Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(4,021)
- Faculty Publications (1,220)
- February 2022 (Revised July 2022)
- Supplement
InstaDeep: AI Innovation Born in Africa (B)
By: Shikhar Ghosh and Esel Çekin
Karim Beguir and Zohra Slim were the co-founders of InstaDeep, a deep tech startup focusing on artificial intelligence (AI) solutions. Instadeep was one of the few companies globally that were partnering with DeepMind, an AI subsidiary of Google [Alphabet Inc.].... View Details
- January 2022
- Case
Bee-ing Better at Bombas
By: Elizabeth A. Keenan, Youngme Moon and John Masko
David Heath and Randy Goldberg founded Bombas in 2013 to serve two missions: to deliver the “best socks in the history of feet,” and to donate socks (the most requested item in homeless shelters) to Americans experiencing homelessness. Eight years later, Bombas had... View Details
Keywords: Social Entrepreneurship; Values and Beliefs; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Digital Marketing; Distribution; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Quality; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Human Needs; Poverty; Growth and Development Strategy; Apparel and Accessories Industry; New York (city, NY)
- January 2022 (Revised December 2022)
- Case
TotalEnergies’ Investment in Hyzon Motors
By: Vikram S. Gandhi and David Lane
In November 2021, Girish Nadkarni, the head of TotalEnergies’ corporate venture capital arm (TEV) was considering whether, and on what terms, to exit an investment in Hyzon Motors, a start-up supplier of hydrogen-powered trucks. TEV had invested $4 million in Hyzon,... View Details
Keywords: Business Units; Communication Intention and Meaning; Renewable Energy; Venture Capital; Growth and Development Strategy; Market Design; Standards; Commercialization; Investment Portfolio; Market Transactions; Energy Industry; Financial Services Industry; Transportation Industry; Europe; New York (city, NY)
- December 2021 (Revised January 2023)
- Case
Katerra (A)
By: Lindsay N. Hyde, Thomas R. Eisenmann and Tom Quinn
In April 2020, Katerra executives struggled with a series of decisions that would determine the fate of one of the best-funded construction startups in history. Katerra was founded in 2015 by technology-industry executive Michael Marks and commercial real estate... View Details
- November 2021 (Revised December 2024)
- Case
Kermit PPI
By: Kyle Myers, Matt Grennan and Sarah Mehta
Launched in 2011, Kermit PPI helped hospitals save money on expensive orthopedic implants and devices by enabling them to renegotiate their contracts with device manufacturers and better monitor compliance. In 2021, as they look to grow, they are entertaining two... View Details
- Article
How Direct-to-Consumer Brands Can Continue to Grow
By: V. Kasturi Rangan, Daniel Corsten, Matt Higgins and Leonard A. Schlesinger
Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands such as Allbirds, Casper, Peloton, and Warby Parker have creatively found a weakness in the marketing citadel of incumbent brands. By using data gleaned from daily interactions with customers, these brands have been able to adapt how... View Details
- Article
No Team is an Island: How Leaders Shape Networked Ecosystems for Team Success
By: Inga Carboni, Robert Cross and Amy C. Edmondson
Today’s organizations rely on networks of dynamic systems of “agile” teams to get work done. Teams are distributed, transient, and loosely bounded in service of responsiveness and innovation. The key to this new way of doing work is managing the networked ecosystem in... View Details
- October 2021
- Article
Overcoming the Cold Start Problem of CRM Using a Probabilistic Machine Learning Approach
By: Nicolas Padilla and Eva Ascarza
The success of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) programs ultimately depends on the firm's ability to understand consumers' preferences and precisely capture how these preferences may differ across customers. Only by understanding customer heterogeneity, firms can... View Details
- September 2021 (Revised December 2023)
- Case
On the Bubble: Startup Bootstrapping
By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang, Tom Quinn and Annelena Lobb
Bubble was a software company in the low-code/no-code market, making tools that allowed users without traditional programming backgrounds or technical skills to build software. The case covers cofounder Joshua Haas’s engineering background, as he experienced a high... View Details
Keywords: Business Startups; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; Business Plan; Disruption; Transformation; Trends; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Relationship Management; Cost vs Benefits; Decisions; Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Equity; Executive Compensation; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Disruptive Innovation; Technological Innovation; Job Interviews; Growth and Development Strategy; Ownership Stake; Opportunities; Applications and Software; Technology Adoption; Technology Industry; Web Services Industry; New York (city, NY); California; France
- September 2021 (Revised December 2021)
- Case
Telepass: From Tolling to Mobility Platform
By: Chiara Farronato, Stefano Denicolai and Sarah Mehta
Telepass, until very recently the sole processor of electronic toll payments on Italy’s highways, has ambitions beyond tolling. Since the mid-2010s, the company has been expanding into adjacent services. In 2017, Telepass launched TelepassPay—a mobile payment... View Details
