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Marsha Patterson
Adesemi was the start-up vision of Monique Maddy. Monique was born in Liberia and
raised in the United States. Her vision was to, “blanket the entire developing world with
affordable wireless telecommunications services.” (Maddy, 2000) Maddy’s article offers deep
insight into the pros and cons such as emerging-market risk, negotiating, cultural differences, and
Adesemi’s infrastructure-related challenges were many. Any third world country the
company would first operate in would prove to be expensive because there would not already be
infrastructure readily available. Adesemi chose to start its operations in the country of Tanzania.
At the time, Tanzania was home to almost 30 million people with only 120,000 phone lines. The
engineers expressed that the network would have to be completely wireless because of the
especially less developed countries, is one of the biggest obstructions to the success or failure of
the business. Adesemi’s challenge was procuring the necessary licensing to operate and receive
commissions for the business they would be creating for the local telecommunications company.
The company soon learned the hard way that doing business in the third world is not the same as
doing business in developed countries. Third world nations present a particular problem where
the lines of ethical business practices can become blurred. A business will be faced with quite a
bit of waiting, pushing, and cajoling, in order to get anything done. This can take weeks,
Adesemi also had to deal with political differences among its own staff. Conducting
business in another country meant that Adesemi pooled management and experience from many
Case Study: Dream Deferred 3
different countries. Employees from the same nationalities tended to bond together against other
nationalities. Without a melting pot of different nationalities that knew how to work together,
Adesemi was faced with the stereotypes attached to different cultures working together. Maddy
describes the different groups issues with each other stating that the Scandinavians were
regarded as cold, the British as snobby, the Tanzanians inept, and the Americans as arrogant.
The political and governmental challenges were evident in how the employees interreacted with
each other and how the business was constantly stonewalled by the government.
Third world entrepreneurs face many problems in raising capital for their overseas
ventures. Maddy separates these emerging-market venture capitalists into two separate and
unequal groups, Do-Gooders and Do-Wellers. Do-Gooder venture capitalists provide equity
capital and loan capital to generate economic prosperity in emerging-market countries as well as
to help stimulate further influx of capital from other investors. These investors want to promote
growth at their own pace by putting little money into these start up businesses, which allows
little opportunity for real return. Do-Wellers on the other hand, believe that business is a high-
stakes game. These investors see untapped opportunity in the third world, and they want to seize
it. They understand that the business is high risk and they are looking for a high reward.
The problem that these two groups of investors create is that the Do-Gooder investors,
while they understand emerging markets and are familiar with the government rules and
regulations, are terrified of the inherent risk and enmesh the company in their own bureaucracy
and rigid methods of investment and analysis. The Do-Wellers on the other hand, have limited
experience with emerging market countries, but they are patient and willing to pour money into
delivery, advocacy, and empowerment. NGO’s play a crucial role in international development
by funneling development funds from individual donors and from wealthy countries into less
developed countries. Because NGOs are idealized for “doing good” and are not concerned with
profit or politics, they play a role in development and encouraging entrepreneurship. (Eric D.
Werker, 2008)
A culturally divergent workforce is another area of doing business abroad that presents its
own set of complications. Maddy explains that she anticipated a diverse workforce would
present a strong and heterogeneous front, where different mind-sets would create new and
exciting solutions to problems. Instead, however, the diversity created more problems than it
solved. The disagreements among the employees from different countries were based on
stereotypes and mistrust of each other. The misunderstandings created from the cultural
diversity of the Adesemi team took up much of the author’s time in settling disputes that were
New businesses in a foreign market need local partner relationships to establish and make
their company credible in the eyes of the locals. The author refers to local partners as, “next-
door neighbors”. Local alliances are a large part of having a successful business because they
provide a local knowledge of customers habits and key government and industry players. This
relationship, however, is more useful in the beginning, or start up, of the company. Established
The “Old Boy Network” proved to be very important to Adesemi. The author partnered
with an old classmate for her company. Adesemi was tied up in not getting answers on a local
Case Study: Dream Deferred 5
level from the local telephone company but after speaking with an old professor, who happened
to be working with the president of the World Bank on a project, a settlement was negotiated
between Adesemi and the government. The author was even able to start raising money for her
company from the consulting firms and investment-bank recruiters on campus. The Harvard
School of Business alumni network was extremely useful to the startup of Adesemi. Having the
Harvard School of Business alumni network available opened many doors and created many
There are many lessons to be learned from this article about conducting a lucrative
business abroad. The potential for new business is extremely high in newly developing
countries. The ability to get the company running and functioning profitably however, is another
story completely. A knowledge of the local customs and government, the ability to find and
retain local relationships, and successfully navigating business in these new environments are all
References
Eric D. Werker, F. Z. (2008, 1 25). What Do Non-Governmental Organizations Do? Retrieved from
Harvard Business School: https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/what-do-non-governmental-
organizations-do
Maddy, M. (2000, 06). Dream Deferred: The Story of a High-Tech Entrepreneur in a Low-Tech World.
Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2000/05/dream-deferred-the-story-of-
a-high-tech-entrepreneur-in-a-low-tech-world