Publications

February 1996
Case

Spartan Stores Incorporated: Reengineering for Efficient Consumer Response

Describes an effort to rationalize operations at a leading grocery wholesaler, enabled by information systems. Spartan Stores, Inc., is cooperatively owned by its 238 retailers and, through training, consulting, systems support, and cost of goods efficiencies, strives... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Restructuring; Information Technology

October 2023
Supplement

Rheaply: Circularity For Every Business Supplement 2

By: Rembrand Koning and Alicia Dadlani

Pitch deck explaining the later vision of the company that was presented by the CEO to potential investors. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Social Entrepreneurship; Entrepreneurial Finance; Mission and Purpose; Technology Industry; Green Technology Industry; United States; Illinois; Chicago

01 Mar 2025
News

Heartland

Let me tell you what’s fantastic about offal.” Jordan Kraft Lambert (MBA 2016), Colorado State University’s first director of agricultural innovation, is a full-body talker, and the topic of organ meat has her fired up. The parts of the cow typically seen as... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; photos by Vance Jacobs. OPEN CONCEPT: Lambert at Quail Ridge Dairy in Fort Morgan, Colorado.

30 May 2000
Lessons from the Classroom

Entrepreneurship’s Wild Ride

entrepreneurial community's success has attracted capital on an unprecedented scale. The venture capital market and the market for initial public offerings have gone to unparalleled valuations. Perhaps most interesting, however, is the... View Details

Keywords: by William Mahoney

May 2008 (Revised March 2010)
Case

Palm (A): The Debate on Licensing Palm's OS (1997)

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Kevin Boudreau and Jordan Mitchell

This case series looks at three important inflection points in Palm's history that relate to decisions about its platform: when the company was debating whether to open its operating system (OS) for licensing to third-party hardware manufacturers; 2001, when the... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Debates; Decisions; Innovation and Invention; Product Launch; Production; Competition; Value Creation; Information Technology Industry

August 2001 (Revised June 2002)
Case

IBM Software Solutions (A)

By: Michael L. Tushman, Charles A. O'Reilly III and Robert Chapman Wood

Executives and managers of key IBM software units struggle to make IBM a top player in the post-mainframe era. When one software unit introduces a visionary product with potential to create a new leadership position for the firm, the result is an epic conflict in the... View Details

Keywords: Business Units; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Managerial Roles; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Conflict Management; Information Technology Industry

January 2017 (Revised August 2019)
Supplement

X Fire Paintball & Airsoft: Is Amazon a Friend or Foe? (B)

By: Feng Zhu and Angela Acocella

Three years after launching his brick-and-mortar store, X Fire Paintball and Airsoft, Steve Herbert Sr. and his sons began selling products on Amazon.com’s third-party Marketplace and online sales expanded rapidly. Over time, X Fire noticed that products of which it... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Competition; Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Small Business; Retail Industry; Canada

08 Jan 2016
News

Investing in Sustainability

to produce food. Less typical among nonprofits is Sustainable America’s investment philosophy. The organization makes direct investments in new technologies that reduce the demand for oil and increase the food supply. Tiller is a fervent... View Details

Keywords: April White; Agriculture

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

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

Web

Educating Leaders - Georges F. Doriot:Educating Leaders, Building Companies, Baker Library, Harvard Business School

Home Site map Map / Directions Search: General Information HBS Home About Annual Report Campus Commencement Dean Nohria Employment Fifty Years of Women Give News New Construction Academic Programs Doctoral Programs Executive Education MBA Summer View Details

August 1998 (Revised June 2000)
Case

FairMarket, Inc.: Where Buyers and Sellers Connect

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Jack Wieland and Chad M. M Raube

On February 20, 1997, FairMarket, an Internet-based business-to-business auction site, was launched. CEO, founder Scott Randall, drew on his experience building Internet businesses at NECX Direct, Yahoo, and Internet Shopping Network to build his business. This case,... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Debates; Entrepreneurship; Growth and Development; Growth Management; Management Style; Product Launch; Multi-Sided Platforms; Problems and Challenges; Information Technology; Information Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry

April 2000 (Revised June 2000)
Case

Everdream

Silicon Valley start-up Everdream wants to turn the provision of PCs to small business into a turnkey service including excellent 24/7 support. This case explores what this will take by focusing on the question of what, if anything, Everdream can guarantee. View Details

Keywords: Service Delivery; Information Infrastructure; Business Startups; Computer Industry; Service Industry; California

fall 2002
Article

The Impact of Internet Exchanges on Business-to-Business Distribution

By: Narakesari Narayandas, Mary N. Caravella and John Deighton

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Communication; Business Ventures; Distribution

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

Web

Archival Collections - Georges F. Doriot : Educating Leaders, Building Companies, Baker Library, Harvard Business School

Home Site map Map / Directions Search: General Information HBS Home About Annual Report Campus Commencement Dean Nohria Employment Fifty Years of Women Give News New Construction Academic Programs Doctoral Programs Executive Education MBA Summer View Details

July 2019
Case

Autonomous Vehicles: Smooth or Bumpy Ride Ahead?

By: Elie Ofek and Akhil Waghmare

In early 2019, transportation was set to undergo a major transformation with the advent of autonomous vehicles (AVs), also referred to as driverless cars, which were nearing completion from an R&D and testing phase. Yet many questions remained open regarding exactly... View Details

Keywords: Transportation; Technological Innovation; Disruptive Innovation; Transformation; Technology Adoption; Business Model; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Transportation Industry; Auto Industry

08 Jan 2008
First Look

First Look: January 8, 2008

one order and return them in the reverse order when should DVDs (e.g., documentaries) are rented before want DVDs (e.g., action films). This effect is sizeable in magnitude, with a one standard deviation change in the difference between sequentially rented films'... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

December 1999
Case

Sun Microsystems, Inc. (A1): "Dot-comming" the World: Philip Nenon on a Billion Dollar Bet

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Jane Roessner

A group at Sun Microsystems, Inc. proposed that a recent acquisition that made fault-tolerant computers for telecommunications was a major opportunity for Sun. If the board provided funding to expand the acquisition's portfolio of products and make them part of the... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Governing and Advisory Boards; Motivation and Incentives; Expansion; Technology Industry