MBA Online

The DBA Program

The Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy (ICS), Hitotsubashi University, began offering a doctoral degree program for business executives in October 2002. The Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) program, which is conducted in English and designed to provide business executives with doctoral-level education, is available at the university’s campus in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo.

Hitotsubashi ICS offers a DBA degree rather than a PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) degree, because a DBA program places more emphasis on business problem-solving and its practical implications, while a PhD degree is intended to provide the necessary theoretical and scientific foundation for an academic career.

The three-year DBA program accepts two categories of students. The first category includes individuals who are graduates of the MBA program at Hitotsubashi ICS. These students are required to spend three years of the program under the supervision of their faculty advisor as full-time students, devoting the second year mostly to doing research and developing their thesis proposals, and the third year to writing their theses.

The second category consists of business practitioners, who have received an MBA degree from other business schools, a Master’s degree other than an MBA, or those deemed qualified by the Admissions Committee for exceptional cases. These students will spend the three years of the program under the supervision of their faculty advisor as part-time students, devoting weekends and winter/spring/summer breaks to doing research and developing their thesis proposals, and writing their theses. DBA candidates in this category may work full-time, but they must maintain residency in Japan while they are enrolled in the DBA program. DBA students in this category may audit MBA courses in the ICS International Business Strategy Program, subject to approval by their advisor and the faculty member teaching the course.

Professor Christina Ahmadjian is Director of the DBA Program. Students may select any member of the ICS faculty as their thesis advisor, contingent on approval by the DBA Program Committee and the faculty member.

For detailed information on admission procedures to the DBA Program at Hitotsubashi ICS, including all submission deadlines, please download the Application Package by clicking the link below (PDF format):

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Global Citizenship (OK Baji / H. Kawada) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

This is a course intended to (a) address the societal responsibility of firms in today’s global business environment, (b) give students experience working with human capital issues confronting today’s society, and (c) encourage students to develop and execute a plan of action for disabled children.

Peter Drucker pointed out that the primary role of companies in the 21st century will be to solve social problems, not economic problems. Companies will increasingly be asked to eradicate poverty, crime, hunger, disease, ignorance, discrimination, injustice, racial tensions, and other social problems. As the mission of our program is to develop leaders capable of initiating, managing, and implementing innovation on a global scale, this course plays a critical role in shaping the core values of our future leaders.

Students will have first-hand experience interfacing with the homeless, mentally disabled children, volunteer workers, etc. Students will be asked to stretch their minds and formulate ideas for making this world a better place for all humankind.
Course Structure

The course is structured so as to give students as much first-hand experience with human capital issues as possible. It has three components.

The first component exposes students to those suffering from poverty, hunger, illness, physical disability, mental disability, and other problems. These people are often shunned by society and treated as sub-human, partly due to ignorance and discrimination.

The second component enables students to interact with “activists” who will be invited to speak on the economic “divide” that separates prosperous countries from the less prosperous, as well as on the social “divide” that separates the “have-nots” from the “haves.”

The third component consists of actual interactions with the “have-nots,” which will take up the bulk of the time for the course. Although the course is scheduled for Wednesday afternoons, we will be spending weekends with the homeless, mentally disabled children, and under-privileged children. Their schedules do not permit us to conduct the sessions on Wednesday afternoons.
Teaching Method

This course is primarily field-based. “Seeing is believing” and “learning by doing” are the basic assumptions behind the course. Many of the sessions will take place outside the classroom. Some will take the form of an overnight trip during a weekend, or an engagement on a Saturday or a Sunday.

In addition, the course will make ample use of video tapes and other visual aids to show where the problems are and what is being done about them.

