Publications

February 2017 (Revised March 2017)
Case

Link REIT

By: Siddharth Yog

Publicly listed in November 2005, Link REIT was the first real estate investment trust (REIT) in Hong Kong after the Hong Kong government decided to privatize a portfolio of community shopping malls, car parks, and fresh produce markets. Run by CEO George Hongchoy, the... View Details

Keywords: Hong Kong; REIT; Real Estate; Retail; Government; China; Housing; Public Company; Strategic Planning; Expansion; Public Equity; Real Estate Industry; Hong Kong; China

01 Mar 2011
News

Two Kinds of Green

social and environmental concerns into daily operations. In the multimedia case “Burt’s Bees: Balancing Growth and Sustainability,” HBS associate professor Christopher Marquis uses text exhibits and video interviews to show how the small natural products View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; natural products company; Miscellaneous Manufacturing; Manufacturing; Management, Scientific, and Technical Consulting Services; Professional Services

October 2019 (Revised December 2019)
Case

BC Partners: Acuris

By: Victoria Ivashina and Terrence Shu

This case follows Nikos Stathopoulos, Managing Partner of BC Partners, as he and his team evaluate the potential sale of one of BC Partners’ portfolio companies, Acuris. Acuris was a global financial intelligence, news, and data company that had been acquired by BC... View Details

Keywords: Fund Management; Fund Raising; Leveraged Buyout; Buyout; Portfolio Management; Operations Improvement; Exit; Exit Strategy; Valuation Ratios; Finance; Private Equity; Leveraged Buyouts; Operations; Performance Improvement; Acquisition; Valuation

01 Dec 2013
News

Your Own Medicine

The first conversation wasn't promising: The Secklers came in planning to set up a venture fund to support companies pursuing DMD treatments and were looking for a fund manager; Williams, a former SVP at Genzyme with no fund-managing... View Details

Keywords: Morrell, Daniel; biomedicine; biopharmaceutical company; Ambulatory Health Care Services; Health, Social Assistance

January 2020
Case

SK Group: Social Progress Credits

By: George Serafeim, Ethan Rouen and David Freiberg

SK Group was one of the largest companies South Korea. A family-run conglomerate consisting of around 120 subsidiaries and employing more than 100,000, SK was tightly knit into the fabric of Korean society. SK viewed their future success as contingent upon the strength... View Details

30 Sep 2021
Blog Post

Driving Social Impact Through Consumer Behavior: Nonprofit to Finance to Retail with Nicole Krantz (MBA 2022)

student-run company, Campus Enterprises, as the Chief Operating Officer,” Krantz shared. “The company is several different ventures under one umbrella, and I founded a new cleaning service business within it.” In her senior year, Krantz... View Details

Keywords: Retail

October 2013 (Revised October 2017)
Case

Bridges Ventures

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Sarah Appleby

Bridges Ventures, a UK-based impact investor with double-digit returns on its investments, is reflecting on its social impact and pondering its future course. View Details

Keywords: Impact Investing; United Kingdom; Financial And Social Return; Social Enterprise; Investment Portfolio; Transportation Industry; Retail Industry; Real Estate Industry; United Kingdom

2020
Working Paper

Institutional Corporate Bond Pricing

By: Ishita Sen, Lorenzo Bretscher, Lukas Schmid and Varun Sharma

We compile a rich dataset that links institutional investors' position level holdings with corporate bond characteristics and estimate demand elasticities with respect to critical sources of risk. Persistence in institutions' holdings provide us with an instrument to... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Bonds; Demand Systems; Insurance Companies; Mutual Funds; Liquidity; Bonds; Insurance; Investment Funds; Financial Liquidity

SSRN

18 Jun 2024
Blog Post

Alumni Career Journey: Ben Schutzman (MBA 2016) - Driving Positive Impact on Community and Climate

transportation angle of cities and, more specifically, how we can positively impact people in communities with better infrastructure and transportation services. Tell us a little bit about your career journey since graduating. I knew that... View Details

