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Product cover image for HP Canada Co.: A Circular Supply Chain for Recycled Plastic

HP Canada Co.: A Circular Supply Chain for Recycled Plastic

Jury Gualandris; Deishin Lee; Cole Beattie

Product #:9B21D002
Supplier:Ivey
Discipline:Operations Management, Sustainability
Setting:Canada, Haiti, United States, China, 2020
Details:Case (PDF) • 13 pages • 2021-03-19

Subjects:

Business managementLeadership and managing peopleOperations and supply chain managementManagement

Industries:

Fabrication and manufacturing

Geography:

North AmericaCentral America and CaribbeanAsiaCanadaHaitiUnited StatesChina
Your Price:$9.71

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It was June 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, and Frances Edmonds, head of sustainable impact at HP Canada Co., the Canadian subsidiary of HP Inc. (HP), was continuing HP’s decades-long pursuit of sustainable impact. HP had worked nearly two decades with strategic partners like Lavergne Groupe to redesign its products and make plastic circular. HP was now committed to using 30 per cent post-consumer recycled plastic across its personal systems and printers by 2025. However, decreasing commodity prices during the COVID-19 pandemic, global supply challenges, and lowered global collection of recycled content could potentially undermine HP’s recycling efforts and goals. Edmonds was considering possible strategic, tactical, and operational actions to cope with the situation and sustain HP’s aspirations. Would HP’s circular supply chain remain viable and competitive?

Learning Objectives

The case can be used in undergraduate- and graduate-level courses on sustainability or operations management. Students are encouraged to examine the challenges related to the development of a more circular supply chain for plastic. After working through the case and assignment questions, students will be able to do the following:
  • Examine why HP has proactively committed to develop a circular supply chain for plastic.
  • Asses how to trade off complex strategic and operational decisions that simultaneously tackle supply and demand challenges in a circular supply chain for plastic.
  • Evaluate the extent to which circular supply chains for recycled plastic can successfully compete against linear supply chains for virgin plastic.
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Case Study: HP Canada Co.: A Circular Supply Chain for Recycled Plastic (English version) | Ivey Publishing