Publications

February 2009 (Revised September 2011)
Background Note

Business and Human Rights

By: Lynn S. Paine and Lara Adamsons

This note addresses some of the most frequently asked questions about the relation between human rights and business. Topics include the definition of human rights, the business leader's role regarding human rights, and legal liability of companies and executives for... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Ethics; Human Capital; Legal Liability; Rights; Leadership; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

February 2021
Teaching Plan

Soofa: Displaying the Right Path?

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Amy Klopfenstein

This teaching plan serves as a supplement to the case “Soofa: Displaying the Right Path?” HBS 820-098. The case explores the tension between two different financing and expansion plans for a startup, and explores issues related to business model pivots and industry... View Details

Research Summary

Social media and user-generated content

In this project, Professor Piskorski, jointly with Andreea Gorbatai, examines inherent trade-offs in provision of user-generated content, using Wikipedia as a research setting. In Wikipedia, every user has the right to add material to an article, but with no... View Details

April 2010 (Revised May 2017)
Case

Tremblant Capital Group

By: Robin Greenwood

Brett Barakett, CEO and founder of Tremblant Capital Group, a New York–based hedge fund, must decide what to do with his fund's position in Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, which has dropped in value by more than 40% in recent months. Tremblant is a hedge fund that... View Details

Keywords: Business Earnings; Behavioral Finance; Stocks; Investment Funds; Consumer Behavior; Competitive Advantage; Financial Services Industry; New York (city, NY)

May 2020 (Revised December 2022)
Case

Soofa: Displaying the Right Path?

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang, Amy Klopfenstein and Amram Migdal

In November 2019, Sandra Richter, co-founder and CEO of Soofa, a network of advertising-supported digital bulletin boards, must decide between two different fundraising and expansion plans for her company. One plan entails raising $15 million in a Series A round and... View Details

June 2023 (Revised July 2023)
Case

Social Media Background Screening at Fama Technologies

By: Joseph Pacelli, Jillian Grennan and Alexis Lefort

Fama Technologies is an online screening company that uses AI to analyze job applicants' publicly available online content for signs of risk and culture fit. The case opens with Ben Mones, founder and CEO, looking to secure funding from venture firms. He is running... View Details

Keywords: Human Resources; Recruitment; Retention; Selection and Staffing; Organizational Culture; Talent and Talent Management; AI and Machine Learning; Social Media; Venture Capital; Entrepreneurship; United States

Article

Is This the Right C-Suite Role?

By: Anne Donnellon, Joshua D. Margolis and Amy Gallo

A Harvard Business School Case Study is presented which asks "Is This the Right C-Suite Role?" Experts Rakefet Russak Aminoach, managing partner at venture capital firm TeamB, and Nadia Rawlinson, chief people officer at Slack and a board director at Vail Resorts and... View Details

Keywords: Executives; Women Executives; Office Politics; Management Teams; Personal Development and Career

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2025
Working Paper

Investor Influence on Media Coverage: Evidence from Venture Capital-Backed Startups

By: Brian K. Baik and Albert Shin

We examine whether and how investors influence media coverage of their private portfolio companies. Using a stacked difference-in-differences design, we find that media coverage of startups increases significantly following venture capital (VC) investment. The effect... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Entrepreneurship; Media; Reputation; Information

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24 Jul 2000
Research & Ideas

Linking the Globe: The Role of Media and Communications

critically important commercially, but even more so politically. The third critical juncture, she said, is where we are right now with the information revolution, the impact of which will be particularly important in the View Details

Keywords: by Kenneth Liss; Media & Broadcasting; Media & Broadcasting; Media & Broadcasting; Media & Broadcasting

March 2021
Supplement

Sky Deutschland - Bidding for Sports Rights (B)

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Sascha L. Schmidt and Sebastian Koppers

