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Publications
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- September 2000
- Article
Regulatory Free Cash Flow and the High Cost of Insurance Company Failures
By: Brian Hall
- May 2000 (Revised July 2000)
- Case
World Trade Organization, The: After the Seattle Protests
Representatives of the World Trade Organization (WTO) met in Seattle to plan the next round of trade negotiations, only to face protestors and fail to reach agreement on an agenda. This case discusses the evolution of the WTO, its rules, and some of the controversy... View Details
- April 2000
- Background Note
Market Failures
By: Bharat N. Anand, Tarun Khanna and Jan W. Rivkin
Examines the role of transaction costs in impeding the functioning of markets and shows how the concept of transaction costs sheds light on a broad range of issues in strategy. View Details
- April 2000
- Article
The Fable of Fisher Body
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Daniel F. Spulber
General Motors' (GM) acquisition of Fisher Body is the classic example of market failure in the literature on contracts and the theory of the firm. According to the standard account, GM merged vertically with Fisher Body in 1926, a maker of auto bodies, because of... View Details
- January 2000 (Revised March 2000)
- Case
Cachet Technologies
By: Paul A. Gompers and Howard Reitz
Describes the decision facing Danny Lewin, Jonathan Seelig, and Tom Leighton, the founders of Cachet Technologies, an MIT spin-out. The firm has done poorly in the annual MIT business plan competition and the founders have to decide whether to continue. View Details
- June 1999 (Revised August 2004)
- Case
The American Basketball League: The Last Chapter
By: Stephen A. Greyser and Elizabeth (Lisa) Smyth
Provides information on the demise of the American Basketball League (ABL) in December 1998. Reviews the League's attendance, television activity, and competitive positioning versus the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA). In conjunction with earlier cases... View Details
- June 1999 (Revised December 2003)
- Case
Snapple
By: John A. Deighton
Tells the story of Snapple's rise and fall, and poses the question "Can it recover?" Many soft-drink brands flourished in the 1980s serving New York's Yuppies, but only Snapple made the big time. It went from local to national success and was poised to go international... View Details
- Article
Fixing What Really Ails Japan
By: Michael E. Porter and Hirotaka Takeuchi
Conventional wisdom claims that Japan’s “economic miracle” stemmed from its unique model of government guidance and its revolutionary corporate management techniques. An in-depth study proves this seriously wrong. Rampant government intervention has caused more... View Details
- April 1999 (Revised September 1999)
- Case
Compaq Computer: Consumer Notebook Group
By: David E. Bell and Ann Leamon
Presents the background for a video of a focus group on Compaq Computer's new consumer notebook. Engineers, manufacturers, and retailers had collaborated on the product design, which has been approved by the executive committee. A launch is scheduled for nine months... View Details
- February 1999 (Revised June 1999)
- Case
Transformation of Pratt & Whitney North Haven (Abridged)
By: H. Kent Bowen, Jeffrey L. Bradach, Linda A. Hill and Kristin Doughty
Business unit manager Tom Hutton has empowered a group of hourly workers to purchase grit blast equipment for two cells. The capital purchase decision runs into some problems when the two cells fail to reach an agreement on which equipment to purchase. A rewritten... View Details
- August 1998 (Revised October 1998)
- Case
Disney's "The Lion King" (C): Repeat Performance?
By: Jeffrey F. Rayport, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Cate Reavis
Three of Disney's animated films that followed "The Lion King"—"Pocahontas," "Toy Story," and "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"—were significantly less successful at the box office and in retail sales. Meanwhile, Disney was focusing on developing live-action blockbusters. View Details
- April 1998 (Revised May 2001)
- Supplement
Acquisition of Consolidated Rail Corporation (B), The
By: Benjamin C. Esty, Lori A. Flees and Mathew M Millett
Eight days after CSX announced it was going to buy Consolidated Rail (Conrail) for $88.65 per share, Norfolk Southern made a hostile $100 per share bid for Conrail. Over the next several months, the potential acquirers upped their bids while exchanging criticism in the... View Details
- January 1998 (Revised April 2001)
- Case
Acer America: Development of the Aspire
By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Anthony St. George
Follows the development, national launch, and global rollout of the Aspire, Acer's first new product developed outside of Taiwan. Implementing a very promising new PC concept proves challenging to Mike Culver and his U.S. team, who are plagued by coordination problems... View Details
- December 1996 (Revised October 1999)
- Case
Kidder, Peabody & Co.: Creating Elusive Profits
By: Robert L. Simons and Antonio Davila
On April 17, 1994, Kidder, Peabody & Co. announced a $350 million charge against earnings resulting from the discovery of false trading profits. That same day, the termination of Joseph Jett's employment with the company was made public. By illustrating the mechanics... View Details
- 1996
- Book
Broken Promises: An Unconventional View of What Went Wrong at IBM
By: D. Q. Mills and G. B. Friesen
- March 1996
- Article
Customer Power, Strategic Investment, and the Failure of Leading Firms
By: J. L. Bower and C. M. Christensen
- December 1994
- Case
Intel's Pentium: When the Chips Are Down (A)
By: Stephen A. Greyser and Norman Klein
Intel, the largest-selling manufacturer of microprocessor computer chips, finds itself in a brand-threatening situation when a flaw is revealed in its top-of-the-line Pentium chip. The story is front-page news for weeks. The company invested tens of millions of dollars... View Details