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February 2010
Case

Corporate Strategy at Berkshire Partners

By: Julie M. Wulf and Scott Waggoner

The managing directors of Berkshire Partners, a mid-sized private equity firm, address strategic and organizational challenges in response to turbulent market conditions, rapid firm growth, and the transition of leadership from its founding partners to the next... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Management Teams; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Competitive Advantage; Corporate Strategy; Financial Services Industry; Boston

22 Mar 2024
Research & Ideas

Open Source Software: The $9 Trillion Resource Companies Take for Granted

figure. Without open source software and their ubiquitous code-creation networks, firms would pay an estimated 3.5 times more to build the software and platforms that run their businesses, or roughly $8.8 trillion, say Harvard Business... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Computer; Information Technology; Technology

September 2018 (Revised August 2021)
Teaching Note

Blackstone at Age 30 and Blackstone at 35

By: Josh Lerner

This teaching note is meant to guide in the instruction of HBS No. 316-013 "Blackstone at 30" case. It examines the process of institutionalization and scaling in private equity and alternative investments more generally, looking specifically at how Blackstone's size... View Details

Keywords: Finance; Blackstone; Alternative Assets; Venture Capital; Private Equity; Business Growth and Maturation; Public Ownership; Cost vs Benefits; Financial Services Industry

August 2007 (Revised February 2008)
Case

Pinnacle Ventures

By: Michael J. Roberts, William A. Sahlman and Elizabeth Kind

Describes a prospective "venture debt" loan to a new venture from the perspective of Patrick Lee, a principal at Pinnacle Ventures. Forces students to grapple with the nature of financial risk in the start-up firm and assess the prospective risks and returns to a... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Venture Capital; Investment Return; Business Startups; Financial Services Industry

March 2009 (Revised November 2009)
Case

WL Ross and Plascar

By: C. Fritz Foley and Linnea Meyer

How can distressed investors take advantage of the procedures governing an international bankruptcy? Wilbur L. Ross, chairman and CEO of the private equity firm WL Ross & Co., LLC, has the opportunity to bid for debt and equity claims on Plascar Industria e Comercio... View Details

Keywords: Borrowing and Debt; Private Equity; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Investment; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Globalized Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries

22 Mar 2022
Cold Call Podcast

How Etsy Found Its Purpose and Crafted a Turnaround

Keywords: Re: Ranjay Gulati; Technology; Retail

December 2019 (Revised December 2022)
Case

TXU (A): Powering the Largest Leveraged Buyout in History

By: Trevor Fetter, Erik Snowberg and Rebecca M. Henderson

This case is designed to support a lively discussion about the relative merits of shareholder vs. stakeholder perspectives in the context of a company that provides a vital public service that has important environmental implications. The 2007 purchase of TXU, the... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Transformation; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Environmental Sustainability; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Energy Generation; Non-Renewable Energy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Utilities Industry; Energy Industry; Texas

August 2023
Teaching Note

Kunshan, Incorporated: The Making of China’s Richest Town

By: William C. Kirby and Noah B. Truwit

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 313-103. The case is designed to give the students an understanding of the local Chinese entrepreneurial state and how foreign and Chinese firms have worked with it to create China’s richest small city. The major themes are—local state... View Details

Keywords: Higher Education; Entrepreneurship; Economic Growth; Economic Systems; Business and Government Relations; Development Economics; China

14 Aug 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Insider Trading Preceding Goodwill Impairments

Keywords: by Karl A. Muller III, Monica Neamtiu & Edward J. Riedl

Research Summary

Current research

Professor Pomeranz's research is situated at the intersection of development economics and public finance. Her current work focuses in particular on corporate taxation and public procurement, the two key ways in which government finance affects firms and entrepreneurs.... View Details

2010
Working Paper

Boundary Spanning in a For-profit Research Lab: An Exploration of the Interface Between Commerce and Academe

By: Christopher C. Liu and Toby E. Stuart

In innovative industries, private-sector companies increasingly are participants in open communities of science and technology. To participate in the system of exchange in such communities, firms often publicly disclose what would otherwise remain private discoveries.... View Details

Keywords: For-Profit Firms; Higher Education; Information Publishing; Innovation and Invention; Science-Based Business; Social and Collaborative Networks; Boundaries; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

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August 1998
Case

Record Masters

By: William A. Sahlman, Michael J. Roberts and Laurence E. Katz

Kent Dauten, a former general partner at the Chicago private equity firm of Madison Dearborn Partners, has engaged in a search to personally sponsor a buyout in which he can play an active management role. He has received a selling memorandum for Record Masters, a... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Leveraged Buyouts; Valuation; Negotiation Deal; Investment

2023
Working Paper

State Employment as a Strategy of Autocratic Control in China

By: Jaya Y. Wen

This paper presents evidence that autocrats use state-owned firms to strategically pacify social unrest via employment provision, a role that may contribute to their favorable treatment and persistence across settings. I use variation in a regional conflict between... View Details

Keywords: State Ownership; Employment; Government and Politics; Conflict Management; China

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01 Apr 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Opting Out of Good Governance

Keywords: by C. Fritz Foley, Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham, Jonathan Greenstein & Eric Zwick

July 2005 (Revised October 2006)
Case

Global Fun: The Internationalization of Theme Parks

By: Geoffrey G. Jones and Steven Shaheen

A fictitious private equity firm considers whether to buy the international theme park business of the LEGO Group. Considers the origins of theme parks in the United States; the international expansion of Disney theme parks to Tokyo and Paris since the 1970s; and the... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Globalized Markets and Industries; Globalized Firms and Management; Global Strategy; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Germany; Tokyo; Great Britain; Denmark; United States; Paris

2009
Other Unpublished Work

Bridge Building in Venture Capital-Backed Acquisitions

By: Paul A. Gompers and Yuhai Xuan

We study the role of common venture capital investors in alleviating asymmetric information between public acquirers and private venture capital-backed targets. We find that acquisition announcement returns are more positive for acquisitions in which both the target... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Venture Capital; Private Equity; Knowledge Sharing; Market Transactions

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2006
Working Paper

Too Motivated?

By: Eric J. Van den Steen

I show that an agent's motivation to do well (objectively) may be unambiguously bad in a world with differing priors, i.e., when people openly disagree on the optimal course of action. The reason is that an agent who is strongly motivated is more likely to follow... View Details

Keywords: Governance Controls; Employees; Wages; Measurement and Metrics; Outcome or Result; Performance; Agency Theory; Motivation and Incentives

SSRN

2012
Chapter

The Small Worlds of Business Groups: Liberalization and Network Dynamics

By: Jon Brookfield, Sea-Jin Chang, Israel Drori, Shmuel Ellis, Sergio G. Lazzarini, Jordan I. Siegel and Juan Pablo von Bernath Bardina

Using comparative data from six major emerging economies — Brazil, Chile, Israel, Mexico, South Korea, and Taiwan — we examine how ownership networks in those societies responded to a roughly similar “ structural break ” of economic liberalization during the 1990s... View Details

Keywords: Emerging Economies; Ownership; Corporate Governance; Emerging Markets