of the M&A practice of a leading investment bank found itself intruiged by SDG's process for analyzing the value and risk drivers of acquisition transactions. But management was not yet ready to turn away from decades of experience in traditional analysis. Management commissioned another pilot, comparing SDG's approach with the bank's traditional approach in a head-to-head, real time analysis of a specific acquisition target.

New Investment Screening Process Triples Return

How do you apply world-class management techniques to private equity investment – a high-stakes business that is inherently uncertain and relationship-driven? That's precisely the challenge that confronted a Fortune 100, multinational, diversified services and manufacturing company when it came to SDG for help.

'Turbo' Asset Valuation Informs Bidding Strategy

Leveraged buyout firms have little time to bid on investment opportunities. Frequently, in a rush to get a deal done, funds often overbid because they underestimate the level of risk associated with a deal.

Responding to Cyclical Volatility

The CEO of a large property and casualty insurer was troubled by the cyclical swings inherent in the core business. He sought help in creating a strategy for introducing and expanding products designed to dampen the volatile nature of the business.

Insurance Profit Center Design

SDG designed a major profit center structure that restructured and moved resources to decentralized operating units for a large property and casualty insurer.

Agrochemical Generics Entry

A major European agrochemical company was trying to determine whether it should enter the market for generic pesticides. Most of the company's executive team were in favor of this strategy – and the momentum was strongly in that direction – but there was a case to be made for not entering the market.

Growth Through Globalization

After 18 months of disagreement, management of a leading basic chemicals producer was still at odds over whether (and where) to build new capacity, whether to expand existing plants in the US, or whether to swap capacity with competitors.

New Growth Initiatives

A diversified chemical company had developed a new class of performance molecules with a wide range of applications. In an effort to approach commercialization with low risk, the company set up a small venture and worked with a few select customers that funded most application development. But despite in its attempts to minimize risk, management began to suspect that it was also limiting opportunities to grow shareholder value.

Maximizing Shareholder Value

Senior executives of a major fine chemicals company questioned the future of a business that manufactured pharmaceutical intermediates because of its erratic performance over the previous decade. The executives sought a sustainable path to dramatically grow the size and profitability of the business.

Portfolio Optimization

A major pesticides producer faced pressure to improve the efficiency of its R&D investments. The existing investment decision process, which had been driven almost exclusively by science, had no mechanism for adequately quantifying risk, and had little credibility at the executive level. Gaining agreement on prioritizing development compounds required much time, effort, and emotion, for little value.

Market Strategy Alternatives

A major agrochemical company was developing a new broadleaf herbicide for corn that would compete directly with the company’s second largest product. The senior executive team, which had concerns about cannibalizing market share, considered canceling the program because it was far behind schedule.

Decision-Making Process

A major chemical company wanted to launch an ambitious, value-focused strategic decision-making process throughout the corporation. Rather than rely on a single consulting firm for implementation, our client insisted on surveying the most successful tools, systems, and processes used by leading corporations and enterprises throughout the world, and on identifying the best practices and processes now being implemented by the world's leading management consultancies.

Retail Experience Strategy

A "Big Three" US automobile manufacturer was looking for insights into its customers' retail experience in order to develop a channel strategy for its North American operations.

Sports Team Bidding Strategy

SDG helped a major Indian conglomerate develop a bidding strategy that allowed it to successfully acquire a sports team at a cost-effective price.

Brand Proliferation

Our client, a Fortune 100 manufacturer of durable consumer products, was wrestling with a proliferation of 17 brands worldwide and no comprehensive branding strategy.

Strategic Agenda Workshops

A privately held corporation that operates more than 900 restaurants in airports and shopping malls in more than 20 countries engaged SDG to conduct a series of Strategic Agenda Workshops to prioritize critical issues and agree on those most likely to need management attention.

Consumer Products Portfolio

Hoping to find ways to grow its portfolio of six categories, 12 brands, and dozens of products, a global healthcare products company wanted first to understand the value of its portfolio.

City Center Master Plan Feasibility

SDG advised a consortium leading the master planning and redevelopment of a 5 million-square-meter city center on the project's overall feasibility, strategy, financial structuring and analysis, and local government relationships.

Value and Risk in $5.2B Nuclear Refurbishment

SDG analyzed the value and risk of the largest recent nuclear investment in North America: the $5.25 billion refurbishment of several units at a 6,200 megawatt nuclear facility.

Business Portfolio Analysis Leads to Value Creation

For a mid-sized utility, SDG developed a corporate portfolio strategy that assessed each business unit and its contribution to corporate shareholder value.

Resource Allocation Redesign Reduces O&M Expenses

A major Midwestern US utility troubled by rapidly increasing operating and maintenance (O&M) expenses in its generation business and substandard plant performance engaged SDG to redesign its generation resource allocation process.

Identifying Risks in Annual Financial Forecasts

One of the world’s largest power and gas companies had developed a complex and rapidly expanding business portfolio with a broad range of business risks and uncertainty affecting financial performance.

New Planning Process Creates Clear Line of Sight to Shareholder Value

The CEO and CFO of a utility on the East Coast of North America wanted to focus all business-planning efforts on shareholder value creation.

