Perpetual Motion

Case Study Prompt

I was flying back from my client the other night, and working away on my laptop. Beside me was seated a mad scientist, who engaged me in conversation, and was excited to find out I was a consultant.

It seems that she has created a perpetual motion machine. It requires no energy, and keeps on going. She wants to know how to make money with it.

How can the mad scientist make money with this machine?

Bain Case Study Overview

This Bain case study is a back-of-the-envelope type case. Cases like these are sometimes used in place of more traditional case studies. Your job here is to identify a market for an unusual new product, and how to take the product to market.

The Market Study Framework will be helpful in creating a structure for the Bain case study, but don’t stop there. Pull from your own experience and knowledge to create a custom structure best suited to the details of the case.

This Bain case study has a qualitative difficulty of 1/4, making it a beginner level case you would find in a first round interview. There is 1 math exhibit in the case.

Bain Interview Tips

If you want to impress in your case interview, you need to know what the firm is looking for in its candidates. For Bain, it is practicality.

Make sure the structure you build consists of work-streams that you, as a future Manager, would be comfortable assigning out to a team of analysts.

Take your Bain case practice a step further by identifying 1 or 2 key areas where you struggled in the case. Make it a priority to focus on those areas in your practice time.

For out-loud practice with an expert, book an hour with an ex-MBB coach.