Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(2,267)
- Faculty Publications (459)
- July 2014 (Revised December 2016)
- Case
EcoMotors International
By: John D. Macomber and Hermes Alvarez
Eco-Motors, funded in part by Khosla Ventures, has to decide how to go to market with a new technology for internal combustion engines for automotive and industrial use. The OPOC engine has opposed pistons and is a two-stroke engine, as compared to a more traditional... View Details
- June 2014
- Case
Making Progress at IDEO
By: Teresa M. Amabile and Katrina Flanagan
This case focuses on different types of client relationships at IDEO, the value of these relationships for IDEO and clients, and the implications for IDEO designers' everyday experience of work. As new types of client work have shifted away from the more classic design... View Details
- June 2014
- Case
Starbucks Coffee Company: Transformation and Renewal
By: Nancy F. Koehn, Kelly McNamara, Nora N. Khan and Elizabeth Legris
Starbucks Coffee Company: Transformation and Renewal analyzes the turnaround and reconstruction of Starbucks Coffee Company from 2008 to 2014 as led by CEO and co-founder Howard Schultz. The case offers executives and students an opportunity to examine in depth how... View Details
Keywords: Howard Schultz; Starbucks; Transformation; Turnaround; Change; Decision Making; Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development; Leadership; Organizations; Problems and Challenges; Risk and Uncertainty; Strategy; Value; Consumer Products Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Retail Industry; North and Central America; Europe; Asia; South America; Middle East; Latin America
- 22 May 2014
- Other Presentation
Inclusion of Small Business in Value Chains
Prerecorded CSV video played as part of the panel "Inclusion of small business in value chains - international experiences," Business Linkages conference. This event was hosted by the leading Brazilian small business development agency, Sebrae, on May 21 and May 22,... View Details
- 2014
- Other Teaching and Training Material
Marketing Reading: Brand Positioning
By: Jill Avery and Sunil Gupta
This Reading addresses the principles of brand positioning and demonstrates how companies can strategically craft powerful, resonant, and unique brand positions to help products stand out amidst the cacophony of the marketplace. Strategic brand positioning provides... View Details
Keywords: Brand Positioning; Branding; Consumer Research; Defensive Strategies; Market Positioning; Marketing; Product Differentiation; Product Positioning; Strategic Positioning; Value Proposition; Customer Relationship Management; Organizational Structure; Customer Satisfaction; Brands and Branding
- April 2014
- Article
The Limits of Scale: Companies That Get Big Fast Are Often Left Behind. Here's Why.
By: Hanna Halaburda and Felix Oberholzer-Gee
The value of many products and services rises or falls with the number of customers using them; the fewer fax machines in use, the less important it is to have one. These network effects influence consumer decisions and affect companies' ability to compete. Strategists... View Details
- March 2014
- Technical Note
Drivers of Value Creation
This note introduces a concise but comprehensive framework for analyzing value creation and value creation advantage, i.e., a firm's superior ability to increase the spread (or gap) between its offering's customer value (or WTP) and supplier cost (or WTS). (While the... View Details
- March 2014 (Revised January 2017)
- Case
From Beijing Jeep to ASC Fine Wines: The Story of an American Family Business in China
By: William C. Kirby and Erica M. Zendell
In 1985, Don St. Pierre Sr. became President of Beijing Jeep, the troubled joint venture between American Motor Corporation and the Chinese government to build Jeep Cherokees in China. Just over a decade later in 1996, leveraging contacts from his time in the... View Details
- October 2013 (Revised August 2015)
- Case
Outotec (A): Project Capture
By: Robert J. Dolan and Doug J. Chung
Outotec was a market leader in providing mining solutions to large mining companies. The company’s specialization and proprietary technology created value for its customers and helped the firm differentiate from its competitors. Yet, Outotec was not pricing or... View Details
- October 2013 (Revised August 2015)
- Supplement
Outotec (B): Action Plan
By: Robert J. Dolan and Doug J. Chung
