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01 Jun 2011
News

Mr. Start-Up

could stray from an assignment to write market assessments and instead create a start-up business plan. “The professor was Walt Salmon, and fortunately he was all for it,” recalls Cassidy, who eventually made good on the plan to launch... View Details

Keywords: Deborah Blagg; News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information

13 Dec 2022
Interview

Why Some Start-Ups Fail to Scale

By: Jeffrey Rayport and Curt Nickisch

Managing rapid growth is a huge challenge for young businesses. Even start-ups with glowing reviews and skyrocketing sales can fail. That’s because new ventures and corporate initiatives alike have to sustain profitability at scale, according to Harvard Business School... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Growth Management; Outcome or Result; Transition

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August 2018
Case

Tapping Growth at Lord Hobo Brewing Company

By: Ethan Rouen and Susanna Gallani

Lord Hobo Brewing Company accounts for its inventory process as it prepares to create its first set of professional financial statements for investors. View Details

Keywords: Inventory; Start-ups; Craft Brewing; Investing; GAAP; Brand Management; Accounting; Working Capital; Entrepreneurship; Private Equity; Business Startups; Business and Shareholder Relations; Food and Beverage Industry; Boston; New England; United States

April 2000 (Revised April 2004)
Case

Infosys: Financing an Indian Software Start-Up

Describes the financing and growth of Infosys, an Indian software start-up. Infosys defies a number of stereotypes about barriers to entrepreneurship in India. The company was founded by a small group of entrepreneurs with little equity and without backing from a large... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Applications and Software; Financing and Loans; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Information Technology Industry; India

23 Nov 2010
Working Paper Summaries

Growth Through Heterogeneous Innovations

Keywords: by Ufuk Akcigit & William R. Kerr; Technology

October 1998 (Revised March 2004)
Case

Spotfire: Managing a Multinational Start-Up

Spotfire, a software start-up, must address the question of dividing its effort between Sweden and the United States in addition to raising venture capital, obtaining new customers, and managing early-stage growth. View Details

Keywords: Growth Management; Multinational Firms and Management; Applications and Software; Business Startups; Information Technology Industry; United States; Sweden

April 2004 (Revised May 2006)
Background Note

Achieving Profitable Growth and Market Value

By: James L. Heskett and Richard G. Hamermesh

Provides an overview of how a new venture needs to change as it passes from the initial start-up to the growth phase. Explores how a venture's leadership, strategy, and execution need to evolve to deal with rapid growth. View Details

Keywords: Growth Management; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Change Management

September 2023
Case

DocSend: A Path off the Plateau?

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Jeffrey Huizinga

Recounts how the leaders of DocSend, an early-stage startup that offered tools for sharing files online, searched for a viable business model and weighed tradeoffs in transitioning from a sales-led to a product-led "go-to-market" approach. View Details

Keywords: Technology; Start-up; Growth; Business Model; Business Startups; Sales; Growth and Development Strategy; Technology Industry

December 2016 (Revised December 2018)
Case

From Start-Up to Grown-Up Nation: The Future of the Israeli Innovation Ecosystem

By: Elie Ofek and Margot Eiran

In June 2016, Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, wrestled with how to sustain Israel’s strong innovation track record and the country’s reputation as the “startup nation.” Despite the economic miracle the country had wrought since its founding, he... View Details

01 Jun 2009
News

Entrepreneur’s Rwandan Start-Up Gets HBS Support

(SHE), and its first business, a Rwandan start-up that employs sixty women to manufacture and distribute low-cost sanitary pads. In recognition of her achievements, Scharpf in March was named the first HBS Social Entrepreneurship Fellow... View Details

Keywords: Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services; Social Assistance; Health, Social Assistance

January 2008 (Revised December 2008)
Case

Codman Academy: Beyond the Start-up Phase

By: Stacey Childress and Tiffany K. Cheng

As it entered its seventh academic year, Codman Academy, an expeditionary learning charter school located in Dorchester, Massachusetts, was reflecting on its successes and challenges. The school had succeeded in placing every member of its most recent graduating class... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; Leadership; Performance Improvement; Partners and Partnerships; Education Industry; Boston

February 2019 (Revised November 2021)
Case

MoviePass

By: Willy Shih

Mitch Lowe, the CEO of MoviePass, was having trouble convincing people of the viability of the company's business model. The company was building a multi-sided platform and was planning to extract value from increasing traffic to movie theaters through a number of... View Details

Keywords: Start-up; Start-up Growth; Start-ups; Business Model Innovation; Business Model; Innovation and Invention; Multi-Sided Platforms; Business Startups; Planning; Motion Pictures and Video Industry; United States

05 Nov 2013
News

Start-Ups Get a Start in New Orleans

they are past the start-up phase but still haven't generated significant growth and sales. Wilkins says the emergence of a number of organizations like his, which are dedicated to supporting entrepreneurs,... View Details

Keywords: New Orleans; Advertising, Public Relations, and Related Services; Professional Services

18 Feb 2013
Research & Ideas

Breaking Through a Growth Stall

identify your core customers and build a scalable platform for growth around them. That's the message from Frank V. Cespedes, the MBA Class of 1973 Senior Lecturer of Business Administration at Harvard Business School; James P. Dougherty,... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

January 2017
Case

Flatiron School

By: Thomas Eisenmann and Halah AlQahtani

In late 2016, the founders of Flatiron School, a startup offering 12-week coding bootcamps, are formulating their growth strategy. Their new online-only program has matched the excellent job placement results for their in-person bootcamps. Should Flatiron shift... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Start-ups; Growth Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Distribution Channels; Growth and Development Strategy; Internet and the Web; Business Startups; Diversification; Expansion; Education Industry; United States

January 2014
Case

Entrepreneurial Finance Lab: Scaling an Innovative Start-up Financing Venture

By: Joan Farre-Mensa, William R. Kerr and Alexis Brownell

EFL provides credit-scoring services in developing countries using psychometric assessment, but the potential loss of a large customer makes them reconsider their scaling narrative. View Details

Keywords: Finance; Developing Countries; Lending; Psychometrics; Scaling; Entrepreneurship; Credit; Developing Countries and Economies; Growth and Development Strategy; Financial Services Industry; Banking Industry; Africa; Latin America

June 2016
Teaching Note

The Cheese and the Oligarchs: The Politics, the Media, and Israel's Dream of a Start-Up Nation

By: Rafael Di Tella and Christine Snively

Israel enjoyed the highest concentration of technology start-ups in the world per capita. Despite regional instability, the country maintained strong economic growth and was considered a high-tech powerhouse. But not all Israelis benefited. Between the 1980s and 2010s,... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Information Technology; Business Conglomerates; Business Startups; Israel