Regulatory Strategy Forms Foundation for Future Negotiations

For a leading utility, SDG developed the legislative strategy, analyzed different dimensions shaping the region’s regulatory strategy, determined the optimal shareholder value relative to these dimensions, and laid the foundation for future regulatory negotiations with various stakeholders.

Price Forecasting Effort Supports Japanese Energy Companies

Our work has focused on developing proprietary price forecasting capabilities for a liberalized energy market in Japan and on developing the ability to make high-quality decisions in that market.

Mega-Project Strategy

A major US oil company was wrestling to determine what near-term investments it should make in Central Asia to keep the longer-term pipeline option open. The opportunity was enormous, and would be far and away the largest value creation opportunity in the entire corporate portfolio. But if the corporation invested near-term and the pipeline fell through, the financial impact could be catastrophic.

LNG Portfolio Optimization

The executive team at a large multinational oil & gas company expressed concern about the corporation's liquified natural gas (LNG) portfolio. Management thought there could be an opportunity to increase the shareholder-value contribution from its LNG operations.

Global Exploration Strategy

For a multinational oil and gas company, SDG optimized its global exploration strategy. By quantifying exploration risks and the value of further efforts to obtain information, SDG helped the company more quickly replace reserves and increase the return on its exploration investment.

Growth Strategy

A major integrated energy company faced the daunting challenge of creating value in the high-cost, high-risk Gulf of Mexico deepwater. Competition was intensifying and the company was falling behind, in part because the organization lacked consensus on setting priorities for leasing, acquisitions, target areas/plays, and infrastructure.

Mature Business Strategy

A multi-billion dollar operating business had been one of the leading cash generators of a global oil and gas major, and a key contributor to technical leadership and innovation. However, the company’s momentum strategy was to “make the most of what we have." Senior leadership was focused on operations rather than discovering breakthrough alternatives.

Value-Based Leadership Program Helps O&G Independent Regain Stature

A once well-regarded large independent was losing its stature. Wall Street’s expectations for the industry had changed, and investors now rewarded only profitable growth and would not tolerate value destruction. For this company, the change triggered five years of stagnant share price relative to its peers. Corporate leaders had tried many approaches to address the problems – without much success.

Portfolio Strategy

A multi-billion dollar operating business was seen as a key opportunity for growth for a global oil and gas major. The company, pursuing a new deepwater basin, faced numerous conflicting challenges, including too many promising leads to fully test prior to expiry, critical staff constraints, limited drilling rig availability, and the need to efficiently allocate more than $10 billion of exploration and development capital across hundreds of projects.

Oil Field Services

Executives at a leading oil-field services company were puzzled. The industry was clearly cyclical, by why did this company experienced hard times that were seemingly unrelated to the normal business cycle?

Profitable Retail Operations

An integrated oil and gas company had recently acquired another company’s retail gasoline operations, and now faced the challenge of integrating company-owned and independent gasoline retailers, streamlining support functions, defining and improving operating standards for retail gasoline sites, and developing sales incentive programs for the front-line retailers.

Urban Planning and Zoning

SDG directed a multifunctional team to develop an urban planning strategy and supporting zoning regulations for a city with a population of more than three million.

Tea Time Product Launch

A client in the consumer beverages industry had an idea for an innovative new fountain beverage and "tea bar" concept. Because the concept was so novel at the time, corporate leaders had little information on the potential market size and penetration and there was significant disagreement within the organization about its value and potential.

Asset Strategy Alternative

When executives of a large oil company announced plans to develop a large stranded gas/condensate field within a few years, not everyone was on board. Equally compelling arguments were made for alternative strategies.

Renewables Analysis

A major US utility asked SDG to evaluate several renewable energy alternatives to better understand the likely demand response, efficiency, and tradeoffs with respect to meeting its reliable service and renewable energy mandates.

Renewable Energy Technology

A startup technology developer wanted to demonstrate the commercial viability of a newly developed proprietary renewable energy technology to investors.

From Subsidy to Free Market

The world’s largest producer of solar cells wanted to better understand the expected transition from subsidy-driven renewable energy markets to an economically sustainable market over the next decade. Specifically our client, an international technology company, wanted to anticipate how the transition would influence the need and value of photovoltaic and storage-related products and services.

Mitigating Risk While Capturing Growth Opportunities

An independent oil & gas producer engaged SDG to develop an Enterprise Risk Management program that would identify risks and growth opportunities and to create a full set of business- and asset-portfolio alternatives to create shareholder value.

ERM Project Profiles

Examples of SDG's experience in Enterprise Risk Management.

Bidding Strategy Project Profiles

Examples of SDG's experience in bidding strategy and game theory.

Internal Decision Support Training and Certification

Oil and gas companies rely on SDG's world-class Executive Education to ensure that successive generations of staff in their in-house decision support organizations have the competence to address the latest wave of challenges in the industry.

IDFC Private Equity Co.

In a move described as “uncommon” for an Indian private equity fund, IDFC Private Equity Co. engaged its longtime strategic partner SDG to help it with strategic investment and risk management of its nearly $1.3 billion under management.

The Galvin Electricity Initiative

SDG has played a key role in the Galvin Electricity Initiative, privately funded by former Motorola chairman Bob Galvin. As part of this initiative, SDG developed two cost-benefit models for evaluating current and future power system configurations, which are available to the public at no charge.