Top 50 Bestselling Case Authors 2022/23: No. 8

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No. 8 - Kamran Kashani

Kamran Kashani
Emeritus Professor of Marketing and Global Strategy
International Institute for Management Development (IMD)

Kamran Kashani is Emeritus professor of Marketing and Global Strategy at IMD. He teaches topics in marketing, market-based strategy, brand building and international management. His special interests span the industrial, business-to-business, and consumer sectors. He has held several academic and management positions at IMD including directorship of the institute’s prestigious MBA programme.

Kamran has worked as a consultant and management educator with a large number of international companies including: ABB, Assa Abloy, Avon, Novartis, Carrefour, Citibank, Electrolux, General Electric, Hewlett-Packard, Honeywell, IBM, Medtronic, Merck, Metso, Nestlé, Orkla, Reuters, Tetra Pak, Unilever and Uponor.

He has written extensively on the subjects of marketing, global strategy, and innovation. His publications, including several books, have been translated into more than a dozen languages around the world. Kamran is the winner of several awards for best paper, case writing and practitioner oriented case method.

In addition, Kamran was the inaugural winner of The Case Centre’s Outstanding Contribution to the Case Method Award.

Kamran's top bestselling cases

Browse Kamran's top three bestselling cases during the last year.

Innovation and Renovation: The Nespresso Story

Reference no. IMD-5-0543

The case traces the development of the Nespresso System in a 100%-owned affiliate deliberately placed outside of Nestle's main organisational structure. It highlights the team's successes and challenges in creating a new, small, niche segment in the mature coffee market and its prospects for growing the business. A radical departure from most Nestle lines of businesses targeted to the mass market, the Nespresso story offers provocative lessons about innovation in large, highly structured organisations.

Value Selling at SKF Service (A): Tough Buyer Confronts Strategy

Reference no. IMD-5-0751

This is the first of a three-case series. Steelcorp is asking suppliers of bearings, including SKF, to submit to online reverse auction where the lowest unit price is likely to win high-value orders. Students must decide whether to participate in the auction or refuse and risk losing large orders during poor market conditions.

Reinventing Nespresso? The Challenges of a Market Leader Under Attack

Reference no. IMD-5-0790

Despite revenues of CHF 3.5 billion in 2011, Nespresso’s 1,700 patents were expiring and copycat capsules compatible with their machines were emerging. The case describes the new competition Nespresso faced, the brand’s first reactions, and the tough choices it had to make in order to sustain its success.

View all Kamran's cases

Bestselling case author in...

8th - 2022/23 8 - 2021/22 13 - 2020/21 9 - 2019-20 2 - 2018/19 2 - 2017/18 2 - 2016/17 4 - 2015/16

“I am often asked by the faculty here at my Institute, IMD, and other business schools where I hold workshops ‘What is the magic formula for writing a good case?’ My response to the question is the following: There is NO magic formula for writing a good case, and if there was one it would be a pretty simple one.

“In my experience, the ingredients (not a formula!) for a good case are twofold: first, an important management problem or dilemma that gives a focus to the case and challenges the student reader to find a resolution for it (these are what I call ‘life-or-death’ issues that truly matter in the real world and for which there no easy solutions); and second, a well-written short story around the management problem or dilemma that engages the student reader from the first paragraph to the last; almost like a good crime novel that keeps readers so engulfed they just can’t put the book down. In my experience both ingredients are essential.”

~ Kamran Kashani