Publications
Publications
Show Results For
- All HBS Web
(2,576)
- Faculty Publications (466)
- January 2025
- Case
Redwood & Strong: The Value of a Consulting Engagement
By: David G. Fubini and Patrick Sanguineti
The board of Redwood & Strong LLP (R&S), the American branch of a large global law firm, is meeting to review the findings of a recent strategic initiative designed to identify potential merger candidates. The request for the engagement originated from Daniel Crawford,... View Details
- December 2024 (Revised March 2025)
- Case
Strategy and CEO Succession at Starbucks
By: Krishna G. Palepu and David Lane
On August 13, 2024, Starbucks announced that Laxman Narasimhan who was appointed as the CEO only in September 2023, was stepping down as CEO and board director “with immediate effect.” Laxman would be replaced on September 9 by Brian Niccol, CEO since 2018 of Chipotle... View Details
Keywords: Strategy; Corporate Governance; Leadership; Management Succession; Cost Management; Labor Unions; Working Conditions; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Service Operations; Investment Activism; Governing and Advisory Boards; Resignation and Termination; Food and Beverage Industry; United States
- December 2024
- Article
Proxy Advisory Firms and Corporate Shareholder Engagement
By: Aiyesha Dey, Austin Starkweather and Joshua White
We study how Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) affect firms’ engagement with shareholders. Our analyses exploit a quasi-natural experiment using say-on-pay voting outcomes near a threshold that triggers ISS to review engagement activities. Firms receiving ISS... View Details
- November 2024
- Background Note
Social Enterprise in the MENA Region
By: Brian Trelstad and Ahmed Dahawy
This research note provides an overview of the socio-economic landscape of social enterprise in the Middle East and North Africa. It highlights the diversity of players in the region including social enterprise organizations (in their many forms) and supporting... View Details
Keywords: MENA; Non-Governmental Organizations; Nonprofit Organizations; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Diasporas; Social Entrepreneurship; Cultural Entrepreneurship; Environmental Sustainability; Geographic Scope; Health Care and Treatment; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Business and Community Relations; Business and Government Relations; Social and Collaborative Networks; Demographics; Service Industry; Service Industry; Service Industry; Egypt; Morocco; North Africa; Tunisia; Jordan; Lebanon; Saudi Arabia; United Arab Emirates; Dubai; Middle East
- 2024
- Working Paper
Hidden Risk
By: Daniel Barth, Phillip Monin, Emil Siriwardane and Adi Sunderam
Since 2013, large U.S. hedge fund advisers have been required to report risk exposures in their regulatory filings. Using these data, we first establish that managers’ perceptions of risk contain useful information that is not embedded in fund returns. Investor flows... View Details
- October 2024
- Case
Tonik
By: Andy Wu, Maliha Malek Quadir and Aticus Peterson
This case study examines Tonik, the first digital bank in the Philippines, as it navigates the challenges of scaling its lending operations and achieving profitability in an evolving fintech landscape. It explores Tonik's journey from its launch in 2018 to early 2024,... View Details
- October 2024
- Case
EU's Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act
By: David B. Yoffie and Sarah von Bargen
Since the early 2020s, the EU began passing regulations on digital platforms and their marketplaces. One of the first was the Digital Services Act package, consisting of the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA). These regulations were focused on... View Details
- September 20, 2024
- Article
It’s Time to Unbundle ESG
By: Aaron K. Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel
ESG is at an inflection point. It has come to represent a broad and inchoate aspiration for what business should be doing beyond maximizing shareholder value. With ESG advocates on the defensive, business leaders need a new roadmap to determine which factors to... View Details
Keywords: ESG; ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) Performance; ESG Ratings; ESG Reporting; ESG Disclosure; Sustainability; Climate; Climate Finance; Climate Risk; Social Accounting; Investment; Governance; Safety; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Financial Services Industry
- September 2024
- Case
Comun: Partners in Peril
By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Alexis Lefort
In spring 2023, Abiel Gutierrez and Andres Santos, co-founders of Comun, faced a critical decision at their fintech startup serving Latino immigrants. Having launched their product the previous year, they experienced rapid growth but encountered rising fraud and... View Details
- September 2024
- Case
Cathay Cargo: Turnaround Short Haul, or Double Crew Long Haul?
