Riipen | Projects

Strategic Market & Sales Channel Research: ESG Appraisal Products

Defined Tasks: Wenco has been undergoing research into ESG and the potential impact on its product line and customers. Initial Phase 1research focused on the overall ESG landscape, influencers and started to examine likely future standards. Phase 2 focused on defining an ESG dashboard that could be delivered by Wenco’s digital platform, focusing on three levels: enterprise, site, and equipment. The majority of the effort focused on equipment dashboards and integration with Wenco technologies (e.g. FMS). Phase 3 will look at the larger picture that will influence mining companies and the supply chain this industry belongs to. It will divide the research into two areas 1. Industry-leading influencers from the customer-demand side and other organizational influencers. For mining, these would include leading buyers such as Tesla, BMW, Tiffany and others (details listed below) as well as United Nations and other bodies. The research will examine what metrics they use to evaluate and influence suppliers along their supply chain in order to determine what operational reporting mining companies should offer in monthly/quarterly and annual reporting related to ESG. 2. The Financial market approach that includes banks, investors, auditors and standards bodies that will create the new “sustainability and social responsibility bottom line” mirrors the approach for financial profit reporting, as well as the technologies (e.g. blockchain) that may be used in such reporting. Expected outcomes: We break the task down into two areas, each area will be assigned to a student/team, respectively. Area 1: ESG management across supply chains. Student(s) assigned to this section are expected to choose six leading companies (three per 80-hour report duration) to carry out research across the supply chain, to figure out: 1. What are the ESG requirements/matrices those companies exert on their suppliers, including mining suppliers? 2. What monthly reports can be created by an ESG management system to help those companies? (Wenco will then determine if any of this data can be captured in near-real-time or by shifts to flow up to aggregated dashboards and reports) Potential supply chains to look at (minimum three per 80-hour session): a. Jewelry: Jewelers (Tiffany, Pandora, Chow Tai Fook, Cartier, etc.) --->Refineries (Johnson Matthey, HNH, etc.)-àmining companies (Barrick, Kinross, Newmont, etc.) b. Electronics: Consumer electronics (Apple, Sony, Nintendo, etc.) ---->Microelectronics (TSMC, NVIDIA, Samsung, Intel, STMicroelectronics, etc.) -àelectronic materials (Tanaka, Heraeus, etc.) àRefineriesàMining companies c. Electric vehicles: Carmakers (Tesla, BMW, etc.)àBattery makers (Panasonic, AESC, PEVE LG, CATL, etc.)àRefineriesàMining Companies d. Other TBD by students, including organizations such as United Nations, other leading industries. Student(s) are also highly encouraged to look at other relevant supply chains/leading companies. Area 2: ESG management through financial instruments. 1. What roles financial institutions are playing in ESG? Which will be the most influential in setting ESG standards and compelling mining and other suppliers to report/comply? 2. What kind of instruments are they using to regulate operating companies? - For example, “Green Loans” are quite popular recently. 3. Are they developing in-house solutions to appraise the ESG performance, or cooperating with 3rd parties? Which of those 3rd parties can be our potential M&A target/partners? Potential 3rd parties: a. Sustainalytics b. Refinitiv c. Envirosuite d. K2Fly e. Minetell Student(s) are also highly encouraged to find and research other targets. 4. How can the data they collect be validated? (e.g., using blockchain? A company called Minespider claimed they have blockchain technology for "green certification")

Category Social sciences + 2

Sales Market Entry Planning: Safety Suite

Purpose: · Market research conducted to understand how safety solutions built for mining could be adjusted to gain a profitable foothold in adjacent markets. · Conducting research on a market adjacent to mining that has been deemed the most attractive based on previous analysis. · Highlighting the key go to market considerations in this new market. Assessing the competitive strengths of key competitors and providing market entry recommendations. Overview: Wenco has recently acquired a fatigue management company that measures brain activity and empowers operators with the information they need to act and avert personal harm and damage to onsite assets. In addition to fatigue management, the Wenco Safety suite also provides solutions for collision awareness, speed monitoring and shift management. As we seek to increase our market share in Safety for mining, we are also hoping to expand into adjacent markets that can also benefit from our Safety solutions. In this project we want students to analyze the safety market, highlighting the segments with the highest degree of similarity to mining. Assessing competitors in segments like underground mining, construction and transportation will provide the Wenco team with an understanding of market attractiveness and our relative competitive strength. Number of Individual Students Required: 2 Defined Tasks: 1. Market Analysis: a. Begin Analysis on the market segment assigned to you from the Wenco team including, competitive landscape, customer segmentation and market sizing that identifies an obtainable market for Wenco's safety offering. b. Point out the most significant considerations for achieving successful entry into the defined segment. In other words, how does Wenco need to adapt sales processes and leverage a new dealer network to achieve success? How competitive will our offering be? c. Create an overview of the path to purchase in these adjacent markets, drawing attention to differences in how Wenco currently secures a customer in our primary markets. 2. Final Report a. Summarize key findings from the Market analysis and provide specific, time bound recommendations for optimal market entry and product development.