October 17, 2022
Article

When Climate Collaboration Is Treated as an Antitrust Violation

By: Matteo Gasparini, Knut Haanaes and Peter Tufano

Carbon emissions transcend firms and borders—they are a massive, unpriced externality. Companies across industries are increasingly waking up to the need to cooperate in the fight against climate change but the law might get in the way. Across Europe and the U.S.,... View Details

Keywords: Climate Impact; Climate Finance; Antitrust; Anti-trust; Climate Change; Environmental Regulation; Law

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25 Sep 2000
Research & Ideas

More Than the Sum of Its Parts: The Impact of Modularity on the Computer Industry

drives. CB: Ultimately, though, the power of modularity does not lie simply in the creation of financial option value and the ensuing impact on competition. Modularity also helps simplify complex systems and divvy up complex tasks so that... View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Computer; Consumer Products; Technology

October 2016
Case

La-Z-Boy (A)

By: Joseph B. Fuller and Natalie Kindred

Kurt Darrow, CEO of La-Z-Boy furniture, must decide whether to continue an overhaul of the company's strategy in the face of a collapse in demand during the great recession. Having pared back La-Z-Boy's portfolio of brands and manufacturing network, he intends to... View Details

Keywords: Retail; Manufacturing; Organizational Transformations; Reorganization; Furniture Industry; Corporate Strategy; Home Fashion; Turnaround; Portfolio Rationalization; Globalization Of Supply Chain; Brand Repositioning; Business Growth and Maturation; Brands and Branding; Competitive Strategy; Vertical Integration; Retail Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States

01 Jun 2005
News

Faculty Research Online

Entrepreneurial Hospital Pioneers New Model Associate Professor Tarun Khanna examines a “Robin Hood” cardiac hospital in India, which treats patients regardless of their ability to pay. His findings? A solvent, successful model of international health care. Is Business... View Details

Keywords: nonprofit; social impact; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services

October 2018 (Revised October 2018)
Teaching Note

La-Z-Boy (A)

By: Joseph B. Fuller and Julia Kelley

Kurt Darrow, CEO of La-Z-Boy furniture, must decide whether to continue an overhaul of the company's strategy in the face of a collapse in demand during the great recession. Having pared back La-Z-Boy's portfolio of brands and manufacturing network, he intends to... View Details

2002
Chapter

Bridging the Gap: How Improved Information Can Help Companies Integrate Shareholder Value and Environmental Quality

By: Forest Reinhardt

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Shareholder Relations; Information; Environmental Sustainability

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2020
Working Paper

Measuring the Cost of Corporate Water Usage

By: DG Park, George Serafeim and T. Robert Zochowski

We develop a methodology that calculates the impact that organizations have on the environment through their water consumption relating to water stress risk. Using the methodology, we derive estimates for four companies that show how assumptions on the geographic... View Details

Keywords: Water; Water Management; Environment; Sustainability; Environmental Impact; Impact-Weighted Accounts; IWAI; Organizations; Environmental Sustainability; Valuation

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September–October 2020
Article

Social-Impact Efforts That Create Real Value

By: George Serafeim

Until the mid-2010s few investors paid attention to environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data—information about companies’ carbon footprints, labor policies, board makeup, and so forth. Today the data is widely used by investors. How can organizations create... View Details

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November 2014 (Revised March 2015)
Case

Disrupting the Meat Industry: Tissue Culture Beef

By: Jose B. Alvarez and Matthew G. Preble

Dr. Mark Post and his team at Maastricht University were perfecting their tissue culture beef product—made entirely from muscle grown in his lab—to give it the same taste, texture and appearance of a traditional beef hamburger. A previous iteration of this product had... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Beef Production; Environmental Impacts Of Food Production; Agribusiness; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Disruptive Innovation; Innovation and Invention; Environmental Sustainability; Food; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Netherlands; United States; United Kingdom