Another important component of the teaching methodology is self-reflection. Students should keep a diary about what they have learned from their experiences. At the end of the course, each student will be asked to verbally present his or her biggest personal take-away from the experiences.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy
[Term 3 & 4] Entrepreneurial Management (M. Korver) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

This course covers the process of identifying and assessing entrepreneurial opportunities, then conceptualizing and planning an enterprise tasked to capitalize on such an opportunity. Students will work in teams to pick an attractive entrepreneurial opportunity (viz., a new technology, new business area, or innovation in an existing market) and develop a business plan, working through issues of opportunity identification and analysis, management team-building and organization, competitive strategy, marketing and sales, and identifying and obtaining necessary resources. We will introduce frameworks necessary to identify and analyze entrepreneurial opportunities and the elements of companies that can quickly define and dominate an existing or new category of business through innovative strategies or disruptive technology.
Course Structure

The course is designed to provide students with the opportunity to gain practical knowledge in how to identify entrepreneurial opportunities and, with limited resources, transform them into successful enterprises. This knowledge will be gained by:
(1) Studying cases of both successful and unsuccessful entrepreneurial ventures
(2) Learning about and applying analytical frameworks to issues commonly faced by entrepreneurs
(3) Examining in detail what a business plan is designed to do, what it contains, how it is developed and written, what are its uses, how to analyze and evaluate the business plan, and what investors look for in a business plan
(4) Providing an environment where students can collaborate to create their own winning business plans as members of entrepreneurial management teams
(5) Interacting with business plan contest judges and hands-on faculty who have deep and recent experience starting and building companies
Teaching Method

The course consists of two sections. Term 3 (Spring) will primarily cover the items (1) through (3) in the previous paragraph and will culminate in a mid-term examination. Term 4 (Summer) will primarily cover items (4) and (5) and will culminate in a business plan competition. Accordingly, the first section consists of regularly scheduled sessions with a mixture of case studies, lectures, and class discussion. Term 4 (Summer) consists of out-of-class collaboration by the team members on development of a business plan with periodic feedback from the faculty. In addition, guest lectures may be scheduled from time-to-time. The details of the business plan competition will be announced during the first class.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] The Information Economy (R. Davies) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

Advances in digital technologies and network services continue to fuel expansion of the information economy. Epitomized by companies such as Amazon, Google, Yahoo!, eBay, Apple, Microsoft, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Sony, and Nintendo, the information economy is at the leading edge of new business models for selling products and services, with and without analogues in the traditional economy.

At the center of this evolution are software platform ecosystems, consisting of constellations of mutually dependent communities of businesses and consumers with a symbiotic relationship to one another that create value through the coordinated efforts of their members. Analysis of the underlying economics of these ecosystems provides important insights into business models, product design, pricing structures, and competitive dynamics, as well as the variable nature of the upstream and downstream integration of software platforms with hardware manufacturers, content providers, application and middleware developers, and end users.

These developments have also given rise to profound changes in the retail market, both traditional and virtual, as exemplified in Long Tail economics. The most successful Internet businesses today are capitalizing on new digital technologies that drive demand down the Long Tail distribution curve and create markets of infinite choice for consumers. By applying principles from economics, history, and business analysis to case studies and other media sources, this course aims to identify the fundamental trends that are shaping the information economy, forming new industries, transforming others, and often sweeping away old ones in a wake of “creative destruction.”
Course Structure

The course begins with introductory lectures on (1) the Long Tail, which currently manifests itself largely as an Internet phenomenon, and (2) the underlying features of software platform ecosystems. By mapping these ecosystems, we will discover important principles that influence pricing, design, organization, and the governance of businesses operating in the information economy. Subsequent lessons apply these principles to detailed analyses of some of the most prominent platform-based industries today, including personal computers, smart phones, video games, and digital media (music, movies, and books), identifying sustainable business models and the key technological drivers and revenue streams that lead to profitability. Following an investigation into issues involving copyrights in cyberspace, the focus shifts to an examination of business models that underlie Web-centric services, such as search and advertising, online auctions and payment systems, e-tailing, and social networking. The choice of cases, articles, and topics is updated each year. In the past, the course included cases on Apple iPod/iTunes, Electronic Arts, NetFlix, BitTorrent, Google, Amazon, eBay, NTT DoCoMo, Mobile Felica, and LinkedIn.
Teaching Method