Strategic Market Research: Safety Sales

Purpose: · Based on pre-defined competitive threats to Wenco’s Fatigue Management offering, identify contingencies in a go to market strategy which will facilitate our revenue goals. Overview: Wenco has recently acquired a fatigue management company that measures brain activity and empowers operators with the information they need to act and avert personal harm and damage to onsite assets. With a focus on the surface mining market, we would like the student to engage in a competitive analysis of Fatigue Management solutions directed specifically at surface mining. In the surface mining market, smart safety solutions are becoming a prerequisite to successfully winning a bid as a fleet management provider. Considering this, Wenco must leverage a deep understanding of the competitive strength of the fatigue solutions coming from our direct competition amongst FMS providers. Amongst fatigue Management offerings in surface mining there are several categories based on the technology delivered and the level of prediction provided by the product. Each of these offerings has a unique profile of advantages/disadvantages that determine competitive strength. As technology advances, Wenco’s offering will constantly face new competitive threats to be identified and needs plans to defend against them. Number of Individual Students Required: 2 Defined Tasks: · At this stage of research, we will provide students with defined competitive threats to our product. Students should expect to: · Engage in Market Research to identify best practice contingency plans for addressing threats. · Develop several alternatives to defend against each defined threat. · Select superior contingency plans in conjunction with Wenco Analysts. · Provide a final deliverable that provides actionable recommendations that Wenco can employ to effectively defend against these threats.

Strategic Market & Sales Channel Research: ESG Appraisal Products

Purpose of Research: ESG dashboard is a emerging market. A good ESG performance is believed can help companies facilitate the financial performance. Wenco, as well as its parent company HCM and even the greater Hitachi group, are trying to understand the market and generate their own strategy of engaging the market, to accelerate the sales promotion of this brand new product. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that ESG-Sustainability scoring is an emerging business recently. There are three types of organizations, non-profit or for profit, in the market acting as providers. For-profit This is the kind of direct competitors. They have two different business models. Provide customized sustainability management solution for customers by charging development fee + licensing fee. For example, Rockwell Automation. Establish a universally accepted scoring system, and charge everyone who want to access the detail score of a specific company. For example, Sustainalytics, Refinitiv, etc. On top of what we already have looked at, there are still a lot of institutions waiting to be researched, including famous MSCI, Bloomberg, S&P and ECPI. The latter business model has a bigger customer base than the former because almost all institutional investors have their own model/solution to quantify ESG factors by dollar, all they need is data. 2. Non-Profit There are also a lot of non-profit organizations providing ESG scores and performance reports. The interval of report renewing is very long, normally from 1 year to 2 years, because of the lack of funding and limited data access. RMI and CDP are examples of this kind of competitors. 3. Affiliations/Academic Institutions Affiliations of national governments, guilds and UN are also leaders in this market. Most of them only provide guidelines for companies and investors to build their own dashboard/report, while others also established a forum/community for members to share their research. Academics institutions, especially business schools, are actively conducting research and appealing for the adoption of “triple bottom lines” instead of traditional unique economic bottom line. Some of research is quite insightful and provide comprehensive frameworks of appraising ESG performance and connecting the performance to economic bottom line. Both kinds in this category are not “pure competitors” but rather “semi-competitors” that also have high potential of becoming partners. PRI, TSM, and SASB are examples of government affiliations, while Wharton and Schulich are those of academic institutions. From demanding side, Big companies, such as Rio Tinto, and institutional investors, such as big banks including RBC, are developing their own appraisal systems, while others are proactively looking for solutions. Expected outcomes: 1. Identify Factors that are deemed most important to ESG dashboard by both supply side and demand side 2. Extra added value to companies other than improving ESG management. 3. Status quo of the competitive of the market 4. Future trends of the market 5. Wenco's GTM strategy: sales channels, partners, etc. Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Category Social sciences + 2

