Elm Ltd

John Anderson & Frank Martin

Case SummaryElm

Limited was started by three friends who worked in a family owned electronics company. The company got into difficulties, and the three decided to act when faced with redundancy. As a result of strong leadership from one of them, Raj Samuel, opportunities to obtain business from large organisations were spotted. The three friends had very little in the way of personal resources and were fortunate that Raj Samuel had a close family friend based in Malaysia who was a successful businessman in his own right. Mr Chan provided both work for the new business and the necessary bank guarantees to develop the business. By virtue of hard work by all three partners, the influence of Mr Chan, and the customer relations that Raj Samuel developed, Elm quickly grew from Ј0.25m in 1986 to Ј4.6m in 1993.The basic theme of this case is to illustrate how an individual, by hard work and the force of personality, can quickly build up a sizeable manufacturing business from nothing. Once that business has stabilised, and development opportunities exist, the skills required and the role of the main driving force of the business may need to alter. The case identifies the problem of the strong-willed entrepreneur, and the problems of business development linked with the need to both delegate, and develop a management team to take the business forward.

The CourseMBA.com Reviewer commented:

"This case study is written at a very high standard. It has sufficient scope to enable its use across a wide spectrum of postgraduate business/management/finance courses. It raises issues that vary from the Organisation Life Cycle concept to the nature and distinguishing features of entrepreneurs; from the inception of mission to the development of strategy. The case raises several issues of relevance, not least the openings to debate the "pathogens" inherent in partnerships where not all the partners commit to the same vision and the realities of business failure proneness where a 'dash for growth' comes off the rails! A very useful contribution to those involved in practical, applied teaching. The quality is excellent!"

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