Publications

March 2023
Case

Mirakl: Growing The Marketplace Economy

By: Antonio Moreno, Santiago Gallino and Emilie Billaud

Mirakl provided the technology and seller network required for companies like Macy's, Best Buy, Walmart, Siemens, or Carrefour to simply design, launch, and administer a marketplace that included products from third-party sellers. What began as a basic business idea in... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Transformation; Technological Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Internet and the Web; Technology Adoption; Sales; Information Technology Industry; Retail Industry; Web Services Industry; Europe; France; Paris; United States

October 1990 (Revised March 1998)
Case

De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd. (A)

Describes the problems facing De Beers at the start of 1983. De Beers had, since its formation in 1888, exercised a large measure of control over the world supply of diamonds. In 1983, the company itself mined over 40% of the world's natural diamonds and, through... View Details

Keywords: Industry Structures; Crisis Management; Business Strategy; Mining; Mining Industry

November 2011
Article

Social Strategies That Work

By: Mikolaj Jan Piskorski

Although most companies have collected lots of friends and followers on social platforms such as Facebook, few have succeeded in generating profits there. That's because they merely port their digital strategies into social environments by broadcasting their commercial... View Details

Keywords: Social Platforms; Social Strategies; Social and Collaborative Networks; Customers; Relationships; Business Strategy; Profit

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20 Mar 2020
News

How grocery stores restock shelves in the age of coronavirus

11 Feb 2013
News

Ten Questions: Cynthia Montgomery

October 2018 (Revised August 2023)
Case

Safecast: Bootstrapping Human Capital to Big Data

By: Ethan Bernstein and Stephanie Marton

On March 11, 2011, at 2:46pm, a 9.1-on-the-Richter-scale, six-minute long earthquake unleashed a tsunami that ravaged the Tohoku region of Japan, damaging the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power facility and releasing sufficient radioactive material into the air and ocean... View Details

December 2014 (Revised August 2015)
Case

Muñoz Group: Sustaining Global Vertical Integration Through Innovation

By: Jose B. Alvarez and Annelena Lobb

Muñoz Group, which supplied supermarket chains and food distribution chains around the world with fruit, flowers, juice and ice cream, was at a strategic crossroads in 2014. CEO Alvaro Muñoz had to choose the best way to achieve profit goals and provide his company... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Supply Chain; Retail; Agribusiness Industry; Globalized Firms and Management; Supply Chain Management; Competitive Advantage; Vertical Integration; Profit; Innovation and Invention; Retail Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; North and Central America

June 1981 (Revised May 1988)
Case

L.L. Bean, Inc.: Corporate Strategy

By: Hirotaka Takeuchi

L.L. Bean, Inc., a Maine-based manufacturer and mail-order retailer of sporting goods and apparel, has grown from $3 million in sales (1967) to over $120 million (1980). Current projections predict an annual compounded growth of 25% through 1985. Management must decide... View Details

Keywords: Globalization; Growth and Development; Growth Management; Production; Quality; Sales; Situation or Environment; Corporate Strategy; Internet and the Web; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Retail Industry

12 Nov 2015
News

Airbnb Pledges to Work With Cities and Pay ‘Fair Share’ of Taxes

November 2007
Article

Solve the Succession Crisis by Growing Inside-Outside Leaders

By: Joseph L. Bower

This article includes a one-page preview that quickly summarizes the key ideas and provides an overview of how the concepts work in practice along with suggestions for further reading. In his interviews and data analysis, Harvard Business School professor Bower found... View Details

Keywords: Talent and Talent Management; Leadership Development; Management Practices and Processes; Management Succession; Planning

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February 2018
Case

Montes Calcados: A Step Ahead

By: James L. Heskett and James T. Kindley

Montes Calçados (MC) is a well-known "fast-fashion" Brazilian manufacturer of casual, but fashionable, shoes for women aged 18–35 in major cities worldwide. To boost its declining revenues, MC must evaluate two growth options: whether to expand distribution online (at... View Details

Keywords: Brands and Branding; Distribution Channels; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Global Range; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Retail Industry

Ashish Nanda is Senior Lecturer and C. Roland Christensen Distinguished Management Educator at Harvard Business School. From 2018 to 2021, he was course head for the MBA Required Curriculum course in Strategy. Beginning in 2022, he is teaching an MBA Elective... View Details

January 2013 (Revised March 2017)
Case

CloudFlare, Inc.: Running Hot?

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Alex Godden

In July 2012, the cofounders of CloudFlare, a Silicon Valley startup that protects websites and accelerates their traffic, are considering the implications of five employees' resignations over the prior three months. Was this natural attrition for a high-tech venture... View Details

Keywords: Management Practices and Processes; Employee Relationship Management; Organizational Structure; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Growth Management; Internet and the Web; Entrepreneurship; Resignation and Termination; Business Startups; Information Technology Industry; Web Services Industry; California

December 2002
Other Article

The Competitive Advantage of Corporate Philanthropy

By: Michael E. Porter and Mark R. Kramer

When it comes to philanthropy, executives increasingly see themselves as caught between critics demanding ever higher levels of "corporate social responsibility" and investors applying pressure to maximize short-term profits. Increasingly, philanthropy is used as a... View Details

Keywords: Strategy

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March 1994
Case

Bose Corp.: The JIT II Program (A)

By: Roy D. Shapiro and Bruce Isaacson

Bose Corp. is evaluating an unusual plan to manage relationships with vendors that supply components for Bose speakers. The company must decide: 1) which planning and ordering activities should be performed by Bose and which can be performed by vendors, 2) how much... View Details

Keywords: Supply Chain Management; Planning; Production; Alliances; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Electronics Industry

03 Apr 2020
News

The Lessons We Choose

October 2004 (Revised April 2005)
Case

Lexar Media: The Digital Photography Company?

Examines growth options for a start-up that has parlayed its core technology in flash memory controllers into a rapidly growing position in the emerging digital photography industry. The new CEO must decide whether LexarMedia should maintain its identity as a digital... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Growth Management; Market Entry and Exit; Business Startups; Business Strategy; Technology Industry