Quantitive Modeling - ESG & Financing Cost

Purpose of Research: Even though there are plenty of evidences that institutional investors have been considering ESG factors in their valuation models for decades, their quantitative methods still remain unclear. Wenco is aiming at creating a predictive model that can use today's ESG performance to estimate tomorrow's financing cost, to give customers' C-Suites some idea that how can their bottom lines be affected by proactively managing environmental and social issues. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that ESG-Sustainability scoring is an emerging business recently. There are three types of organizations, non-profit or for profit, in the market acting as providers. For-profit This is the kind of direct competitors. They have two different business models. Provide customized sustainability management solution for customers by charging development fee + licensing fee. For example, Rockwell Automation. Establish a universally accepted scoring system, and charge everyone who want to access the detail score of a specific company. For example, Sustainalytics, Refinitiv, etc. On top of what we already have looked at, there are still a lot of institutions waiting to be researched, including famous MSCI, Bloomberg, S&P and ECPI. The latter business model has a bigger customer base than the former because almost all institutional investors have their own model/solution to quantify ESG factors by dollar, all they need is data. 2. Non-Profit There are also a lot of non-profit organizations providing ESG scores and performance reports. The interval of report renewing is very long, normally from 1 year to 2 years, because of the lack of funding and limited data access. RMI and CDP are examples of this kind of competitors. 3. Affiliations/Academic Institutions Affiliations of national governments, guilds and UN are also leaders in this market. Most of them only provide guidelines for companies and investors to build their own dashboard/report, while others also established a forum/community for members to share their research. Academics institutions, especially business schools, are actively conducting research and appealing for the adoption of “triple bottom lines” instead of traditional unique economic bottom line. Some of research is quite insightful and provide comprehensive frameworks of appraising ESG performance and connecting the performance to economic bottom line. Both kinds in this category are not “pure competitors” but rather “semi-competitors” that also have high potential of becoming partners. PRI, TSM, and SASB are examples of government affiliations, while Wharton and Schulich are those of academic institutions. From demanding side, Big companies, such as Rio Tinto, and institutional investors, such as big banks including RBC, are developing their own appraisal systems, while others are proactively looking for solutions. Expected outcomes: 1. Collecting data from institutional investors and banks 2. Collecting data from companies, especially mining companies 3. Create a model to quantify ESG performance has on financial factors, including but not limited to changes in financial frictions 4. Test the model with real world data Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Sales Market Entry Planning: Safety Suite

Edge Research of ESG Standards and Scoring Systems

Purpose of Research: A lot of non-profit organizations are proactively engaging the improvement of ESG management, including affiliations of guilds and governments, academic institutions and NGOs. They either issuing and editing standards. or providing open source scoring systems, or doing cutting edge research. Understanding they work is crucial to getting the big picture of the future of ESG. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that ESG-Sustainability scoring is an emerging business recently. There are three types of organizations, non-profit or for profit, in the market acting as providers. For-profit This is the kind of direct competitors. They have two different business models. Provide customized sustainability management solution for customers by charging development fee + licensing fee. For example, Rockwell Automation. Establish a universally accepted scoring system, and charge everyone who want to access the detail score of a specific company. For example, Sustainalytics, Refinitiv, etc. On top of what we already have looked at, there are still a lot of institutions waiting to be researched, including famous MSCI, Bloomberg, S&P and ECPI. The latter business model has a bigger customer base than the former because almost all institutional investors have their own model/solution to quantify ESG factors by dollar, all they need is data. 2. Non-Profit There are also a lot of non-profit organizations providing ESG scores and performance reports. The interval of report renewing is very long, normally from 1 year to 2 years, because of the lack of funding and limited data access. RMI and CDP are examples of this kind of competitors. 3. Affiliations/Academic Institutions Affiliations of national governments, guilds and UN are also leaders in this market. Most of them only provide guidelines for companies and investors to build their own dashboard/report, while others also established a forum/community for members to share their research. Academics institutions, especially business schools, are actively conducting research and appealing for the adoption of “triple bottom lines” instead of traditional unique economic bottom line. Some of research is quite insightful and provide comprehensive frameworks of appraising ESG performance and connecting the performance to economic bottom line. Both kinds in this category are not “pure competitors” but rather “semi-competitors” that also have high potential of becoming partners. PRI, TSM, and SASB are examples of government affiliations, while Wharton and Schulich are those of academic institutions. From demanding side, Big companies, such as Rio Tinto, and institutional investors, such as big banks including RBC, are developing their own appraisal systems, while others are proactively looking for solutions. Expected outcomes: 1. Interview non-profit Organizations/Affiliations/Academic Institutions to learn: a. Trends of upgrading standards and increasing regulations. b. Cutting-edge research. c. Difficulties in data collection and shortening the interval of reporting. 2. Compare existing standards and scoring systems to summarize factors they are measuring. 3. Comparing reputations of different scoring systems/standards Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Next Gen real-time sustainability Dashboard

