Publications

23 Jan 2008
First Look

First Look: January 23, 2008

Both offered equal levels of financial support to donating parties. Eighty donations and 120 specimen shipping invoices from 2005 were analyzed in each program. Donations to the two programs did not significantly differ in terms of... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

26 Jul 2004
Research & Ideas

A Better Way to Negotiate: Backward

Perlman knew that, while VCs might have been willing to make small investments in his new firm, they were, at the time, quite wary of making major financial commitments to consumer electronics plays such as WebTV. To better understand the... View Details

Keywords: by James K. Sebenius

29 Mar 2016
First Look

March 29, 2016

paper prices necessitated the development of a comprehensive financial plan to relieve the financial pressures on Stone. Among the alternatives to be considered are straight debt, convertible debt, and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

15 Sep 2014
Research & Ideas

Are the Most Talented Employees the Highest Paid? Yes—If They’re Bankers

sectors such as the oil or chemistry industry. In 2011, even in the wake of the financial crisis, "returns to talent" were three times higher in the finance industry than in the economy as a whole. (This held true even in cases where the... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Banking

23 Aug 2004
Research & Ideas

Strategy for Small Fish

started developing them have ceased to exist as independent entities. In those cases in which the skills and capabilities that characterized new ecosystem domains were distinct enough to justify a truly focused strategy (for example, personal View Details

Keywords: by Marco Iansiti & Roy Levien

06 Jun 2005
Research & Ideas

Microsoft vs. Open Source: Who Will Win?

it), the development cycle is significantly shorter. Proponents of OSS claim that if this demand-side learning (as we call it) is sufficiently strong, OSS will oust traditional software. In addition, software engineers claim that the... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Technology

08 Apr 2014
First Look

First Look: April 8

August 2013 MIT Sloan Management Review The High Price of Customer Satisfaction By: Keiningham, Timothy, Sunil Gupta, Lerzan Aksoy, and Alexander Buoye Abstract—Managers often assume that improving customer satisfaction and financial... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

December 2003 (Revised October 2014)
Case

Alusaf Hillside Project

By: Kenneth S. Corts and John R. Wells

The aluminum industry has suffered from long periods of depressed prices and profits interspersed with relatively short-lived price and profit peaks. The case investigates why this has occured, focusing on the decision Alusaf must make on whether to invest in a major... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Business Cycles; Financial Crisis; Metals and Minerals; Financial Strategy; Investment; Price; Profit; Demand and Consumers; Industry Structures

August 2014 (Revised March 2015)
Case

Molycorp: Issuing the 'Happy Meal' Securities (B)

By: Benjamin C. Esty and E. Scott Mayfield

Molycorp, the Western hemisphere's only producer of rare earth minerals, was in the middle of a $1 billion capital expansion in its effort to become a vertically integrated supplier of rare earth minerals, oxides, and metals. After reporting lower than expected... View Details

December 2021 (Revised January 2023)
Supplement

Katerra (B)

By: Lindsay N. Hyde, Thomas R. Eisenmann and Tom Quinn

In May 2020, SoftBank executives, having invested nearly $2 billion in Katerra, decided the vision of an end-to-end, vertically-integrated construction process was worth saving—with some major changes to company structure. The SoftBank Vision Fund invested $200 million... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Failure; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Entrepreneurship; Construction; Real Estate Industry; Construction Industry; Technology Industry; United States

February 2006 (Revised August 2006)
Case

Kevin McCarthy and Westlake Chemical Corporation (A)

Examines forecasting earnings/performance for a commodity chemical firm during a period of high uncertainty, highlighting the combined effects of input process (natural gas), industry capacity/utilization, and cyclicality. Assuming the role of Kevin McCarthy (the top... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Futures and Commodity Futures; Forecasting and Prediction; Chemicals; Chemical Industry

01 May 2000
What Do You Think?

Can You Hard-Wire Performance?

Can you design processes to reflect the promises implicit in hard-wiring?; (4) Do you have the people, incentives, and technology to deliver on the promise?; (5) Are you big enough?; (6) Do you have the financial capability to protect... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

December 2000 (Revised March 2003)
Case

Machinery International (B)

By: David F. Hawkins

An assistant is asked to prepare illustrative derivative and hedge accounting examples for the audit committee. Students are required to complete the examples. Teaching Purpose: Introduces students to the basics of derivative and hedge accounting. View Details

Keywords: Accounting Audits; Machinery and Machining; Activity Based Costing and Management; Currency; Cost Management; Financial Statements; Construction Industry; Accounting Industry; United States

November 1994 (Revised November 1994)
Case

MW Petroleum Corporation (A)

By: Timothy A. Luehrman, Peter Tufano and Barbara Wall

Amoco Corp. is negotiating to sell a wholly-owned subsidiary, MW Petroleum, to Apache Corp. MW owns large reserves of oil and gas comprising many properties at different stages of engineering, development, and production. The proposed acquisition is a large one for... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Business Subsidiaries; Mining; Cash Flow; Stock Options; Financing and Loans; Price; Negotiation; Production; Valuation; Mining Industry

September 2024
Case

TechEnergy Ventures: Innovating Through Corporate Venture Capital

By: Rebecca Karp and Lena Duchene

This case examines TechEnergy Ventures, the corporate venture capital (CVC) arm of the Techint Group, and its role in scaling innovation within the energy sector. Founded in 2021, TechEnergy Ventures operates with a mandate to invest in disruptive technologies to... View Details