Publications

March 2000 (Revised April 2001)
Case

eFrenzy, Inc. (A)

By: Marco Iansiti and Nicole Tempest

Details how to design, launch, and scale a rapidly growing Internet venture. Focuses on the challenges and opportunities involved in leveraging a network of partners. View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Business Growth and Maturation; Internet and the Web; Product Development; Business or Company Management; Problems and Challenges; Information Technology Industry; United States

Web

2024 Reunion Presentations - Alumni

operating architecture, redefining how they create, capture, share, and deliver value. Professor Karim Lakhani discusses how reinventing the firm around data, analytics, and AI removes traditional... View Details

01 Jun 2012
News

Made in the USA

Jim Knott's Aquamesh lobster traps set a new standard for durability, quickly supplanting the wooden traps used by generations of lobstermen. Chinese knockoffs failed to match Aquamesh's patented process. Will business leaders reconnect... View Details

Keywords: Blagg, Deborah; cheese; lobster fishing; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping; Fishing, Hunting and Trapping

January 2006
Case

Jack Strang at SequenceLabs

By: Mukti Khaire, John J. Gabarro and Lynda M. Applegate

How can entrepreneur manage his firm if things go wrong despite having a great idea, a solid team, and financial backing? Jack Strang founded a biotech firm with his friend Peter Evans, to develop molecular pathway-based "cures" for metabolic disorders. The idea was... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Business or Company Management; Venture Capital; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Business Growth and Maturation; Failure; Biotechnology Industry

June 2001 (Revised May 2002)
Case

Spir-It, Inc. (B): Managing People

When Jack Sindler founded Spir-it, Inc. in 1934, he was the company's sole employee. By 1999, Sindler's firm more than survived its first 55 years. Employment was up to nearly 200, with facilities in two states and work done in three shifts. The product line--which had... View Details

Keywords: Growth Management; Production; Business Growth and Maturation; Interpersonal Communication; Logistics; Human Resources; Diversity Characteristics; Manufacturing Industry

February 2008
Article

The Founder's Dilemma

By: Noam Wasserman

Most entrepreneurs want to make a lot of money and to run the show. New research shows that it's tough to do both. If you don't figure out which matters more to you, you could end up being neither rich nor king. View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Entrepreneurship; Profit; Growth and Development Strategy; Managerial Roles

September 2008 (Revised June 2013)
Case

Odyssey Healthcare

By: Robert F. Higgins, Virginia Fuller and Umer Raffat

In January 2001, Dick Burnham, CEO of Odyssey Healthcare, and Odyssey's Board of Directors were considering selling the hospice care company to a larger provider or making an initial public offering (IPO). With 38 hospice locations in 21 states, Odyssey had been... View Details

Keywords: Liquidity; Venture Creation/development; Hospice; Venture Capital; Financial Liquidity; Business Exit or Shutdown; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Plan; Entrepreneurship; Health Industry; United States

17 Jan 2012
First Look

First Look: January 17

PublicationsUncommon Service: How to Win by Putting Customers at the Core of Your Business Authors:Frances Frei and Anne Morriss Publication:Harvard Business Review Press,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

August 1998
Case

HIMSCORP, Inc.

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

Himscorp is an industry consolidation of records storage companies providing management and retrieval services of active medical records to healthcare institutions. Kent Dauten, a former general partner at Madison Dearborn Partners with 15 years of venture capital and... View Details

Keywords: Value Creation; Initial Public Offering; Business Exit or Shutdown; Business Growth and Maturation; Decision Choices and Conditions; Consolidation; Information Industry

October 1996 (Revised April 2004)
Case

Eric Wood (A)

By: Myra M. Hart

Describes the early career of an MBA who went to work in a small business, bought the company, and is now contemplating an acquisition to expand the business. The issues involve personal/business finance and financial risk, as well as valuation and financial... View Details

Keywords: Personal Development and Career; Business Growth and Maturation; Mergers and Acquisitions; Risk and Uncertainty

15 Dec 2015
First Look

December 15, 2015

monetary rewards are at stake (Study 3). The tendency to infer dislike from dissimilarity is driven by a belief that others have a narrow and homogeneous range of preferences (Study 5). Publisher's link:... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

October 1993 (Revised September 1996)
Case

BANC ONE - 1993

By: Hugo Uyterhoeven and Myra M. Hart

From a small local bank, Banc One has grown to one of the largest and most profitable banks in the United States under the leadership of its CEO, John B. McCoy. It has an impressive track record of improving the performance of its acquisitions while retaining the... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Acquisition; Organizational Culture; Policy; Adaptation; Business Growth and Maturation; Strategy; Performance Improvement; Industry Structures; Banking Industry; United States

November 2000 (Revised December 2001)
Case

iSteelAsia (A)

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Pamela A. Yatsko

The chairman of a Hong Kong-based steel distributor starts an online Asian steel trading portal and contemplates different paths to profitability and growth. Barriers include industrial culture, weakened markets in the spring of 2000, and vulnerability to takeover by... View Details

Keywords: Commercialization; Distribution Channels; Business Growth and Maturation; Horizontal Integration; Transformation; Corporate Strategy; Business Strategy; Mergers and Acquisitions; Steel Industry; Hong Kong

September 1996 (Revised June 1998)
Case

InterSoft of Argentina (A)

By: Linda A. Hill and Stacy Palestrant

Focuses on InterSoft of Argentina, a growing software company in Argentina. In 1993, InterSoft acquires a Russian software company and Emilo Lopez, the vice president and director of InterSoft's Systems Software Lab, must manage a creative, cross-cultural, "virtual"... View Details

Keywords: Applications and Software; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Business Growth and Maturation; Mergers and Acquisitions; Management Teams; Groups and Teams; Partners and Partnerships; Information Technology Industry; Argentina; Russia

July 2005 (Revised July 2016)
Case

Sanford C. Bernstein: Growing Pains (Abridged)

By: Boris Groysberg and Anahita Hashemi

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation

December 1980 (Revised October 1993)
Case

National Expansion at Neiman Marcus

By: Robert G. Eccles Jr.

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Retail Industry

February 2008 (Revised March 2011)
Case

Sandhar Technologies Group, Ltd.

By: G. Felda Hardymon and Ann Leamon

Jayant Davar, CEO and founder of Sandhar Technologies Group, a privately held auto components maker in India, is trying to decide how best to grow the company. He recently took a $22 million investment from Actis Capital, a major emerging markets private equity firm,... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Business Growth and Maturation; Competitive Advantage; Entrepreneurship; Mergers and Acquisitions; Emerging Markets; Growth and Development Strategy; Manufacturing Industry; Auto Industry; India