Purpose of Research: A lot of companies already have started the development of environmental dashboard to appraise their performance on GHG emission reduction. However, the next step of those dashboard remains unclear. How can it be expanded to other environmental concerns and social issues, and eventually evolve to an inclusive ESG dashboard? Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that there is no significant causal link between RMI (Responsible Mining Index) ESG performance and long-term stock prices. Nonetheless, some remarkable drops in stock prices can still be seen after major environmental scandals have been reported even though those changes still cannot be predicted quantitatively and will be compensated quickly because of strong financial performance. We believe the reason investors are not able to react to ESG failures rationally and continuously is because there is a lack of tools to do so. Currently, there are a few organizations, for-profit or non-profit, that are providing ESG scoring metrics for institutional investors to make their own decision, but none of them can provide “near real time score”, which we believe is the prerequisite of connecting scores directly to the prediction of stock prices and/or profit. Currently, almost all ESG reports are updated annually or bi-yearly. This is not helpful either to investors or to companies because they must make decisions accurately and quickly to make things right. If they do not obtain information in a precise and timely manner, the only thing they can do is exclude this information from their valuation model or their daily operational management considerations. Therefore, a more “real-time” updated ESG dashboard is imperative to achieve the ambition of “triple bottom line”, and sub-dashboard of environmental factors, especially “real-time emission” dashboard, is the priority considering the inevitable trend of emission reduction. Expected outcome: 1. Extra added value to companies in targeted industries other than improving ESG management. 2. The trend of increasing sustainability regulations and new factors to be monitored 3. The strategy of expanding the dashboard from equipment (emission) to greater environment (water, tailings, etc.) to social good (communities, aboriginals, employees’ well-being, etc.) to the final inclusive real-time ESG dashboard. Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

GTM Strategy for Real-Time Emission dashboard

Purpose of Research: Wenco, with an ambition of becoming a digital platform provider in the mining, quarrying and construction industries, has realized that the real-time emission dashboard could be a essential part of the platform and taking our customers management to another new level. In order to collect adequate information to guide the development and promotion of the dashboard, a strategic market research is indispensable. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that there is no significant causal link between RMI (Responsible Mining Index) ESG performance and long-term stock prices. Nonetheless, some remarkable drops in stock prices can still be seen after major environmental scandals have been reported even though those changes still cannot be predicted quantitatively and will be compensated quickly because of strong financial performance. We believe the reason investors are not able to react to ESG failures rationally and continuously is because there is a lack of tools to do so. Currently, there are a few organizations, for-profit or non-profit, that are providing ESG scoring metrics for institutional investors to make their own decision, but none of them can provide “near real time score”, which we believe is the prerequisite of connecting scores directly to the prediction of stock prices and/or profit. Currently, almost all ESG reports are updated annually or bi-yearly. This is not helpful either to investors or to companies because they must make decisions accurately and quickly to make things right. If they do not obtain information in a precise and timely manner, the only thing they can do is exclude this information from their valuation model or their daily operational management considerations. Therefore, a more “real-time” updated ESG dashboard is imperative to achieve the ambition of “triple bottom line”, and sub-dashboard of environmental factors, especially “real-time emission” dashboard, is the priority considering the inevitable trend of emission reduction. Expected outcome: 1. Market landscape, including market size, competitors, potential customers etc. 2. Go-To-Market strategy a. Recommendation of targeted market segments. b. Recommendation of targeted regional markets c. Channels and strategies for recommendations 3. Price and pricing policy Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Real-time Emission Monitoring Technology

Purpose of Research: Emission reduction is an inevitable trend and is putting unprecedented pressure on the mining industry and adjacent industries such as quarrying and construction. In order to monitor the emission in a real-time manner, a research in existing technologies is imperative. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that there is no significant causal link between RMI (Responsible Mining Index) ESG performance and long-term stock prices. Nonetheless, some remarkable drops in stock prices can still be seen after major environmental scandals have been reported even though those changes still cannot be predicted quantitatively and will be compensated quickly because of strong financial performance. We believe the reason investors are not able to react to ESG failures rationally and continuously is because there is a lack of tools to do so. Currently, there are a few organizations, for-profit or non-profit, that are providing ESG scoring metrics for institutional investors to make their own decision, but none of them can provide “near real time score”, which we believe is the prerequisite of connecting scores directly to the prediction of stock prices and/or profit. Currently, almost all ESG reports are updated annually or bi-yearly. This is not helpful either to investors or to companies because they must make decisions accurately and quickly to make things right. If they do not obtain information in a precise and timely manner, the only thing they can do is exclude this information from their valuation model or their daily operational management considerations. Therefore, a more “real-time” updated ESG dashboard is imperative to achieve the ambition of “triple bottom line”, and sub-dashboard of environmental factors, especially “real-time emission” dashboard, is the priority considering the inevitable trend of emission reduction. Expected outcome: 1.. Define a new reporting/data renewing interval: what frequency of updating is helpful to investors and mining companies themselves, while it is still feasible. 2. A deep dive into real-time emission monitoring (because it is the most straight forward factor, the most imperative trend, and the most feasible action with available technologies): a. Indispensable technologies (including sensors, telemetry, communication, etc.) b. Existing solutions and their pros and cons c. Potential partners (including acquisition target etc.) Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Development of Real-time Sustainability Dashboard

