At a time when Africa’s GNP was growing at 2-3%, our client was experiencing stagnant sales in its largest African market. We were asked to investigate market dynamics and uncover potential causes.
We began by working closely with the client’s field teams to understand the market landscape by region, including key players and growth factors. In tandem, we interviewed wholesalers, distributors, retailers and customers to gain a clear picture of the consumer path to purchase. Armed with this foundational knowledge, we employed specialized investigative techniques to root out the causes of our client’s disappointing sales.
Our findings revealed a large number of small-scale, unregulated, unbranded producers that affected not only our client, but their major competitors as well. While we proved the market was growing, the extra sales were being attributed to this unlicensed activity. Our research was used to create a cross-industry initiative with the government to bring up the standards in this unregulated part of the industry and ensure that all players conformed to the same standards.
We helped a global market leader in building supplies determine how a competitor was gaining market share and experiencing rapid growth.
Our client’s growth strategy weighed heavily on acquiring competitors geographically, expanding city-by-city, and we helped to evaluate a key acquisition.
When a Fortune 100 global consumer goods company’s competitor was acquired, we predicted how their new market strategy might affect our client.
Our client, an industry innovator, asked us to investigate a competitor that began using a similar delivery system and product packaging to their own.
An acquired dairy company suffered an EBITDA decline of $30 million. We analyzed the client’s due diligence process and built a complete picture of the company.
A private equity firm invested in a company in Central Asia and was preparing it for sale. We provided guidance to improve the company’s competitive profitability prior to sale.
Our client felt its understanding was limited in growth markets and needed a strategy, and we knew they could only do this with insights into its competition.
When a transportation company was experiencing strong competition, we studied the competitor and determined how it was achieving its competitive advantage.