Staffan Canback - From Greenlands to Tellusant
Tellusant's executive chairman Staffan Canback presented his career journey at Henley Business School's celebration of 30 years of DBA Research Colloquiums. The presentation summarizes Dr Canback's research on diseconomies of scale using transaction cost theory. It goes from a conceptual framework, to a path diagram quantified with structural equations, to a LISREL-notated matrix summary of the path diagram. He earned his doctorate in 2002. The presentation then covers Dr Canback's founding (2004) and leading Canback Consulting on global journey with on the ground work in more than 70 countries. The consulting firm leveraged the quantitative methods learned during the doctoral research, but applied them to consumer goods companies. The consulting firm was sold to The Economist Group in 2015. Finally, Dr Canback gave an overview of his latest venture, Tellusant, founded in 2000. The company aims to automate most aspects of management and management consulting (in due time). It already has SaaS-based products such as TelluSim and (Share of) Wallet that replace business analysts. The benefits are higher accuracy, global comparability, lower cost, and shorter lead times. He ends with a summary of how Henley affected the post-doctorate career. [Greenlands is the doctoral and executive education campus of HBS.]
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Staffan Canback - From Greenlands to Tellusant
- 1. From Greenlands to Tellusant Academic research meets real-world management problems Staffan Canback, DBA6
- 2. In 2002, I received my DBA based on research on diseconomies of scale Industry Choice Economies of Scale STRUCTURE STRATEGY Diseconomies of Scale Economies of Scale Organisation Asset Specificity Corporate Performance Canback, S. 2002:Bureaucratic Limits of Firm Size. DBA thesis, Henley Business School
- 3. The conceptual framework was converted into a path diagram The next slide converts this path diagram into LISREL notation matrix equations Dataset comprised the 784 largest US nonfinancial companies
- 4. I learned that a company can be expressed in algorithms; no executives required (in the future) For this work, I was awarded the EDAMBA first prize for best DBA thesis in Europe, 2002/03 η1 η2 = γ11 γ12 γ13 γ14 γ16 γ17 γ21 γ22 γ23 γ24 γ25 γ26 γ37 ξ1 ξ2 ξ3 ξ4 ξ5 ξ6 ξ7 + ζ1 ζ2 𝑋1 𝑋2 𝑋3 𝑋4 𝑋5 𝑋6 𝑋7 𝑋8 𝑋9 𝑋A 𝑋B = 1 λ22 𝑋 λ32 𝑋 1 1 1 λ76 𝑋 λ86 𝑋 λ96 𝑋 λ97 𝑋 λA7 𝑋 λB7 𝑋 ξ1 ξ2 ξ3 ξ4 ξ5 ξ6 ξ7 + δ2 δ3 δ7 δ8 δ9 δ𝐴 δ𝐵 𝑌1 𝑌2 = 1 1 η1 η2 + ε1 ε2 Φ = − φ21 − φ31 φ32 − φ41 φ42 φ43 − φ51 φ52 φ53 φ54 − φ65 − φ74 φ76 − 𝚿 = − Ψ21 − Θδ = 𝟎 ξ1 = Atmospheric Consequences ξ2 = Bureaucratic Insularity ξ3 = Incentive Limits ξ4 = Communication Distortion ξ5 = Economies of Scale ξ6 = Asset Specificity ξ7 = M‐Form 𝑋1 = ulabour 𝑋2 = tenure 𝑋3 = age 𝑋4 = rd 𝑋5 = levels 𝑋6 = fixhigh 𝑋7 = foreign 𝑋8 = dr 𝑋9 = vert 𝑋A = govern 𝑋B = div η1 = Growth η2 = Profitability 𝑌1 = growth 𝑌2 = eva 𝐇 = Γ ⋅ Ξ + Ζ 𝑿 = Λ ⋅ Ξ + Δ 𝒀 = I ⋅ H + E Φ 𝚿 Θδ OR
- 5. CANBACK CONSULTING Managerially Relevant — Analytically Robust • Algorithmic analyses • Subnational focus • In-market insights Offices On-the-ground work Country projects With a McKinsey and Monitor partner background, and fueled by the DBA, I built a next generation consulting firm Canback Consulting was sold to The Economist Group in 2015
- 6. From this, I took the step in 2020 to realize the vision of automating management—Tellusant was founded TelluSim Demand simulations StrategyAI Self-populated strategic plans TelluPlan The integrated strategy platform QuantRisk Quantitative country risks FoX Exchange rates and inflation Share of Wallet Who—Where—When TelluBase The world like no one has seen it
- 7. I gained invaluable insights on my ‘Greenlands to Tellusant’ journey • My Henley DBA instilled a worldview ‒ Rationality ‒ Facts ‒ Attention to detail • My professional life got immeasurably more fun after Henley • It is not the specifics of what I learned, but the generalized wisdom, that matters. I never: ‒ applied structural equation models after Henley ‒ used the academic papers I read ‒ had to write, write, write again Staffan in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, drinking airag (fermented horse milk) during an M&A effort
- 8. Finally, a large thank you to Henley and some key people. Their support made this journey possible Phillip Samouel – Thesis adviser David Price – Thesis adviser Louise Hillier – DBA program administrator Karl Lippert – CEO, SABMiller Latin America Carlos Brito – CEO, Anheuser- Busch InBev Richard Rushton – CEO, Distell Jesse Logan – VP, Canback Consulting Philip Burgin-Young – CEO, Tellusant (& Canback Consulting) Bobo Shen – Chief Product Officer, Tellusant (& Canback Consulting)