The course will be taught using interactive lectures and class discussions based on assigned cases and other readings. There will be a midterm paper and an in-class final examination (open book), requiring focused analysis of specific industry trends and business models that will allow students to apply insights discovered in class and formulate their own views.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Innovation & Organization (E. Osono) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

The annual reports of many companies talk about their aim to come up with innovation. However, it is not easy. Why? It is because it is often difficult for an organizational environment that encourages innovation to co-exist with an organizational environment that supports the efficient and reliable execution of an established business. For innovation, you need an organizational environment that encourages innovation, namely, risk taking, an action orientation, learning from failure, and slack resources, to name a few. For execution, there must be accountability for the results and less tolerance for failure.

This course builds on the knowledge in Knowledge Management, Organizational Behavior, and Innovation Management to deepen your understanding of organizational design, management practices, idea generation, and the experimentation process for innovation. It tries to answer such questions as, “how can I make my group innovative?” and “what are the critical characteristics for idea generation and the experimentation process?” (Module 1), “what is the organization that encourages innovation rather than hinders it like?” (Module 2), and “how can we develop innovative new businesses within a large organization?” (Module 3). In addition, throughout the course, students will be asked to conduct some individual-level exercises outside of the classroom, which will ask you for example, “Do at least one thing differently from your normal routine” and “Make all of your mundane decisions on an intuitive yes/no basis.”

This course has two aims. One is to help you develop to become a better player as an individual who can take different perspectives, pay attention to details, and be mindful. The second is to help you develop to become a better team leader of innovative projects. You do not have to wait until you climb up the corporate ladder to make your company more innovative. There are many things you can do. Understanding several core factors for innovative organization will give you the foundation.

The Term 2 (Winter) course, Innovation & Competition, which focuses on the strategy side of innovation management, and this course are complementary but independent enough so that those students who did not take Innovation & Competition will still learn effectively.
Teaching Method

The course is case-oriented. The core factors of innovative organizations are not complicated, but how to implement them in organizations is the challenge. Hence, we learn from best practice companies in innovation such as IDEO, 3M, Toyota, Bandai, and IBM. Learning will take place from discovering why these core factors are critical through interactive discussions, your own effort to apply critical factors to cases, exercises, as well as comments from your fellow students. Also, we invite guests to the class to learn from their experience of dealing with the critical factors.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Design & Creativity (T. Kamegai) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

Learning how to be creative is one of the great managerial challenges in the Knowledge Economy. What was once central to companies – price, quality, and much of the left-brain, digitized, analytical work associated with explicit knowledge – is being shipped off to developing countries. The new core competence is increasingly becoming the right brain that smart companies are harnessing to generate top-line growth. The challenge is no longer just making assembly lines run more efficiently, but creating consumer experiences, not just products, and reconceiving entire brand categories, not just adding a few more colors.

Companies are beginning to realize that design is often the path to innovation as well as the source of competitive advantage. Apple and Samsung are recent cases in point. In these creative companies, design is starting to play a key role in connecting with their customers’ emotions, linking R&D labs to consumer needs, recalibrating employee incentives to emphasize creativity, and constructing maps that show the path to innovation. These creative companies mastered a new design thinking and created products that address consumers’ unmet, and often unarticulated, desires. They built an innovation DNA and culture that bring about high success rates, routinely beating competitors.
Course Structure

The course is structured to empower your creative mind by learning the following:
(1) Strategic approaches to create great design
(2) Synergy of visual images and touch/feel
(3) Building creative relationships with others
Teaching Method

The course will be based on “learning by doing.” We will engage in projects and activities that will make use of both your mind and body.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Brand Management (S. Akutsu) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

This is an advanced marketing elective course that focuses on the development and implementation of brand management. Managers in charge of a brand(s) face many challenges, such as (1) developing brand strategies that synthesize internal resources and competitive strategy, (2) clarifying brand philosophies, (3) generating and motivating brand identities, (4) understanding the brand images of key customers in depth, (5) communicating brand identities effectively with customers, (6) designing a comprehensive brand architecture, (7) developing and implementing brand building programs, (8) evaluating brand’s value conceptually and quantitatively, and (9) managing brands over time and across cultures.

