Publications

January 2025
Case

Untapped Global: Financing Africa's Missing Middle

By: Raymond Kluender and Emanuele Colonnelli

In November 2024, Jim Chu, founder and CEO of Untapped Global, faced mounting internal tensions over the company’s strategic direction. Untapped had developed a data-driven revenue-based financing (RBF) model to address the “missing middle” problem—the $5.2 trillion... View Details

16 Dec 2008
First Look

First Look: December 16, 2008

requires that students consider sources of competitive advantage that arise from the companies' markedly different business models. Purchase this case: http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/ b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=709409 View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

April 1990 (Revised November 1992)
Case

Population Services International: The Social Marketing Project in Bangladesh (Abridged)

By: James E. Austin

Population Services International (PSI) was a not-for-profit agency founded to disseminate family planning information and to market birth control products, primarily in less developed countries seeking to curb their population explosions. In 1976, PSI concluded an... View Details

Keywords: Conferences; Developing Countries and Economies; Information Publishing; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Social Marketing; Agreements and Arrangements; Product; Nonprofit Organizations; Pharmaceutical Industry; Bangladesh; Washington (state, US)

20 Mar 2007
First Look

First Look: March 20, 2007

numerical tests, sales forecasts from our model are more accurate than forecasts from time-series models that ignore inventory and price as well as forecasts from financial analysts. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/07-056.pdf View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

25 Jul 2006
First Look

First Look: July 25, 2006

Jones Author's Abstract A noteworthy characteristic of the contemporary global economy is the uneven distribution of world foreign direct investment (FDI). While in the first global economy before 1929 most... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

06 Jun 2016
Research & Ideas

Skills and Behaviors that Make Entrepreneurs Successful

Opportunities. Measures skills and behaviors associated with the ability to identify and seek out high-potential business opportunities. Vision and Influence. Measures skills and behaviors associated with the ability to influence all View Details

Keywords: by HBS Working Knowledge

July 2022 (Revised October 2022)
Case

Nestlé, Shared Value and KitKat Diplomacy

By: Geoffrey G. Jones and Sabine Pitteloud

The case revolves around the decision on March 23, 2022 by Mark Schneider, the chief executive of Swiss-based Nestlé, to withdraw the emblematic Kit Kat chocolate bar from sales in Russia in response to the invasion of Ukraine in the previous month, although not its... View Details

Keywords: Shared Value; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Globalized Economies and Regions; Ethics; War; Social Issues

April 2017 (Revised February 2020)
Case

Restructuring Ukraine

By: Kristin Mugford, Seema Amble and Tian Feng

In June 2015, Ukraine found itself struggling with a volatile and devalued currency, dramatically diminished foreign reserves, and a projected financing shortfall of $40 billion. Ukraine’s new government sought to return the nation to stability following political... View Details

Keywords: Exchange Rates; Politics; Macroeconomics; Financial Crisis; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Restructuring; Economy; Currency Exchange Rate; Banks and Banking; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Bonds; Sovereign Finance; Capital Markets; Credit; Debt Securities; Financial Liquidity; Financial Markets; Government and Politics; Ukraine

September 1992 (Revised July 1998)
Case

Germany in the 1990s: Managing Reunification

By: George C. Lodge and James W. Ragsdale

In October 1990, eastern Germany was incorporated into the Federal Republic of Germany. The German people rewarded the architect of these changes, Helmut Kohl, with an enhanced majority in national elections. But only two years later it was hard to remember these heady... View Details

Keywords: Economy; Inflation and Deflation; Central Banking; Interest Rates; Political Elections; Situation or Environment; Integration; Europe; Germany; Italy; United Kingdom

07 Jul 2021
Book

Good News for Disgraced Companies: You Can Regain Trust

landscape is bitterly divided and the COVID-19 pandemic has shaken the economy and led to widespread job losses globally, a corporate focus on trust may be more important than ever, Sucher says. She has studied corporate trust for two... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

24 Feb 2011
Research & Ideas

What’s Government’s Role in Regulating Home Purchase Financing?

The collapse of the US housing finance system, the subprime mortgage crisis, was a key contributor to the international economic crisis ignited in 2008. What should government do to prevent such an economic short-circuit in the future? On... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Financial Services

May 2005 (Revised October 2022)
Case

The Octopus and the Generals: The United Fruit Company in Guatemala

By: Geoffrey Jones and Marcelo Bucheli

Examines the overthrow of President Jacobo Arbenz of Guatemala in 1954 in a U.S.-backed coup in support of the United Fruit Co. Over the previous half century, United Fruit had built a large vertically integrated tropical fruit business that owned large banana... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Multinational Firms and Management; Policy; International Relations; Business History; Business and Government Relations; Central America; Guatemala; United States

20 Sep 2016
First Look

September 20, 2016

can harness volunteer leadership for transformative change; and how professionals can sustain core values in the midst of daily routine. The diverse array of writers with international reputations in their fields makes it the only book of... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

10 Nov 2003
Research & Ideas

Globalization: The Strategy of Differences

how much to adapt a business model is certainly important for extracting value from international operations. But to focus exclusively on the tension between global scale economies and local considerations... View Details

Keywords: by Pankaj Ghemawat

2023
Working Paper

Deglobalization and Entrepreneurial Investment: The Natural Experiment of Brexit

By: Elisa Alvarez-Garrido and Juan Alcácer

We seek to gain insight into the consequences of deglobalization on entrepreneurial investment by analyzing an instance of economic disintegration: the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union. Brexit is not only a unique empirical opportunity, a natural... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurial Finance; International Relations; Trade; Disruption; Globalized Economies and Regions; United Kingdom

Read Now

26 Sep 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, September 26, 2017

unconditional bonuses. The results have implications for companies trying to use bonuses to more effectively manage their salespeople. Publisher's link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=53260 forthcoming Journal of Political View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Research Summary

Overview

Professor Begenau’s research agenda is directed at better understanding how financial markets work and how they affect the real economy. She uses quantitative analysis to build both prescriptive and descriptive models concerning financial risk in banking, and she also... View Details

November 2003 (Revised May 2016)
Case

Weetman Pearson and the Mexican Oil Industry (A)

By: Geoffrey Jones and Lisa Bud-Freirman

Taught in the MBA Evolution of Global Business course, a business history course on the growth of multinationals. Explores the role of the British entrepreneur Weetman Pearson in developing the Mexican oil industry before 1914. Shows this entrepreneur's evolution from... View Details

Keywords: History; Risk and Uncertainty; Non-Renewable Energy; Growth Management; Multinational Firms and Management; Entrepreneurship; Investment; Developing Countries and Economies; Energy Industry; Mexico

May 2025 (Revised June 2025)
Background Note

Social Enterprise in Latin America

By: Brian L. Trelstad and Karina Souza

This research note provides an overview of the social enterprise ecosystem in Latin America, exploring current dynamics across key markets, including country-specific insights on Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, and Central America. In a region characterized... View Details