Purpose of Research: Create a “near real-time” environmental factors scoring dashboard for mining companies and adjacent industries such as quarrying and construction can help them better understand the status of their trucks, and thus minimize the risk of unintentional pollution. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that there is no significant causal link between RMI (Responsible Mining Index) ESG performance and long-term stock prices. Nonetheless, some remarkable drops in stock prices can still be seen after major environmental scandals have been reported even though those changes still cannot be predicted quantitatively and will be compensated quickly because of strong financial performance. We believe the reason investors are not able to react to ESG failures rationally and continuously is because there is a lack of tools to do so. Currently, there are a few organizations, for-profit or non-profit, that are providing ESG scoring metrics for institutional investors to make their own decision, but none of them can provide “near real time score”, which we believe is the prerequisite of connecting scores directly to the prediction of stock prices and/or profit. Currently, almost all ESG reports are updated annually or bi-yearly. This is not helpful either to investors or to companies because they must make decisions accurately and quickly to make things right. If they do not obtain information in a precise and timely manner, the only thing they can do is exclude this information from their valuation model or their daily operational management considerations. Therefore, a more “real-time” updated ESG dashboard is imperative to achieve the ambition of “triple bottom line”, and sub-dashboard of environmental factors, especially “real-time emission” dashboard, is the priority considering the inevitable trend of emission reduction. Expected outcome: 1. Find out important environmental factors and create a dashboard for mining 2. Find out important environmental factors and create a dashboard for adjacent industries that also have GHG/AQI emission issues, such as quarry and construction. 3. Explain how can those factors, or mismanagement of those factors can impact the bottom line. Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Competitive Sales Analysis: Safety Suite

Purpose: Based on the feature set and technology employed by our fatigue management system, identify the most significant competitive threats to Wenco’s fatigue management offering. Overview: Wenco has recently acquired a fatigue management company that measures brain activity and empowers operators with the information they need to act and avert personal harm and damage to onsite assets. With a focus on the surface mining market, we would like the student to engage in a competitive analysis of Fatigue Management solutions directed specifically at surface mining. In the surface mining market, smart safety solutions are becoming a prerequisite to successfully winning a bid as a fleet management provider. Considering this, Wenco must leverage a deep understanding of the competitive strength of the fatigue solutions coming from our direct competition amongst FMS providers. Amongst fatigue Management offerings in surface mining there are several categories based on the technology delivered and the level of prediction provided by the product. Each of these offerings has a unique profile of advantages/disadvantages that determine competitive strength. As technology in this niche market advances, Wenco’s offering will constantly face new competitive threats to be identified and needs plans to defend against them. Number of individual students required: 2 Defined Tasks: · Create an overview of the fatigue management market for open pit mines including competitors, solution types and regulatory considerations for the product in different regions. · Identify Wenco’s largest competitive threats in this space, highlighting why each offering might be stronger or weaker then Wenco’s in 3 major regional markets. (Australia, North America, Europe). · Categorize different types of competitor offerings based on technology, regional market share and notable competitive advantages. · Develop a final deliverable that highlights the largest risks for the offering in the three defined regional markets.

Market Selection: Safety Suite

Purpose: · Market research conducted to understand how safety solutions built for mining could be adjusted to gain a profitable foothold in adjacent markets. · Identify which adjacent market is most attractive for the Wenco safety suite considering our present offerings (Fatigue Management, Collision Avoidance). Overview: Wenco has recently acquired a fatigue management company that measures brain activity and empowers operators with the information they need to act and avert personal harm and damage to onsite assets. In addition to fatigue management, the Wenco Safety suite also provides solutions for collision awareness, speed monitoring and shift management. As we seek to increase our market share in Safety for mining, we are also hoping to expand into adjacent markets that can also benefit from our Safety solutions. In this project we want students to analyze the safety market, highlighting the segments with the highest degree of similarity to mining. Assessing competitors in segments like underground mining, construction and transportation will provide the Wenco team with an understanding of market attractiveness and our relative competitive strength. Number of Individual Students Required: 2 Defined Tasks: Market Attractiveness Analysis a. Research markets that are most like mining using developed benchmarks (processes, use cases etc). b. Based on the Wenco Safety suites existing capabilities and jobs done for customers, identify where we will have the best chance of gaining market share in an adjacent market i. (Trucking, Underground Mining and Industrial Construction are all example markets). c. Identify and analyze the competitor offerings in these markets. Highlight the advantage in feature offerings that competitors may have relative to Wenco solutions. Final Report a. Based on the findings of your analysis, develop a final deliverable that identifies the best adjacent market for entry by Wenco’s safety portfolio. b. Provide strong reasoning based on indicators of market attractiveness to show which market is the most rationale for Wenco to engage.