Keywords: Mobile Payment; App; Mobility Services; Analysis; Change; Change Management; Transformation; Transition; Innovation and Invention; Strategy; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Transportation; Transportation Networks; Value; Value Creation; Consumer Behavior; Technology Industry; Transportation Industry; Insurance Industry; Europe; Italy; Milan
- September 2021 (Revised December 2021)
- Case
Telepass: From Tolling to Mobility Platform (Abridged)
By: Chiara Farronato, Stefano Denicolai and Sarah Mehta
Telepass, until very recently the sole processor of electronic toll payments on Italy’s highways, has ambitions beyond tolling. Since the mid-2010s, the company has been expanding into adjacent services. In 2017, Telepass launched TelepassPay—a mobile payment... View Details
Keywords: Mobile Payment; App; Mobility Services; Analysis; Change; Change Management; Transformation; Transition; Innovation and Invention; Strategy; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Transportation; Transportation Networks; Value; Value Creation; Technology Industry; Transportation Industry; Insurance Industry; Europe; Italy; Milan
- Article
Elevate Employees, Don't Eliminate Them
By: Ryan W. Buell
The last major global shock—the 2008 recession—led to what economists call a “jobless recovery” as companies found they could get by with fewer employees. But post-pandemic, the author writes, managers should focus on changing employees’ roles instead. He has five key... View Details
- Article
Unconscious Bias Training That Works
By: Francesca Gino and Katherine Coffman
To become more diverse, equitable, and inclusive, many companies have turned to unconscious bias (UB) training. By raising awareness of the mental shortcuts that lead to snap judgments—often based on race and gender—about people’s talents or character, it strives to... View Details
- August 2021
- Case
Orchadio's First Two Split Experiments
By: Iavor I. Bojinov, Marco Iansiti and David Lane
Orchadio, a direct-to-consumer grocery business, needs to conduct its first two A/B tests—one to evaluate the effectiveness and functioning of its newly redesigned website, and one to market-test four versions of a new banner for the website. To do so, it will rely on... View Details
Keywords: Information Management; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Resource Allocation; Marketing; Measurement and Metrics; Customization and Personalization; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Digital Platforms; Information Technology Industry; Food and Beverage Industry
- August 2021
- Case
Yummy: Delivering Value to Venezuela
By: Ayelet Israeli, Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago and Carla Larangeira
By June 2021, Yummy had become Venezuela’s first and largest food delivery app and last-mile logistics company. In Caracas, the nation’s capital, Yummy held a 55% market share, while operations in other cities had already started to take place, including in three of... View Details
- August 2021
- Case
Livongo: Scaling a Purpose-Driven Organization in Healthcare
By: Ranjay Gulati, Aseem Shukla and Reva Nohria
When seasoned entrepreneur Glen Tullman founded the chronic health care startup Livongo in 2014, it was personal. His son lived with diabetes, and Tullman knew firsthand how taxing it could be to manage such an unrelenting disease. Livongo set out to empower people... View Details
- August 2021
- Case
Mylestone: Can Multiple Pivots Preserve the Life of a Death Tech Startup?
By: Shikhar Ghosh and Marilyn Morgan Westner
Dave Balter and Jim Myers co-founded Mylestone, a death tech startup that applied technology to transform how grieving people memorialize the dead. The startup addressed a cultural problem and promised to solve a pressing need in the antiquated, multi-billion dollar... View Details
- August 2021 (Revised March 2022)
- Case
Camera IQ and the Metaverse: Building Augmented Reality Brand Experiences
By: Jill Avery and Rayan Nahas
Camera IQ, a camera marketing software company that empowered brands to create and launch augmented reality experiences (AREs) across social platforms, had just raised an additional $5 million to fund further product development and expand its marketing and sales... View Details
Keywords: Brand Management; Virtual Reality; Augmented Reality; B2B; Technology Platform; Marketing; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Digital Marketing; Internet and the Web; Growth Management; Customer Relationship Management; Customer Value and Value Chain; Social Media; E-commerce; Applications and Software; Digital Platforms; Advertising Industry; United States
- August 2021 (Revised November 2023)
- Supplement
Coats: Supply Chain Challenges
By: Willy C. Shih
Coats, the largest thread maker in the world, transformed its business to digital colour measurement so that it could respond better to customer demand in the garment industry for rapid product cycles and more fragmented colour choices. Its embrace of digital colour... View Details
- August 2021
- Supplement
Coats: Supply Chain Challenges: Spreadsheet Supplement
By: Willy C. Shih
Coats, the largest thread maker in the world, transformed its business to digital colour measurement so that it could respond better to customer demand in the garment industry for rapid product cycles and more fragmented colour choices. Its embrace of digital colour... View Details