By: Willy Shih and Billy Chan
Tom Owen, Director Cargo at Cathay Pacific Airways, had a problem. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the grounding of passenger flights meant the sudden loss of 50% of the airline's cargo carrying capacity. But the bigger challenge was that the Hong Kong government imposed... View Details
- September 2024
- Case
Topaz: Navigating Governance, Legacy, and Change
By: Christina R. Wing and Carla Larangeira
Since its founding in 2011, the Garza Sada brothers and their father positioned Topaz among leading family offices in Monterrey, Mexico, with several assets under management. Topaz aspired to have a transformative impact across multiple Mexican industries. An industry... View Details
Keywords: Business Conglomerates; Family Business; Governing and Advisory Boards; Managerial Roles; Management Succession; Family Ownership; Corporate Governance; Organizational Structure; Adoption; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; Latin America; Mexico
- August 2024 (Revised March 2025)
- Case
DBS' AI Journey
By: Feng Zhu, Harold Zhu and Adina Wong
Headquartered in Singapore, DBS Bank, one of Asia's leading financial services groups, embarked on a multi-year digital transformation under CEO Piyush Gupta in 2014. It was then that DBS also began experimenting with AI to drive value for the business and customers.... View Details
- August 2024
- Case
Circle: Reinventing the Future of Money
By: Shikhar Ghosh and Shweta Bagai
In early 2024, Circle Internet Financial's leadership team gathered to discuss the company's strategic path as it prepared for an IPO. Founded in 2013 by Jeremy Allaire, Circle had emerged as a pioneer in digital finance through its USD Coin (USDC), a regulated... View Details
- July 2024
- Case
“In That Crucible, You Find Innovation”: Public Safety Transformation in Albuquerque
By: Hise O. Gibson and Antonio Manuel Oftelie
“In That Crucible, You Find Innovation”: Public Safety Transformation in Albuquerque" centers on Mayor Tim Keller’s leadership during the social justice protests in 2020 and his efforts to reinvent Albuquerque’s public safety model. Faced with both a federal consent... View Details
- March 2024
- Case
Nomad: A License to Bank
By: Paul A. Gompers and Pedro Levindo
In late 2023, Lucas Vargas, CEO and co-founder of Nomad, a fintech that offered financial services in the United States for Brazilian residents, had to decide what to do to ensure the company’s continued expansion. Nomad launched its first product, a U.S. digital bank... View Details
Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Startups; Customer Satisfaction; Decision Making; Entrepreneurship; Banks and Banking; Initial Public Offering; Global Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Product Launch; Organizational Culture; Going Public; Ownership Stake; Innovation and Invention; Strategic Planning; Business and Government Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Risk and Uncertainty; Business Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Corporate Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Vertical Integration; Leadership; Law; Service Industry; Service Industry; Service Industry; Brazil; United States; North America; Latin America
- February 2024 (Revised July 2024)
- Case
Korea Venture Investment Corporation
By: Paul A. Gompers and Billy Chan
Financial service sector Korea Venture Investment Corporation (KVIC) is the venture capital arm of the Korean government with a founding mission to build a domestic startup ecosystem that would be as competitive as Silicon Valley. KVIC manages a basket of... View Details
- February 2024 (Revised February 2024)
- Case
CLSA: Integrating ESG in Stock Valuation
By: Shirley Lu, Aaron Yoon and Billy Chan
In 2023, a senior financial analyst at the Hong Kong-based stock brokerage firm CLSA was surprised to see that, based on his calculations, the financial impact from climate risks on a major Indian cement manufacturing company’s projected earnings could be massive.... View Details
- February 2024 (Revised April 2024)
- Case
Uniswap: Fighting a Vampire Attack (A)
By: Shikhar Ghosh, Shweta Bagai and Liang Wu
This is the first of a three-case series that explores the challenges faced by Uniswap, a key player in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector. Founded by Hayden Adams, the case traces Uniswap's rapid growth from a simple idea inspired by a Reddit post to becoming one... View Details
Keywords: Blockchain; Cryptocurrency; Crypto Economy; Community; Decentralization; Decentralized Exchange; Decentralized Finance; Open Platforms; Open-source Innovation; Market Distruption; Stablecoin; Vampire Attack; Web3; Token; Digital Platforms; Entrepreneurship; Governance; Technological Innovation; Competitive Strategy; Financial Liquidity; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; United States
- 2024
- Working Paper
When Insurers Exit: Climate Losses, Fragile Insurers, and Mortgage Markets
By: Ishita Sen, Pari Sastry and Ana-Maria Tenekedjieva
This paper studies how homeowners insurance markets respond to growing climate losses and how this impacts mortgage market dynamics. Using Florida as a case study, we show that traditional insurers are exiting high risk areas, and new lower quality insurers are... View Details
- January 2024
- Case
Post-Wirecard: BaFin under Mark Branson
By: Jonas Heese, Carlota Moniz and Daniela Beyersdorfer
In November 2023, Mark Branson, the head of Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin), reflected on the efficacy of the reforms initiated since the Wirecard scandal. BaFin had been discredited after Wirecard’s downfall in 2020. The press had derided it... View Details