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Publications
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(2,437)
- Faculty Publications (603)
- February 2024 (Revised February 2024)
- Teaching Note
Travelogo: Understanding Customer Journeys
By: Eva Ascarza and Ta-Wei Huang
Teaching Note for HBS Exercise 524-044. The exercise aims to teach students about 1) Customer Segmentation; and 2) constructing buying personas, 3) Get actionable insights from clickstream data. View Details
- February 2024
- Case
Tabby: Winning Consumers' Digital Wallets
By: Eva Ascarza and Fares Khrais
Hosam Arab (MBA 2009), cofounder and CEO of Tabby, a Saudi-based fintech startup, raised its Series D funding round in October 2023, four years after its inception, valuing it as a regional unicorn. Tabby's core product, a buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) service, allowed... View Details
- February 2024
- Case
More than Optics: Olympus's Vision to Become a Leading Global MedTech Company
By: David J. Collis and Haisley Wert
In August 2022, CEO Yasuo Takeuchi reflected on Olympus Corporation’s recent transformation from being known as a Japanese consumer camera company to becoming a leading global medical technology (MedTech) company. Over the past dozen years, Takeuchi and prior... View Details
- January 2024 (Revised February 2024)
- Exercise
Travelogo: Understanding Customer Journeys
By: Eva Ascarza, Nicolas Padilla and Oded Netzer
In late May 2023, Sarah Merino, the newly appointed manager of the Customer Insights group at Travelogo—an online travel booking platform—initiates a comprehensive analysis of clickstream data to understand the varied behaviors and needs of their users. In preparation... View Details
- January 2024
- Case
National Football League and Private 5G
By: Andy Wu, Grant Son and Shuoyo Chen
On September 9, 2021, the National Football League (NFL) designated Verizon as its official 5G partner in a 10-year deal, committed to enhance the experience for NFL teams, players, and fans in stadiums. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said, “Verizon will help us... View Details
- 2023
- Working Paper
Rapport in Organizations: Evidence from Fast Food
By: Achyuta Adhvaryu, Parker Howell, Anant Nyshadham and Jorge Tamayo
Common identity often provides a foundation for workplace rapport. Though gender is perhaps the most frequently studied dimension of identity among workers, little is known about how gender match between managers and their workers might affect team performance. Using... View Details
- October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
- Case
KOKO Networks: Bridging Energy Transition and Affordability with Carbon Financing
By: George Serafeim, Siko Sikochi and Namrata Arora
The problem was massive: two million hectares of African forests were lost annually to charcoal production for cooking, an area equivalent to 13 times Greater London, resulting in one billion tons of carbon emissions yearly. At the same time, an estimated 700,000... View Details
Keywords: Clean Tech; Digital; Carbon Credits; Carbon Offsetting; Climate Change; Entrepreneurship; Energy Sources; Environmental Sustainability; Health; Market Design; Business Startups; Transition; Environmental Regulation; Policy; Energy Industry; Consumer Products Industry; Africa; Kenya; Rwanda
- 2022
- Working Paper
Why Do Index Funds Have Market Power? Quantifying Frictions in the Index Fund Market
By: Zach Y. Brown, Mark Egan, Jihye Jeon, Chuqing Jin and Alex A. Wu
Index funds are one of the most common ways investors access financial markets and are perceived to be a transparent and low-cost alternative to active investment management. Despite these purported virtues of index fund investing and the introduction of new products... View Details
- October 2023 (Revised January 2024)
- Case
Ball: EVA Driving the World's Leading Can Manufacturer (A)
By: Jonas Heese and Susan Pinckney
The case describes Ball’s multi decade history of using Economic Value Added to drive decision making and workforce compensation. In 2016, the company acquired Rexam PLC and became the world’s leading metal beverage container company. Consumer demand for varied... View Details
Keywords: Budgets and Budgeting; Cost Accounting; Financial Reporting; Financial Statements; Buildings and Facilities; Green Building; Mergers and Acquisitions; Customer Satisfaction; Decisions; Forecasting and Prediction; Machinery and Machining; Asset Pricing; Corporate Finance; Capital; Cost; Financial Management; Goods and Commodities; Compensation and Benefits; Executive Compensation; Employee Relationship Management; Goals and Objectives; Resource Allocation; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; Arizona; California; Texas