The goal of this course is to provide students with concepts, theories, models, and methods that will help resolve these challenges. It is complementary to the database-marketing elective as it places more emphasis on concepts and theories, while the database-marketing course stresses empirical methods and quantitative data analysis.
Course Structure

In the first class, the course overview is provided. Fundamental questions concerning brand are discussed such as (1) what is brand, (2) why it is important, (3) to whom it is important, (4) when it is important, (5) where it is important, how to build it, and who should be in charge. Guidelines for the group project are also provided.

Thereafter, the course is structured in three modules. The first module introduces key concepts and models of brand management. In particular, it closely examines different conceptualizations of brand equity and brand identity. Insights and implications each conceptualization conveys, as well as other related concepts, are discussed. A variety of measurement models and scales of brand equity are also introduced.

The second module covers the basic models of brand strategy and branding, as well as their relationships with organizational capabilities and market opportunities. Organizational capabilities of brand building are identified and their roles are discussed. Akutsu and Ishida’s Context Branding Model is introduced as a frame of branding that has been developed and proven in the Japanese and other overseas markets.

The third module covers brand portfolio strategy and other advanced topics of brand strategy and branding. David A. Aaker’s Brand Portfolio Model is introduced and its relation to Context Branding Model is discussed. Other topics include branding nations and branding in Asia.
Teaching Method

While this course consists primarily of case discussions, lectures, videos, and guest speaker sessions are combined to effectively teach both theory and practice. Due to the nature of this advanced elective course, students are expected to enthusiastically prepare for and participate in the class. Students have an opportunity to present the outcome of their group project in a later session.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Topics in Finance (R.Yasuda) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

This course tries to identify recent key corporate topics and analyze them from the viewpoints of three factors: strategy, organization, and finance. These three factors are mutually interactive in the real corporate world. Students are encouraged to apply what they learnt about the basics of these three themes in the previous three terms.

Topics will be selected from among important issues that top corporate managers having recently been facing.
Course Structure

The first four topics will be based on the Corporate Evolutional Development Concept which emphasizes non-linier type of corporate development by smartly adapting itself to changing environments or by mutation.

Evolutional development requires the corporate organization to respond to seasonal characteristics of the environment.
(1) Growth Strategy (in response to the spring season)
(2) M&A Strategy (in response to the summer season)
(3) Turnaround Strategy: The case of Tokyu (in response to the autumn season)
(4) Corporate Venture as the mutation

In addition, four other topics will be introduced to enhance the understanding of students on recent finance topics.
(1) Why has the world financial and energy and food crisis arisen, and how should corporations respond to overcome this crisis of stagflation?
(2) Recent strategies of financial institutions: the shortage of capital in global financial institutions and moves for merchant banking and asset management businesses
(3) Is fund capitalism contributing to the healthy growth of corporations and society?
(4) What is the role of smart CFOs?
Teaching Method

The teaching methodology is a combination of lectures and case discussions, as well as lectures by outside guest speakers. This combination may vary depending upon the topics. For instance, growth strategy may start with a lecture on the first day and be followed by a case discussion which is assigned for homework. Turnaround strategy is conducted in a one-day case discussion of Tokyu. On the other hand, other topics will be conducted mainly by lectures, with small pre-reading assignments. In addition, several students will be requested to give 5-10 minute commentary speeches on related news topics at the beginning of class.

ICS , Graduate Schl f Internatinal Crprate Strategy

[Term 4] Change Management (K. Ichij) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

This curse is abut rganizatinal change management, in which a firm seeks t successfully mbilize peple fr change t imprve its business perfrmance.