Outotec was a market leader in providing mining solutions to large mining companies. The company’s specialization and proprietary technology created value for its customers and helped the firm differentiate from its competitors. Yet, Outotec was not pricing or... View Details
- 2013
- Tool
Harvard Business Review's Go to Market Tools: Customer Lifetime Value
By: Thomas Steenburgh and Jill Avery
How much are your customers worth? Has your marketing budget been slashed? Need to figure out the best place to invest your time and effort to reach your growth target? HBR's Go to Market Tool helps calculate your customer's lifetime value, allowing you to prioritize... View Details
- October 2013
- Article
The Strategy That Will Fix Health Care
By: Michael E. Porter and Thomas H. Lee
In health care, the days of business as usual are over. Around the world, every health care system is struggling with rising costs and uneven quality, despite the hard work of well-intentioned, well-trained clinicians. Health care leaders and policy makers have tried... View Details
- September 2013
- Teaching Note
Gary Hirshberg and Stonyfield Farm
By: Nancy F. Koehn and Nora N. Khan
Gary Hirshberg and Stonyfield Farm is the story of one entrepreneur's vision and journey to create a market-leading, environmentally responsible business founded on the principles of product quality, organizational alignment and sustainability. A former... View Details
- August 2013
- Article
Customer-Driven Misconduct: How Competition Corrupts Business Practices
By: Victor Manuel Bennett, Lamar Pierce, Jason A. Snyder and Michael W. Toffel
Competition among firms yields many benefits but can also encourage firms to engage in corrupt or unethical activities. We argue that competition can lead organizations to provide services that customers demand but that violate government regulations, especially when... View Details
- July–August 2013
- Article
A Joint Model of Usage and Churn in Contractual Settings
By: Eva Ascarza and Bruce G.S. Hardie
As firms become more customer-centric, concepts such as customer equity come to the fore. Any serious attempt to quantify customer equity requires modeling techniques that can provide accurate multiperiod forecasts of customer behavior. Although a number of researchers... View Details
- July–August 2013
- Article
Building Sustainable Cities
By: John D. Macomber
By 2050 the number of people living in cities will have nearly doubled, to 6 billion, and the problems created by this rampant urbanization are among the most important challenges of our time. Of all resource-management issues, the author argues, water, electricity,... View Details
- June 2013
- Case
Olympic Rent-A-Car U.S.: Customer Loyalty Battles
By: John Deighton and James T. Kindley
The marketing and operations managers for Olympic Rent-A-Car meet to decide how to respond to changes in the loyalty rewards program at the market-leading competitor. The competitor's program gives awards based on dollars spent instead of days rented and eliminates... View Details
- May 2013 (Revised May 2014)
- Case
Innovation at the Boston Consulting Group
By: Robert G. Eccles, Das Narayandas and Penelope Rossano
This case is about how the Boston Consulting Group has approached innovation from its founding to the present day. It discusses the role of the firm's talent market and client market in developing these innovations. View Details
Keywords: Innovation; Strategy Consulting; Professional Service Firm; Knowledge Management; Client Management; Product Development; Leadership; Customer Focus and Relationships; Customer Value and Value Chain; Independent Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Innovation Leadership; Innovation Strategy; Value Creation; Consulting Industry
- April 2013
- Article
Business Model Innovation and Competitive Imitation: The Case of Sponsor-Based Business Models
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Feng Zhu
This paper provides the first formal model of business model innovation. Our analysis focuses on sponsor-based business model innovations where a firm monetizes its product through sponsors rather than setting prices to its customer base. We analyze strategic... View Details
- April 2013 (Revised October 2013)
- Case
National Instruments
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Keri Pearlson and Natalie Kindred
This case explores the use of social media to support product design, customer support, marketing and HR activities at National Instruments (NI). Based in Austin, Texas, with over $1 billion in 2011 sales, NI designs, produces, and sells software and hardware platforms... View Details