- October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
- Case
Fantuan
By: Feng Zhu and David Lane
In 2023, CEO Randy Wu was considering the optimal growth strategy for Fantuan, a restaurant food delivery platform that had expanded from its 2014 founding in Vancouver, Canada to serve the Chinese demand for Asian cuisine in urban markets across Australia, Canada, the... View Details
Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Focus and Relationships; Diasporas; Entrepreneurship; Digital Platforms; Growth Management; Business Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; Canada; United Kingdom; Australia
- October 2023 (Revised June 2024)
- Case
Catalent: Catalyzing the Next Era of Growth
By: Satish Tadikonda, William Marks and Kevin Emancipator
Catalent's newly appointed CEO, Alessandro Maselli, experienced the highs of the pharmaceutical contract development manufacturing (CDMO) space during COVID-19 while helping Moderna and others bring vaccines to market quickly and safely. After rushing to add capacity... View Details
- October 2023
- Case
Vida Health: Transforming Chronic Disease Treatment
By: William Sahlman and Nicole Tempest Keller
San Francisco based Vida Health, founded by Stephanie Tilenius, former vice president of Commerce and Payments at Google, was a B2B digital health startup focused on the treatment of cardiometabolic conditions, such as diabetes and obesity. Its innovative digital... View Details
- October 2023 (Revised May 2024)
- Case
JSW Steel: Balancing Growth While Decarbonizing
By: Vikram S Gandhi and Radhika Kak
Sajjan Jindal, Chairman & Managing Director of JSW Steel, India's largest steel producer by market capitalization, was facing a dilemma. Steel demand in India was expected to grow exponentially over the next decade. However, given its traditional reliance on carbon,... View Details
- September 2023 (Revised February 2024)
- Case
Accelerating with Caution: Forecasting and Managing birddogs' Growth
By: Mark Egan
As 2017 was drawing to a close, birddogs’ founder and CEO, Peter Baldwin, was working with his CFO Jack Sullivan to prepare for 2018. Their task at hand? To predict the demand for their product in the coming season, determine the appropriate investments in working... View Details
- September 2023
- Supplement
Accelerating with Caution: Forecasting and Managing birddogs’ Growth (B)
By: Mark Egan
As 2017 was drawing to a close, birddogs’ founder and CEO, Peter Baldwin, was working with his CFO Jack Sullivan to prepare for 2018. Their task at hand? To predict the demand for their product in the coming season, determine the appropriate investments in working... View Details
- September 2023
- Article
The Changing Role of Managers
By: Letian Zhang
This study argues that the increase in middle management in recent decades was
accompanied by a major shift in managerial roles. Increased task complexity and a
new management philosophy have reduced the need for direct supervision but generated
a much greater... View Details
- July–August 2023
- Article
Demand Learning and Pricing for Varying Assortments
By: Kris Ferreira and Emily Mower
Problem Definition: We consider the problem of demand learning and pricing for retailers who offer assortments of substitutable products that change frequently, e.g., due to limited inventory, perishable or time-sensitive products, or the retailer’s desire to... View Details
- 2024
- Working Paper
Residential Battery Storage - Reshaping the Way We Do Electricity
By: Christian Kaps and Serguei Netessine
In this paper, we aim to understand when private households invest in behind-the-meter battery storage next to rooftop solar and how those batteries impact households, the electricity market, and emissions. We answer three main research questions: 1) When do customers... View Details
- 2023
- Working Paper
The Effects of Inconsistent Work Schedules on Employee Lateness and Absenteeism
By: Caleb Kwon and Ananth Raman
Problem Definition: Employee lateness and absenteeism pose challenges for businesses, particularly in the retail industry, where punctuality is vital for optimal store operations and customer service. This paper relates employee lateness and absenteeism with... View Details
- June 2023
- Supplement
Clash of Two Giants Simulation Exercise
By: Feng Zhu and Marco Iansiti
Many markets are organized around platforms that connect consumers with complementary applications and services. These platforms are two-sided because both sides - consumers and those providing applications or services - need access to the same platform to interact. A... View Details