Business leaders face varius challenges. Challenges f launching new grwth strategies, challenges f implementing new business mdels, and challenges f accmplishing crprate transfrmatin, t name a few. Business leaders have t implement change initiatives and mbilize the entire rganizatin fr change s that they can vercme the challenges facing them.

Change, hwever, is nt easy. ld habits die hard. Peple are afraid f change. Every change initiative faces resistance; therefre, business leaders shuld be gd at managing change. Successful change management aims t manage change prcesses successfully s that the challenges identified can be effectively and efficiently vercme within a shrter perid f time.

In this curse, students will study leadership, prcesses, and key enablers fr successful change management.
Curse Structure

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy
The curse is structured s that the students will have a better understanding f the successful executin f change initiatives. Effective change management is required when business leaders launch new initiatives t vercme the challenges facing them. Therefre, in this curse, several key leadership challenges such as the executin f a new grwth strategy, a new business mdel, a new rganizatin, and crprate transfrmatin will be studied. In this study, the fllwing key prcesses fr change management will be examined.
Assessing change necessity.
Shaping a visin fr a change initiative.
Mbilizing cmmitment: Spnsring frm abve; repeating small wins; and caching and guiding.
Making change last: embedding new culture; and establishing scial netwrk.
Teaching Methd

This curse will be taught using the Harvard Business Schl type f case methd. Students will be asked t prepare a case and discuss questins designated by the instructr fr each sessin. Mst learning will take place in class primarily frm cmments made by fellw students. The rle f the instructr will be t facilitate stimulating discussin.

ICS , Graduate School of International Corporate Strategy

[Term 4] Venture Capital (M. Korver) (2009/Term 3&4 (Spring&Summer))

The objective of this course is to provide an overview of entrepreneurial finance from the differing perspectives of institutional investors, venture capitalists, and entrepreneurs. By “entrepreneurial finance” (or venture capital), we mean the provision of growth capital in the form of an investment in the equity (stock) of privately-held companies at various stages of development. The term “entrepreneurial finance” is used in the course title to distinguish this course from “corporate finance.” Corporate finance is commonly taught with reference to the markets for publicly traded securities. The major difference between corporate finance and entrepreneurial finance is that the former deals with markets that are more efficient than the private equity market. Accordingly, our analysis must reflect the fundamental inefficiencies of the private equity market and will raise many issues that are not considered in standard courses on corporate finance.

Venture capital is a major source of growth capital for new ventures. Since its origins in the U.S. after World War II, the size of the venture capital market has grown substantially on a global scale and become increasingly institutionalized. For example, at its peak annual venture capital investments exceeded $141 billion worldwide in 2000. However, this amount is still quite small in comparison to the market for publicly traded stocks. Furthermore, the bursting of the stock market “bubble” has had a significant impact on the venture capital market. In Japan, the venture capital market is still small and immature relative to the U.S. but is viewed as a positive force for the transformation of the economy by providing necessary capital to new ventures and re-vitalizing established firms.
Course Structure

The course covers the “venture capital cycle” which comprises (1) fundraising and structuring of the venture capital fund; (2) investment origination, due diligence, and valuation; (3) negotiating investment terms and making the investment decision; (4) strategies for post-investment value creation and investment management; and (5) investment exit strategies. The course is divided into two modules. The first module focuses on investment in venture companies. The second module focuses on venture capital funds. Topics expected to be covered include the following:

(1) Ventures and entrepreneurs
• Due diligence
• Valuation
• Understanding the term sheet
• Negotiating the investment
• Entrepreneur compensation
(2) Venture capital funds
• Institutional investors
• Fund portfolio management
• Fundraising and structure
• Exit
• Managing the VC firm
Teaching Method

This course will be taught using a mixture of lectures and class discussion of assigned cases. Students are required to come to classes for which a case has been assigned thoroughly prepared by reading the cases and studying the attached exhibits. This will enable them to take part in the class discussion and better understand and respond to the comments made by other students in the class. In addition, students are required to read the assigned readings which will expose them to the basic concepts and analytical frameworks required to fully understand the cases.