Carsten Schmidt, CEO of Sky Deutschland, needs to prepare for the auction of German soccer rights. Much was at stake. Not only was soccer the most widely watched sport in Germany, the company had long advertised that only Sky showed “every game, every goal.” In... View Details

Keywords: Sports; Entertainment; Television Entertainment; Intellectual Property; Auctions; Bids and Bidding; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Germany

March 2021
Case

Sky Deutschland - Bidding for Sports Rights (A)

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Sascha L. Schmidt, Renate Imoberdorf and Sebastian Koppers

Carsten Schmidt, CEO of Sky Deutschland, needs to prepare for the auction of German soccer rights. Much was at stake. Not only was soccer the most widely watched sport in Germany, the company had long advertised that only Sky showed “every game, every goal.” In... View Details

Keywords: Sports; Entertainment; Television Entertainment; Intellectual Property; Auctions; Bids and Bidding; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Germany

February 2020 (Revised April 2020)
Case

Building Uzbekistan's Capital Market

By: Jonas Heese and Botir Kobilov

In December 2019, Atabek Nazirov, head of Uzbekistan’s capital market regulatory agency, prepared the release of Uzbekistan’s capital market strategy. As Nazirov was getting ready to release the strategy, he reflected on the first year of his tenure and the steps... View Details

Keywords: Capital Markets; Strategy; Central Asia; Uzbekistan

15 Feb 2000
Research & Ideas

The Right Connections

capital on their ability to secure resources. "In biotech it can take eight to ten years to develop a product and cost hundreds of millions of dollars to bring it to market," says Higgins. "Therefore, funding is... View Details

Keywords: by Judith A. Ross

Article

Big Other: Surveillance Capitalism and the Prospects of an Information Civilization

By: Shoshana Zuboff

This article describes an emergent logic of accumulation in the networked sphere, 'surveillance capitalism,' and considers its implications for 'information civilization.' The institutionalizing practices and operational assumptions of Google Inc. are the... View Details

Keywords: Surveillance Capitalism; Big Data; Google; Information Society; Privacy; Internet Of Everything; Rights; Economic Systems; Analytics and Data Science; Internet and the Web; Ethics

SSRN

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May 2010
Supplement

Tremblant Capital Group Exhibits (CW)

By: Robin Greenwood

Brett Barakett, CEO and founder of Tremblant Capital Group, a New York-based hedge fund, must decide what to do with his fund's position in Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, which has dropped in value by more than 40 percent in recent months. Tremblant is a hedge fund... View Details

Keywords: Transformation; Decisions; Forecasting and Prediction; Cash Flow; Cost of Capital; Stocks; Investment Funds; Consumer Behavior; Business Strategy; Competitive Advantage; New York (state, US)

18 Sep 2017
Research & Ideas

'Likes' Lead to Nothing—and Other Hard-Learned Lessons of Social Media Marketing

a direct connection between a social media chat about a product with the actual purchase of that product. “The biggest challenge right now is that all this money is shifting into digital marketing, but there... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman; Advertising; Technology

Research Summary

Renovating Democratic Capitalism

By: Malcolm S. Salter

This in-process work focuses on how best to address the declining public trust and confidence in democratic capitalism, which many citizens consider to be a cornerstone of our national ideology and identity? While the answer to this question is not entirely clear, I... View Details

17 Aug 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Venture Capital Data: Opportunities and Challenges

Keywords: by Steven N. Kaplan and Josh Lerner; Financial Services; Banking

February 2025
Case

What's Heiring Next? The Saga of the Murdoch Media Empire

By: Lauren Cohen, Mayra Gazel and Sophia Pan

As Lachlan Murdoch left the courthouse, he puzzled on the next phase of his battle for control over his father Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. With Rupert aging and his siblings determined to retain their voting rights, Lachlan was convinced that the future of News... View Details

Keywords: Family Business; Lawsuits and Litigation; Rights; Management Succession; Family Ownership; Family and Family Relationships; Power and Influence; Media and Broadcasting Industry