The Business Strategy Game is the most widely played computer simulation in the strategic management market and is used in business schools all across the world. The industry's product is athletic footwear and the geographic scope of the market is global. Each company in the industry is managed by a team of students/players who must match their strategic wits against the other company teams‹competition is head-to-head.

Requires a Variety of Decisions. The company that players manage has plants to operate, a work force to compensate, distribution expenses and inventories to control, capital expenditure decisions to make, marketing and sales campaigns to wage, a website to operate, sales forecasts to consider, and ups and downs in exchange rates, interest rates, and the stock market to take into account.

Companies can manufacture and sell their footwear in branded markets in North America, Asia, Europe, and Latin America, plus they can compete for supplying private-label footwear to North American chain retailers. Branded sales can be pursued through any or all of three distribution channels‹independent footwear retailers, company-owned and operated retail stores, and direct sales made online at the company's website.

Extensive Strategy Options. Companies can position their products in the low end of the market, the high end, or stick close to the middle on price, quality, and service; they can have a wide or narrow product line, small or big dealer networks, extensive or limited advertising. Company market shares are based on how each company's product attributes and competitive effort stacks up against the efforts of rivals. Demand conditions, tariffs, and wage rates vary from geographic area to geographic area. Raw materials used in footwear production are purchased in a worldwide commodity market at prices that move up or down in response to supply-demand conditions.

Drills Players in Real-Life Management and Decision-Making. In plotting out competitive strategies each decision period, players are thrust into becoming active strategic thinkers and planners and forced to assess the industry environment, evaluate the strength of competitive forces, and monitor the actions of rival companies. Each team of company executives is challenged to chart a basic strategic direction for the company, set strategic and financial objectives, choose from any of many different strategies, and then try to make the chosen strategy work or else change to an alternate strategic approach. As the simulation unfolds and new events transpire, companies have occasion to react to changing market and competitive conditions, initiate moves to try to build competitive advantage, and decide how to defend against aggressive actions by competitors. And by having to live with the decisions they make, they experience what it means to be accountable for performance and for achieving satisfactory business results.

Exciting, Integrative, and Very Hands-On. This global industry simulation is a very powerful hand-on exercise for conveying the challenge of managing a business in the 21st century and for giving players valuable practice in how to exercise good business judgment. Because the elements of The Business Strategy Game cut across many different areas of company operations, the exercise helps players integrate material from many different core courses in business, look at specific functional decisions from the standpoint of the company as a whole, and see the importance of thinking strategically about a company's competitive position and future prospects. Players of the simulation learn an enormous amount from working with the company and industry data, exploring strategic options, and trying to unite production, marketing, finance, and human resource decisions into a coherent business strategy that produces good results.

Highlights of the 7th Edition

• For the first time, the software for both players and game administrators is downloadable from the BSG website at www.mhhe.com/bsg. Each Player's Manual contains a sticker with a unique, one-time use download code, which the student will use to obtain the player's software. Both students and instructors always have instant access to the latest version of the game.
• An easy-to-use e-mail feature makes the simulation ideal for use in distance-learning situations, allowing company members (students) to click on the built-in e-mail button that sends their decision file to the game administrator (instructor) and allowing the game administrator to e-mail the results back to company members.
• Use of Microsoft Excel as the programming platform provides greater operating reliability and easier-to-use features. This new seventh edition requires use of PCs loaded with Microsoft Excel‹the version on Office 97 or Office 2000.
• The addition of a fourth global market segment (Latin America) makes the simulation more global than ever before.
• A new online market segment enables rival companies to utilize the Internet to sell directly to consumers (to complement sales through brick-and-mortar retailers).
• Special help screens are always available so that if players forget some of the information in the Player's Manual, they can quickly access the information online by clicking on the Help button that appears on every screen.
• A much-revised and improved Player's Manual is now organized around the decision screens.