Identify Financial Impacts of Environment, Social and Governance

Purpose of Research: Institutional investors and banks have been looking at the ESG performance of companies for decades in order to minimize the risk of their investments. Therefore, it is essential to find out which part of their decision, for example, risk premiums asking, will be affected by which factors of ESG. By identifying and revealing those connections, Wenco can help customers to keep close eyes on their own performance and minimize the risk of not only major scandals, but also the cost of financing. Number of individual students required: 1 Defined Tasks: Our previous research shows that ESG-Sustainability scoring is an emerging business recently. There are three types of organizations, non-profit or for profit, in the market acting as providers. For-profit This is the kind of direct competitors. They have two different business models. Provide customized sustainability management solution for customers by charging development fee + licensing fee. For example, Rockwell Automation. Establish a universally accepted scoring system, and charge everyone who want to access the detail score of a specific company. For example, Sustainalytics, Refinitiv, etc. On top of what we already have looked at, there are still a lot of institutions waiting to be researched, including famous MSCI, Bloomberg, S&P and ECPI. The latter business model has a bigger customer base than the former because almost all institutional investors have their own model/solution to quantify ESG factors by dollar, all they need is data. 2. Non-Profit There are also a lot of non-profit organizations providing ESG scores and performance reports. The interval of report renewing is very long, normally from 1 year to 2 years, because of the lack of funding and limited data access. RMI and CDP are examples of this kind of competitors. 3. Affiliations/Academic Institutions Affiliations of national governments, guilds and UN are also leaders in this market. Most of them only provide guidelines for companies and investors to build their own dashboard/report, while others also established a forum/community for members to share their research. Academics institutions, especially business schools, are actively conducting research and appealing for the adoption of “triple bottom lines” instead of traditional unique economic bottom line. Some of research is quite insightful and provide comprehensive frameworks of appraising ESG performance and connecting the performance to economic bottom line. Both kinds in this category are not “pure competitors” but rather “semi-competitors” that also have high potential of becoming partners. PRI, TSM, and SASB are examples of government affiliations, while Wharton and Schulich are those of academic institutions. From demanding side, Big companies, such as Rio Tinto, and institutional investors, such as big banks including RBC, are developing their own appraisal systems, while others are proactively looking for solutions. Expected outcomes: 1. Interview demand side, including companies, banks, institutional investors to learn: a. Their own approaches on ESG performance measuring and reporting b. Their views on currently available products and existing standards. c. Their expectations on Next Gen products. 2. Interview for-profit organizations to learn: a. Prices and pricing policies b. Customers’ feedback on legacy products c. Trends and plans 3. Summarize the research and make recommendations. a. Identify ESG factors that can impact financial performance b. Explain what financial factors will be impacted and how Remarks: Students in Richmond, BC will be considered first

Social Profit Measurement Alternatives for Company Performance

PROJECT SCOPE Hitachi has a strong focus on Social Innovation, but while multi millions of dollars are being put into social beneficial initiatives, there are not quantifiable and repeatable measurements for success that can rival the ubiquity of common financial measurements like P&L, EBITDA etc. Startups and Fortune 500 companies may all aspire to do social good, or support sustainability, but the ultimate measurements of the success of a company that board members and investors use are the capital market accepted measurements of revenue growth, profitability and share price, which is driven by long term projections on those financial metrics. Good businesses can create social harm (e.g. the opioid crisis driven in part by profits for pharmaceuticals, social media creating obsession and distraction in an effort to monetize its user base to appease financial investors, food industries putting profit and "share of stomach" over health, etc). Investors are looking for ways to invest in socially responsible companies but ultimately the only repeatedly quantifiable measurement of success are financial in nature. Therefore, more and more institutions and consulting companies appeal for approaches such as “triple bottom lines” to emphasize the value of environmental and social good. In this context, all most all commercial companies are issuing sustainability report annually. However, lack of timeliness and lack of substantial, information are fatal disadvantages of those reports, making them more like a propaganda rather than a reflective introspection or an informative communication with investors. Even though Wenco currently can provide very comprehensive solutions to measure and improve productivity, asset health and safety via its Digital Platform, ESG is the missing piece of the puzzle. Therefore, this project is designed to encourage students to study existing guidelines and edge-cutting research of quantifying and reporting social good, sustainability, quality of life improvement, and other metrics that can be used across industries as a balance to purely financial measurements. These "Social Profit" measurements could be used to score candidate startups for investors and investment funds (particularly for employee pension funds or other limited partners that may desire socially responsible investment), or for shareholders and boards to evaluate corporate success beyond general "goodwill" or avoidance of bad brand image. These measurements should be numerical in nature and serve as a weighted combination with traditional financial measurements to create a truly balanced Balance Sheet of financial profitability AND social profitability. The data collecting and reporting shall be more frequent than currently common annual report. It could be quarterly, monthly, weekly, even daily, if not hourly, to maximize the efficacy of the report, and could eventually evolve to a real-time dashboard. Students are highly encouraged to start with mining industry and /or adjacent industries such as quarrying and construction, if they have appropriate knowledge, experience, resources, and connections. Students should be prepared to: To Be Found in Attachment

