Business failures, costly decisions and the lessons they leave behind.
The full archive, in the appFatigue crack in a PW4077 fan blade separated at 12,500 ft; a missed 2016 inspection reading and intervals too long were cited — 239 aboard landed safely.
Read the caseEstée Lauder paid $1.45B for Too Faced in 2016; three years later, cooling prestige makeup forced a $641M write-down — nearly half the price gone.
Read the caseElectrolux agreed in 2014 to buy GE's appliance unit, its largest deal ever, bet on a divestiture package the DOJ refused, and paid $175 million to walk away.
Read the caseLoblaw merged PC Plus and Shoppers Optimum into PC Optimum in February 2018. The rollout broke at once — apps crashed, points vanished, and customers revolted.
Read the caseThe Canadian payments firm handed the CEO role to a hired executive after a short-seller crash, then brought the founder back as interim 26 months later.
Read the caseThe crowdsourced-invention startup turned community ideas into dozens of money-losing products; by September 2015 it was in Chapter 11, Wink sold for $15M.
Read the caseTwo chemists claimed tabletop fusion at a press conference. The world's top labs raced to replicate it — and found nothing.
Read the caseChina's 'Sesame Street English' licensed a TV brand through a Japanese middleman, then sold franchises on invented returns until illegal textbooks caught up.
Read the caseVivendi bought Gameloft in a hostile 2016 takeover. Within three years, the mobile gaming pioneer had closed 10 studios and halved its 5,000-person workforce.
Read the caseA 2015 anti-fraud test copied real SEPA debtor data, then nobody retired the server. About 12M people were exposed.
Read the caseNordLB, a German Landesbank, owned the world's largest shipping loan book. When shipping collapsed, it lost €2B in a year and needed a €3.6B bailout.
Read the caseASCI told Kent RO to modify its 16-year-old 'purest water' tagline; Kent sued, and the Delhi High Court stayed the order.
Read the caseAn automated config verifier flagged its own bad value, every client raced to 'fix' it, and Facebook had to switch itself off to stop the feedback loop.
Read the caseLocal investors bought Philadelphia's two big papers with borrowed money — then litigated for a year to stop their lenders taking over.
Read the caseStella Liebeck suffered third-degree burns from McDonald's 190°F coffee. The verdict became a frivolous-litigation symbol — but McDonald's had 700+ prior burns.
Read the caseFender's legal campaign against Stratocaster-style guitars triggered a boycott from the guitar YouTubers who drove its sales.
Read the casePaul Touradji never paid the profit share he promised two star traders, fought them for ten years, and a New York jury made him pay $46 million plus interest.
Read the caseFacebook's Portal was a smart display with an always-on camera for video calls. Privacy fears, weak sales and Meta's pivot to enterprise killed it in 2022.
Read the caseIn 1968, 3M scientist Spencer Silver invented a weak adhesive with no use. Six years later, a colleague used it for a bookmark. Post-it Notes were born.
Read the caseToyota Motor (China) dictated minimum resale prices for Lexus dealers in Jiangsu for four years — regulators fined it ¥87.6M, about 2% of its 2016 China sales.
Read the case