Publications

11 Mar 2014
News

HBS Associate Professor Amy Cuddy Named Young Global Leader by World Economic Forum

May 2019
Case

Whiskey and Cheddar: Ingredient Branding at the Caesan Cheese Cooperative (Brief Case)

By: John A. Quelch and Katherine B. Hartman

The Caesan Cheese Cooperative is considering introducing a new high-quality, high-margin artisan whiskey cheddar cheese. Deidra Kelly, vice president of marketing and product development at Caesan, must recommend to the Board of Directors whether to launch the product... View Details

Keywords: Brands and Branding; Product Development; Management; Product Marketing; Product Positioning; Marketing Strategy; Partners and Partnerships; Food and Beverage Industry

November 2006 (Revised January 2007)
Case

Habitat for Humanity International in South Africa

By: Nicolas P. Retsinas, Arthur I Segel and Nelson Hioe

In March 2006, Larry English, Director of Program Design and Innovation for Habitat for Humanity International Africa and the Middle East, was reflecting on a large development project in Durbin that had stalled. Notwithstanding global attention led by former President... View Details

Keywords: Partners and Partnerships; Investment; Innovation Strategy; Emerging Markets; Social Entrepreneurship; Poverty; Property; Projects; South Africa; Middle East

September 2024 (Revised March 2025)
Supplement

Wemade: (Re)Establishing Trust in Blockchain Games (B)

By: Jung Koo Kang, Charles C.Y. Wang, David Allen and Kwangmoon So

This supplement reviews Wemade's efforts to rebuild confidence in its business after its WEMIX coin was delisted from the major South Korean cryptocurrency exchanges on December 8, 2022. It outlines Wemade's strategy of transparency, which included partnerships with... View Details

Keywords: Blockchain; Cryptocurrency; Crypto Economy; Accounting; Financial Reporting; Revenue Recognition; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Corporate Disclosure; Information Technology; Financial Markets; Governance; Accounting Industry; Video Game Industry; South Korea

08 Jan 2020
News

Unpacking Amazon’s Workforce Development Strategy

19 Nov 2013
News

Best Buy 3.0? The big box reinvented

May 2008 (Revised May 2008)
Case

Symyx Technologies, Inc.

By: H. Kent Bowen, Courtney Purrington and Thomas D. Perry

Symyx is a science-based company spun out of Berkeley. Its unique materials technology has been exploited for 10 years, but the company needs a new business model. The company concept required the invention of hardware and software to do high throughput materials... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Transition; Engineering; Technological Innovation; Resource Allocation; Product Development; Partners and Partnerships; Science-Based Business; Information Infrastructure; Applications and Software

Find at Harvard

April 2022 (Revised May 2022)
Case

Mastercard Labs (A) (Abridged)

By: Linda A. Hill, Sunil Gupta, Emily Tedards and Julia Kelley

When Ajaypal (Ajay) Banga became the CEO of Mastercard in 2010, he shifted the company’s competitive focus from card networks to cash itself. Mastercard’s new vision of a “World Beyond Cash” distilled into a three-pronged framework: Grow the core business, Diversify... View Details

08 Nov 2017
HBS Seminar

Elizabeth Lyons, UC San Diego School of Global Policy & Strategy

February 2023
Case

Roblox: Virtual Commerce in the Metaverse

By: Ayelet Israeli and Nicole Tempest Keller

In 2022, Roblox had 58.8 million daily active users, including over half of all children and teens under the age of 16 in the United States. Roblox, a free-to-use “co-experience platform”, allowed users to come together in immersive 3D experiences to socialize, work,... View Details

2017
Report

The Competitive Advantage of Racial Equity

By: Mark R. Kramer, Angela Glover Blackwell, Lalitha Vaidyanathan, Lakshmi Iyer and Josh Kirschenbaum

Corporate America is missing out on one of the biggest opportunities of our time for driving innovation and growth: creating business value by advancing racial equity.
Developed in partnership with PolicyLink and funded by the Ford and W.K. Kellogg foundations,... View Details

Keywords: Racial Equity; Diversity; Race; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Competitive Advantage; Value Creation

Register to Read

Marcus by Goldman Sachs marked a dramatic shift for the 150-year-old financial institution, which historically had served only businesses and the wealthiest people. The fintech startup operated within Goldman Sachs, offering unsecured personal loans for the mass... View Details

December 2017 (Revised April 2018)
Case

Area One Farms

By: Forest Reinhardt, Jose B. Alvarez and Annelena Lobb

In 2017, Joelle Faulkner, CEO of Area One Farms, a Canadian private-equity fund focused on investing in the best Canadian farms and helping them expand, considered the merits and disadvantages of expanding her business to the U.S. While the markets shared some... View Details

Keywords: Expansion; Decision Choices and Conditions; Private Equity; Canada; United States

2003
Case

Universitas 21 Global

By: Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble

In a move that could redefine the future of higher education, Thomson Learning, in partnership with a worldwide consortium of universities, created a new institution of higher education, Universitas 21 Global (U21G), that had no campus, and no classrooms. It existed... View Details

Keywords: Online Technology; Expansion; Higher Education; Education Industry

Read Now

August 1974 (Revised March 1986)
Case

Architects Collaborative, Inc.

Although internationally recognized for quality design, the collaborative's billings have been on a plateau for four years and they are losing jobs to architects with sophisticated marketing practices. The main issue is how marketing can be integrated into a design... View Details

Keywords: Design; Marketing Strategy; Creativity; Service Industry

2018
Working Paper

Conceptions of Ethics in the Cannabis Industry: The Case of Boston, MA

By: Kristin Sippl

Work in progress exploring the consumer demand for and conceptualizations of social, economic, and environmental ethics in the emerging cannabis industry, and the private sector’s and civil society’s response. Draws on interviews and fieldwork from Portland, OR,... View Details

Keywords: Cannabis Industry; Ethics; Demand and Consumers; Boston

Read Now

November 2019 (Revised December 2019)
Case

Marcus by Goldman Sachs

By: Rory McDonald, Samir Junnarkar and David Lane

Five years on from the 2008 financial crisis, Goldman Sachs remained wounded. Revenues at the global investment bank had stagnated below pre-crisis levels, and the firm had yet to rebound from a substantial decline in securities-trading revenues. Marcus by Goldman... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Banks and Banking; Innovation Leadership; Growth and Development Strategy; Growth Management; Organizational Culture; Financial Services Industry; United Kingdom

February 2004 (Revised April 2004)
Case

Orchid Partners: A Venture Capital Start-up

By: Myra M. Hart and Kristin Lieb

The development of a new venture partnership and the challenges associated with raising its first fund are chronicled. The decision to focus on early-stage investments, the determination of the appropriate size of the fund, the fund-raising process, and the steps in... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Venture Capital; Entrepreneurship; Problems and Challenges; Partners and Partnerships; Investment; Motivation and Incentives; Financing and Loans; Personal Development and Career