Category Social sciences + 4

Matches 5

IIoT Digital Platform Sustainability Go-To-Market Strategy

We are looking to develop a product and go-to-market strategy for our newly created digital IoT platform, specifically around the creation of a sustainability/carbon usage application. We are already launching an Asset Health IIoT solution for our parent, Hitachi Construction Machines, but the platform has an ability to sell beyond our traditional mining market, and via new partners. The company has a well established strategic plan that will be shared in detail, but needs to examine all the commercial and strategic aspects of generating new revenues into brand new markets. With this particular case, we want to look at opportunities with new partners (including one being developed with Shell Oil) on using data from Hitachi mining and construction equipment (and other OEM equipment in mining, construction and other industries), to create a dashboard reporting on sustainability measurements like fuel consumption, carbon utilization and other metrics that provide insight into achieving environmental goals. We would like to collaborate with students to understand what solutions we can create from the information on the machine, what potential partners may already be doing in this area that we can integrate with, and the go to market strategy on partners and channels that can help sell to select target markets. Students should be prepared to: Develop a strategic plan with recommended new target markets and sustainability offerings Examine potential competitors/partners in related industries that offer sustainability measurement solutions Develop a promotion and marketing strategy tailored towards that recommended target markets Identify key commercial success factors given new markets and potentially new sales channels

Category Market research + 1

B2B Digital Platform Go-To-Market Strategy

We are looking to develop a launch strategy for our newly created digital IoT platform. We are already launching an Asset Health IIoT solution for our parent, Hitachi Construction Machines, but the platform has an ability to sell beyond our traditional mining market, and via new partners. The company has a well established strategic plan that will be shared in detail, but needs to examine all the commercial and strategic aspects of generating new revenues into brand new markets. We would like to collaborate with students to understand what we need to do to generate greater adoption, retention and overall revenue while best using our new platform. Students should be prepared to: Develop a strategic plan with recommended new target markets and offerings Develop a promotion and marketing strategy tailored towards that recommended target markets Recommend updates or changes to our website, including considerations for a partner portal and/or eCommerce direct orders Identify key commercial success factors given new markets and potentially new sales channels

Matches 2

Change Management for rapidly growing technology company

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco manage change in a rapidly growing company. Wenco has been in a cycle of growth for the past few years and there have been many changes to the company in order for this growth to occur. One area of focus we would like to visit is change management. Solid change management can be beneficial to us moving forward. There has been so much change to Wenco over the past few years that students will be able to utilize the lessons from their course in multiple areas. To help us deliver our goal to recruit top talent, students are expected to: Work with human resources and executives on recent and planned changes to the company as it grows at a rapid pace Develop a change management plan and program to help the company and its employees cope and adapt

Category Human resources - general + 2

Cloud data storage strategy for IT Systems and Solutions

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco determine if it should rely on third party cloud platforms to store internal engineering data and customer data or create its own data center for either internal IT storage or customer data storage for upcoming cloud based offerings. Wenco has been funded by its parent, Hitachi Construction Machinery, to create a cloud based platform to deliver solutions to customers. There will be a large amount of data from tens of thousands of large machines deployed globally. There is a potential for significant data storage costs if Wenco utilizes a third party cloud platform. A business case should be made to determine if Wenco should store customer data in a third party data center, or create its own cloud storage system. Wenco will also want to determine the best approach for its own internal IT storage needs. As part of the Cloud data storage project, students are expected to: Learn Wenco's IT and product strategies to understand company plans and objectives Analyze potential costs (storage, support, total cost of ownership etc) around utilizing third party cloud solutions vs developing an in-house solution Present findings and business case to Wenco executives

