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Product cover image for Warner Bros. Pictures: The Harry Potter Dilemma

Warner Bros. Pictures: The Harry Potter Dilemma

Neil Bendle; Matt Boswick

Product #:9B12A025
Supplier:Ivey
Discipline:General Management, Marketing
Setting:United States, 2010
Details:Case (PDF) • 10 pages • 2012-07-05 (Rev: 2012-09-26)

Subjects:

Game theoryCompetitive strategyLeadership and managing peopleSales and marketingManagementMarketing

Industries:

Media, entertainment, and professional sports

Geography:

United StatesNorth America
Your Price:$9.71

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This and the Paramount Pictures: The Transformers Dilemma case are set in December 2010 and show industry consultants thinking about how to market the final installments of very successful movie franchises. Both Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures want to market their movies to gain the greatest gross revenue (i.e. box office ticket revenue). Each company must take into account the scheduling of the other players in the market. The cases also deal with changes in the movie industry. These include the expansion of the number of 3D movies and the importance of franchise movies.

Learning Objectives

This case is appropriate to use with advanced undergraduates or MBAs. It was designed to be used in a competition course and illustrates simple competitive concepts such as the use of game theory in business, overconfidence, and competitor neglect. The case also has obvious application to entertainment marketing, where the 3D element and ticket pricing will be of special interest.

The objectives of the case are:
  • To illustrate the interdependencies of competitive strategies in the marketplace.
  • To learn the basic game theory idea that there is rarely a perfect strategy for any player in a competitive market independent of what another player chooses. The key first question to any analysis is: “What will the other person do?” Until you can predict what the other people involved will do, it is impossible to devise a meaningful strategy for your own company.
  • To consider the advantages of various possible release dates.
  • To understand the complexity of such considerations in the market.
  • To develop a marketing plan for a movie launch, including financial projections of breakeven ticket revenue.
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Case Study: Warner Bros. Pictures: The Harry Potter Dilemma (English version) | Ivey Publishing