Publications

October 2018
Case

SeatGeek

By: Robert F. Higgins and Sarah Mehta

In late 2016, Russ D'Souza and Jack Groetzinger, co-founders of the online event ticketing platform SeatGeek, faced some difficult decisions. In the company's seven-year history, SeatGeek had positioned itself primarily as an aggregator, facilitating ticket... View Details

Keywords: Event Ticketing; Sports Ticketing; Acquisition; Business Model; Decision Making; Cost vs Benefits; Digital Platforms; Sports; Strategy; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Digital Platforms

January 1983 (Revised August 1988)
Case

Universal Robotics Corp.

Three former classmates are founding a company to design, develop, manufacture, and market industrial robots. Principal issues involve the sources, amount, and form of outside investment, the allocation of equity, and the terms and conditions under which outside funds... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Business Startups; Corporate Finance; Technology Industry; Technology Industry

October 2018
Case

American Family Insurance and the Artificial Intelligence Opportunity

By: Rajiv Lal and Scott Johnson

Smith made sweeping changes at the auto giant, which had become complacent in its success and was losing share to foreign imports. Smith instituted a barrage of controversial changes at GM that included forming strategic joint ventures... View Details

Keywords: Automotive & Aerospace

October 2017 (Revised April 2024)
Case

Snap Inc. Goes Public (A)

By: Lynn Sharp Paine and Will Hurwitz

Snap Inc.’s chairman must decide how to address investor concerns about the company’s unprecedented plans to issue only non-voting shares in its upcoming IPO. The case is set in early 2017 following the public availability of Snap’s IPO filing with the U.S. Securities... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Capital Structure; Corporate Accountability; Governing and Advisory Boards; Corporate Governance; Going Public; Business and Shareholder Relations; Leadership; Management; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Venture Capital; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; United States; California

01 Apr 2001
News

Edwin Yu: Bidding on the Future

went from leading portal to overextended venture incubator in just one year. The founder and owner was removed, and Yu, 36, was left to pick up the pieces. As chairman and CEO, he is now restructuring and refocusing the company to be a... View Details

Keywords: Alejandro Reyes; Telecommunications; Information

April 2005 (Revised June 2006)
Case

Yahoo! Messenger: Network Integration

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Alison Berkley Wagonfeld

Describes Yahoo!'s management of the launch of version 6.0 of its Instant Messenger (IM) product, which incorporates features from 12 other Yahoo! properties, including Search, Music, Games, Photos, Personals, News, and Shopping. The integration of features from so... View Details

Keywords: Integration; Business Units; Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Competitive Advantage; Information Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry; United States

19 Feb 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, February 19, 2019

risks yet to be identified. Purchase this case: https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/product/119045-PDF-ENG Harvard Business School Case 818-116 1366 Technologies: Scaling the Venture (B) It was March 2018.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

15 May 2023
News

From Scientist to Business Leader

tuberculosis. After several years working in the lab, Kim began to wonder if she was in the right role. Then COVID hit, and demand for the company’s products surged. “My CEO asked if I could step away from the bench into a business operations role, because we were... View Details

Career Coach

Mo Fong

Mo Fong (HBS ‘02, Stanford ‘95 ChemE, ‘96 MA Education ) Mo is currently the Executive Director at Stanford Technology Ventures Program in the School of Management and Engineering focusing on... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Technology; Technology; Technology; Technology; Technology; Technology; Technology

Fast Answer

Workplace Diversity: Data Sources

Gender Equality. Associations & Organizations AllRaise.org An organization supporting non-binary and women founders and funders in the technology space. They create an annual report tracking diversity in View Details

Web

Blog | Social Enterprise | Harvard Business School

Curriculum Social Enterprise Student Club Social Entrepreneurship Summer Fellows Technology for Good Transformative Impact Tri-Sector Impact HBS Announces 2020 Goldsmith Fellows 02 Sep 2020 Harvard Business School (HBS) has announced the... View Details

01 Mar 2010
News

How to Spur Prosperity

Dreams: Why Public Efforts to Boost Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Have Failed — and What to Do about It (Princeton University Press), HBS finance and entrepreneurial management expert Josh Lerner offers a timely look at what works... View Details

Keywords: Deborah Blagg; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services; Administration of Economic Programs; Government

April 2025
Case

Salesforce Agentforce: The Limitless Workforce

By: Suraj Srinivasan, Allison Ciechanover and George Gonzalez

In early 2025, Salesforce was a global leader in cloud-based enterprise software, best known for pioneering customer relationship management (CRM) delivered as a service. Over the past two decades, the company had expanded into marketing, customer service, analytics,... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customer Relationship Management; Price; AI and Machine Learning; Technology Adoption; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Sales; Business Strategy; Ethics; Product Launch; Technology Industry; United States

November 2014 (Revised February 2016)
Case

DoubleDutch

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Matthew G. Preble

Lawrence Coburn and Pankaj Prasad, co-founders of the event solution startup DoubleDutch, have to make a significant decision about their young company's sales function. DoubleDutch's key product was a mobile application (app) and event management platform that... View Details

Keywords: Sales Management; Selling; Marketing Management; Strategy Implementation; Business Marketing; Sales Force Management; Salesforce Management; Marketing; Sales; Marketing Strategy; Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Technology Industry; United States; Europe; Asia

01 Apr 1999
News

Q & A: Confronting New Technologies: When Doing Right Is Wrong

corporate radar. Interestingly, some venture capital firms have revisited their prior investments and confirmed that those involving disruptive rather than sustaining technologies proved far more profitable... View Details

30 Nov 2021
Interview

TikTok: Super App or Supernova?

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Brian Kenny

TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, was launched in 2012 around the simple idea of helping users entertain themselves on their smartphones while on the Beijing Subway. By May 2020, TikTok operated in 155 countries and had roughly 1 billion monthly active users, placing... View Details

Keywords: Apps; Artificial Intelligence; Business Startups; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Business Model; Digital Platforms; Growth and Development Strategy; AI and Machine Learning; Social Media