Category Information technology

Change Management for rapidly growing technology company

Category Human resources - general

Talent Acquisition Strategy in hot Vancouver market

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco develop a strategy to recruit talent in a hot Vancouver market. We are currently facing an enormous challenge in the area of recruitment. Recruiting technology professionals in Vancouver (and the entire lower mainland area) has proven to be extremely difficult as more and more companies are targeting the same candidates. We are looking for creative ways to attract new employees. We would like suggestions on improving our postings, methods of recruitment and benefits within the organization (including education on what the norms are) in order to recruit top talent. To help us deliver our goal to recruit top talent, students are expected to: Research our current recruitment strategy, and highlight areas for improvement Compare Wenco's overall benefits, programs and processes to benchmark technology companies in the area (including outside companies such as Amazon and Microsoft who have established local offices) Create a plan to help Wenco recruit top talent in a hot market

Category Human resources - general

Machine Learning for Predictive Maintenance - Hitachi Construction Machines

This particular challenge focuses on helping analyze large amounts of mining equipment event data from major customers in order to determine predictive causes of machine failure. While the project can eventually expand to multiple equipment types and brands, the scope will be around the Hitachi brand EX 5600 mining excavator and potentially other extremely large mining excavator equipment from sites in Japan and Africa, with a potential to include customers from Australia and other locations. As part of the Machine Learning project, students are expected to: Learn about Asset Health priorities for Mining Industry - through discussions with Wenco and possibly self study Work with Wenco analyst to analyze data provided by Wenco, to determine if there are predictive indicators of machine failure Prepare a report and presentation delivered to executives of the company

Category Engineering - general + 1

M&A and Go To Market Strategy for global technology leader

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco prioritize the multiple opportunities it sees, and helping to identify key partnerships and merger and acquisition (M&A) targets the company should investigate. The company has a well established strategic plan that will be shared in detail, but needs to focus its efforts to prioritize the many opportunities that it could pursue, and to identify key target companies to partner and potentially acquire to profitably grow company revenues to its target. The company is well funded by it's parent, Hitachi Construction Machines (HCM), but requires prioritization and business planning to justify the investment. To help us prioritize target markets and companies, students are expected to: Research our current strategy, through a detailed case study and confidential strategic plans that will be provided Research the various markets and players in the strategic focus areas Prioritize potential partners, investment and acquisition targets based on solid business criteria (e.g. market growth, fit to strategy, revenue and profit targets etc) Prepare a business plan and presentation delivered to executives of the company

Cloud data storage strategy for IT Systems and New Products

Category Information technology

Machine Learning for Predictive Maintenance - Hitachi Construction Machines

Category Engineering - general + 1

Recurring Revenues Solutions Strategy

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco increase the amount and relative percentage of predictable recurring revenues. The company has a well established strategic plan that will be shared in detail, but needs to transition its revenues from traditional "one deal at a time" high capital expense (CAPEX) sales to recurring, predictable operating expense (OPEX) sales. The company strategy identifies key growth areas such as data/IoT and autonomy, and has been funded by its parent, Hitachi Construction Machines, to develop a cloud platform to be able to deliver global solutions to a larger and wider global market. With these new initiatives comes the opportunity to create a solutions and serviced based pricing model that will achieve the goal of increasing recurring revenues. To help us deliver our goal to increase recurring revenues, students are expected to: Research our current strategy, through a detailed case study and confidential strategic plans that will be provided Develop a strategy to price existing and new solutions in a manner that shifts from one-off CAPEX to predictable, recurring revenue OPEX models. Prepare a business plan and presentation delivered to executives of the company

Category Marketing - general + 2

Major Customer Sales Strategy

This particular challenge focuses on helping Wenco create a sales execution strategy to capture new mining customers The company has a well established strategic plan that will be shared in detail, but needs to focus its efforts to win new "customer logos". Traditionally Wenco has sold to individual mine sites, rather than focus on executive level relationships across corporate enterprise customers. We need to capture new customers across the globe. In addition, we need to develop C-level relationships at the corporate level for customers we already have, but only at a mine site level. For example, Wenco has replaced its competition at one of the world's largest copper mine sites in Africa, but that customer has its headquarters in Vancouver, the home location for Wenco, yet no executive level relationship exists. Wenco needs to both increase the number of new customers, as well as develop enterprise-wide deals with existing customers. To help us develop our sales strategy, students are expected to: Research our current strategy, through a detailed case study and confidential strategic plans that will be provided Research the top mining customers worldwide, determining key decision makers and important initiatives (via secondary or primary research) Prioritize potential customers, and help develop strategic action plan Prepare a plan and presentation delivered to executives of the company

Category Market research + 1

Merger and Acquisition Strategy for a rapidly growing Mining technology company