Publications

October 2011 (Revised March 2012)
Case

AQR's DELTA Strategy

By: Daniel Bergstresser, Lauren Cohen, Randolph B. Cohen and Christopher Malloy

In the summer of 2008, AQR Capital Management was considering the launch of a new hedge fund strategy. The proposed DELTA portfolio would offer investors exposure to a basket of nine major hedge fund strategies. The DELTA strategy would be innovative in two ways.... View Details

Keywords: Investment Portfolio; Investment Funds; Financial Strategy; Financial Services Industry

May 1993 (Revised July 1995)
Case

Air Miles

By: John A. Quelch

The chairman and CEO of a U.K.-based frequent buyer travel award program is planning on launching in North America. Management must determine the marketing strategy to be used, specifically how the U.K. program should be altered, whether the U.S. and Canadian markets... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Service Delivery; Market Entry and Exit; Adaptation; Product Launch; Service Industry; Canada; United Kingdom; United States

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March 2020
Article

The Role of Numbers in the Customer Journey

By: Shelle Santana, Manoj Thomas and Vicki Morwitz

At each stage in customers’ journeys, they encounter different types of numeric information that they process using different judgment strategies. Relevant numbers might include budgets, price, product attributes, product counts, product ratings, numbers in brand... View Details

Keywords: Numbers; Heuristics; Numerical Cognition; Pricing; Customer Journey; Information; Consumer Behavior

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22 Feb 2008
Working Paper Summaries

Consumer Demand for Prize-Linked Savings: A Preliminary Analysis

Keywords: by Peter Tufano, Nick Maynard & Jan-Emmanuel De Neve; Financial Services

November 2015 (Revised May 2016)
Case

Aspiring Minds

By: Karim R. Lakhani, Marco Iansiti and Christine Snively

By 2015, India-based employment assessment and certification provider Aspiring Minds had helped facilitate over 300,000 job matches through its assessment tools. Aspiring Minds' flagship product, the Aspiring Minds Computer Adaptive Test (AMCAT), used machine learning... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Strategy; Higher Education; Technological Innovation; Employment; Technology Industry; India; China

June 2024
Article

Information Spillovers in Experience Goods Competition

By: Zhuoqiong Charlie Chen, Christopher Stanton and Catherine Thomas

When experience goods compete, consuming one product can be informative about value for similar untried products. We study a two-period model of duopoly competition in markets that have this feature and where firms can price discriminate between consumers based on... View Details

Keywords: Experience Goods; Competition; Information; Demand and Consumers; Profit; Price

January 2021 (Revised October 2021)
Case

iOpenEye: Theater and #MeToo in Nigeria

By: Caroline Elkins, Tarun Khanna and Joyce J. Kim

In 2014, Ifeoma Fafunwa, an award-winning playwright and director, founded iOpenEye, a commercial production company dedicated to driving social change through performance art. iOpenEye’s flagship theatrical production was called “Hear Word! Naija Woman Talk True,”... View Details

Keywords: Theatre; Social Change; Entrepreneurship; Social Enterprise; Arts; Entertainment; Social Issues; Health Pandemics; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Business Model; Nigeria

2009
Working Paper

Principles that Matter: Sustaining Software Innovation from the Client to the Web

By: Marco Iansiti

Economic analysis often reviews the role of principles—such as respect for intellectual property rights—in driving innovation. Given the interdependent nature of innovation in information technology, three core principles have emerged that work together to ensure that... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Technological Innovation; Intellectual Property; Partners and Partnerships; Competition; Information Technology; Internet and the Web

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May 2011 (Revised July 2015)
Case

Ford Motor Company: Strengthening the Dealer Network

By: V. Kasturi Rangan, Katharine Lee and Marie Bell

The case describes a five-year effort (2006-2011) of distribution rationalization and consolidation at Ford. The financial crisis in the second-half of 2008 forced GM and Chrysler into bankruptcy. Having completed the distribution overhaul work by 2011, its senior... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Product; Distribution; Consolidation; Distribution Channels; Transformation; Business Processes; Auto Industry

28 Mar 2016
Research & Ideas

What's a Boss Worth?

quite a lot. “If you have a better boss on a team, you get more out of each individual worker” Academics and practitioners alike are interested in how to construct the best teams to get the most productivity out of people working... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Service

10 Oct 2007
Research & Ideas

“Blank” Inside: Branding Ingredients

the quality of what's inside. We need the assurance of the Sunkist brand. A variant on this theme is ingredient branding: putting the brand of an ingredient on the outside of a product to increase its appeal. When is the provider of the... View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch; Consumer Products; Consumer Products

11 Dec 2012
First Look

First Look: Dec. 11

Meneilly, manager of hip-hop star Shawn Carter-better known as Jay-Z-and a partner in Carter's company Roc Nation and Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of Microsoft's Online Services division, to enter into an unprecedented, high-stakes partnership to benefit the... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 2021
Case

Unshrinking the Pie: Desirée Stolar's Negotiation Saga (A)

By: James K. Sebenius and Alex Green

When Desirée (“Des”) Stolar’s wool sweater shrank two sizes, the Harvard Business School student worked with classmates to develop a solution that both fixed her problem and launched Unshrinkit, a successful consumer goods company with a widely-available product for... View Details

Keywords: Bargaining; Startups; Negotiation; Contracts; Negotiation Tactics; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Strategy; Consumer Products Industry

July 1998 (Revised January 2009)
Case

Display Technologies, Inc. (Abridged)

By: H. Kent Bowen and Jonathan West

Display Technologies, Inc. (DTI) is a new joint venture between Toshiba and IBM Japan that is manufacturing the most advanced form of flat panel displays. With success in achieving significant production volumes, DTI has been asked to double its output as quickly as... View Details

Keywords: Joint Ventures; Decision Choices and Conditions; Leadership Style; Production; Outcome or Result; Performance Capacity; Strategy; Hardware; Electronics Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Japan

April 2017
Case

Yushan Bicycles: Learning to Ride Abroad

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Paul S. Myers

Yushan Bicycles, one of Taiwan's leading bicycle manufacturers, is pursuing an international expansion strategy by increasing demand for its range of traditional and electric bicycles and shifting its product mix toward higher-margin models sold through specialty... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Firms and Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Conflict Management; Learning; Bicycle Industry; Taiwan; Australia

October 2021
Supplement

Unshrinking the Pie: Desirée Stolar's Negotiation Saga (B)

By: James K. Sebenius and Alex Green

When Desirée (“Des”) Stolar’s wool sweater shrank two sizes, the Harvard Business School student worked with classmates to develop a solution that both fixed her problem and launched Unshrinkit, a successful consumer goods company with a widely-available product for... View Details

Keywords: Bargaining; Startups; Negotiation; Contracts; Negotiation Tactics; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Strategy; Consumer Products Industry

December 2005 (Revised February 2006)
Case

Migros

By: Forest L. Reinhardt, Vincent Marie Dessain and Anders Sjoman

In October 2005, Urs Riedener, head of marketing at Swiss retailer Migros, is contemplating the company's competitive position. Primarily a retailer for foods and near-foods products, the cooperative Migros, with close to 600 retail outlets in Switzerland (but only... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Corporate Governance; Corporate Strategy; Cooperative Ownership; Supply Chain Management; Product Marketing; Environmental Sustainability; Social Enterprise; Business or Company Management; Marketing Strategy; Retail Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Switzerland