Publications

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28 Mar 2019
News

What’s Really Driving Disruption (It’s Not Technology)

May 2022
Case

The NFL’s $110-Billion Media Rights Deals

By: Anita Elberse and Elizabeth Warner

On March 18, 2021, Brian Rolapp, chief media and business officer at the National Football League (NFL) presented the results of a months-long effort to renegotiate rights deals with the NFL’s current partners in television—the media conglomerates behind the networks... View Details

Keywords: Sports; Entertainment; Media; Marketing; Strategy; General Management; Negotiation; Partners and Partnerships; Competition; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Sports Industry

August 2023
Case

Floward

By: Krishna Palepu and Namrata Arora

In 2022, Abdulaziz B. Al Loughani, CEO and co-founder of Floward, an online flower and gifting company established in Kuwait in 2017, contemplated the firm's growth trajectory. Floward, an e-commerce enterprise that offered fresh-cut flowers sourced directly from... View Details

Keywords: Initial Public Offering; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; E-commerce; Information Technology Industry; Middle East; North Africa; Saudi Arabia; Kuwait; United Arab Emirates; Jordan

November 2003 (Revised March 2004)
Supplement

GE's Talent Machine: The Making of a CEO

By: Christopher A. Bartlett

CEO Jeff Immelt, ex-CEO Jack Welch, and HR Chief Bill Conaty discuss how GE has made talent development a source of sustainable competitive advantage. Immelt describes GE's deeply embedded philosophy around its people and how it has allowed the company to add value... View Details

Keywords: Business Conglomerates; Talent and Talent Management; Human Resources; Business or Company Management; Performance Capacity; Performance Effectiveness; Competitive Advantage; System; Value

Article

Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing for Surgical Episodes

By: Peter Najjar, Matt Strickland and Robert S. Kaplan

Health care costs related to surgical care account for 40% of all hospital and physician spending. Payers attempting to contain costs are replacing fee-for-service with value-based payment schemes that can encompass entire episodes of care, including physician services... View Details

Keywords: Surgery; Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Bundled Payments; Health Care and Treatment; Cost Management

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25 Mar 2011
Working Paper Summaries

How Do Incumbents Fare in the Face of Increased Service Competition?

Keywords: by Ryan W. Buell, Dennis Campbell & Frances X. Frei; Banking

January 2010 (Revised March 2013)
Case

HubSpot: Lower Churn through Greater CHI

By: F. Asis Martinez Jerez, Thomas Steenburgh, Jill Avery and Lisa Brem

HubSpot, a web marketing startup is under pressure from VCs to rapidly acquire new customers and to maintain a low level of customer churn. In the case, students explore the drivers of customer churn and uncover opportunities to increase customer retention across the... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Relationship Management; Customer Satisfaction; Customer Value and Value Chain; Forecasting and Prediction; Consumer Behavior; Happiness; Consulting Industry

December 2018
Case

Choosy

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Julia Kelley

Founded in 2017, Choosy is a data-driven fashion startup that uses algorithms to identify styles trending on social media. After manufacturing similar items using a China-based supply chain, Choosy sells them to consumers through its website and social media pages.... View Details

October 2023
Case

Leading Transformation at IHCL

By: Krishna G. Palepu, V.G. Narayanan and Malini Sen

In November 2017, Puneet Chhatwal, took charge as MD and CEO of IHCL, popularly referred to as the Taj Hotels. Despite being India’s largest hospitality company by market capitalization and respected for its values and service, IHCL had made losses for the last seven... View Details

Keywords: Turn Around Management; Hospitality Industry; Brand Management; Financial Strategy; Business Model; Restructuring; Asset Management; Leadership Style; Crisis Management; Brands and Branding; Product Positioning; Segmentation; Asia; India

Research Summary

Managing Marketspace Service Interfaces

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport

Jeffrey F. Rayport is focusing on the strategic challenges that face businesses selling information-intensive products and services. A key strategic issue in such businesses is the dematerialization of information-intensive products and services as a consequence of... View Details

07 Jun 2023
HBS Case

3 Ways to Gain a Competitive Advantage Now: Lessons from Amazon, Chipotle, and Facebook

Network effects can provide an advantage Some products become more competitive the wider the network of customers. For instance, Facebook benefits from the wide user base that increases value for customers... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

2023
Working Paper

Financial and Informational Integration Through Oracle Networks

By: Lin William Cong, Eswar Prasad and Daniel Rabetti

Oracles are software components that enable data exchange between siloed blockchains and external environments, enhancing smart contract capabilities and platform interoperability. We find that oracle integration is positively associated with total value locked and... View Details

Keywords: Decentralized Finance; Blockchain; Smart Contract; International Economy; Interoperability; Risk Sharing; Applications and Software; Financial Markets; Economics; Risk Management

SSRN

April 2023
Article

The Stock Market Valuation of Human Capital Creation

By: Ethan Rouen and Matthias Regier

We develop a measure of firm-year-specific human capital investment from publicly disclosed personnel expenses (PE) and examine the stock market valuation of this investment. Measuring the future value of PE (PEFV) based on the relation between... View Details

Keywords: Intangibles; Valuation; Human Capital; Investment Return

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06 Dec 2019
News

Why Progress Bars Can Make You Feel Better

Price Bargaining and Competition in Online Platforms: An Empirical Analysis of the Daily Deal Market

The prevalence of online platforms opens new doors to traditional businesses for customer reach and revenue growth. This research investigates platform competition in a setting where prices are determined by negotiations between platforms and businesses. We compile a... View Details

April 2014
Article

The Limits of Scale: Companies That Get Big Fast Are Often Left Behind. Here's Why.

By: Hanna Halaburda and Felix Oberholzer-Gee

The value of many products and services rises or falls with the number of customers using them; the fewer fax machines in use, the less important it is to have one. These network effects influence consumer decisions and affect companies' ability to compete. Strategists... View Details

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2022
Book

Purpose + Profit: How Business Can Lift Up the World

By: George Serafeim

The roadmap and best practices to reap the enormous value that can emerge when your business prioritizes social and environmental goals—such as climate change, diversity and inclusion, and sustainability—right alongside the pursuit of profit.

We not only... View Details

Keywords: ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) Performance; Profitability; Business And Society; Organizations; Mission and Purpose; Goals and Objectives; Social Issues; Environmental Sustainability; Value Creation; Organizational Change and Adaptation

04 Oct 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Fair (and Not So Fair) Division

Keywords: by John W. Pratt

2018
Book

Driving Digital Strategy: A Guide to Reimagining Your Business

By: Sunil Gupta

Disruption and transformation get a lot of hype and for good reason. Digital technologies have disrupted entire industries and incumbents have often struggled in this new world. Typical approaches used by legacy players such as using technology to improve efficiency,... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Information Technology; Transformation; Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Value Creation; Customer Focus and Relationships; Organizational Structure; Digital Strategy

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