Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(3,297)
- Faculty Publications (1,071)
- February 2015 (Revised April 2016)
- Supplement
Quincy Apparel (B)
By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Lisa C. Mazzanti
The (B) case provides post-mortem analysis from Quincy's cofounders on why their startup failed and what they could have done differently. Explanations for failure focus on Quincy's ambitious value proposition and resulting operational challenges; cofounder conflict;... View Details
- January 2015 (Revised October 2018)
- Case
Nasty Gals Do It Better
By: David Collis, Diane Chang, Matthew Shaffer and Ashley Hartman
In 2006, Sophia Amoruso started Nasty Gal, an eBay boutique selling vintage clothes. With a strong sense of style and personality, Amoruso poured herself into building the brand and developing relationships with her customers—typically the slightly edgy 18–24 year old.... View Details
Keywords: Business Growth; Brand Management; Online Retail; Clothing; Apparel; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Brands and Branding; Management; Marketing Strategy; Strategic Planning; Social Media; E-commerce; Digital Marketing; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; United States
- January 2015
- Article
Competing with Privacy
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane
We analyze the implications of consumer privacy for competition in the marketplace. We consider a market where firms set prices and disclosure levels for consumer information, and consumers observe both before deciding which firm to patronize and how much information... View Details
- December 2014 (Revised November 2023)
- Case
Codecademy: Monetizing a Movement?
By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Lisa C. Mazzanti
Codecademy, an open-platform, online community for learning computer programming, launched in 2011. By 2014, the company had raised a total of $12.5 million in funding and was, on many fronts, an overwhelming success. However, there were still no revenues. The founders... View Details
Keywords: Entrepreneurial Management; Startup Management; Technology; Computer Programming; Coding; Online Education; Monetization; Online Communities; Marketplaces; Internet and the Web; Education; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Technology Industry; Education Industry
- 2014
- Book
Retail Revolution: Will Your Brick & Mortar Store Survive?
By: Rajiv Lal, Jose B. Alvarez and Dan Greenberg
In Retail Revolution, the authors go beyond the common belief of retail as a monolithic industry and provide a framework that any brick-and-mortar retailer can use to respond to the eCommerce threat. Through six examples, this book demonstrates how this... View Details
- December 2014
- Case
Groupon: A New CEO Takes Charge
By: Lynda M. Applegate and Arnold B. Peinado
On August 7, 2013, Eric Lefkofsky, the chairman and largest shareholder of Groupon was named CEO, replacing founder Andrew Mason, who had run the company since its inception in 2009. When Groupon had its initial public offering (IPO) in November 2011, the company's... View Details
- December 2014 (Revised August 2024)
- Case
HomeAway: Organizing the Vacation Rental Industry
By: Rory McDonald, Feng Zhu and Cheng Gao
In less than 10 years, cofounders Brian Sharples and Carl Shepherd had transformed HomeAway from just another Internet startup into the world's leading vacation-rental marketplace—a global online platform that links customers seeking vacation-home rentals to the... View Details
- November 2014
- Supplement
The Grommet - Video Supplement
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Karen Gordon Mills, Lena G. Goldberg and Annelena Lobb
- November 2014
- Article
Beyond Bedlam: How Consumers and Brands Alike Are Playing the Web
By: John A. Deighton and Leora Kornfeld
The new marketing order, as played out on media platforms like YouTube, Twitter and Instagram, is so unlike the order it is displacing that it might seem like bedlam, an asylum of sorts for ideas intelligible only to their creators. And yet, surely, something... View Details
- Article
Digital Ubiquity: How Connections, Sensors, and Data Are Revolutionizing Business
By: Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani
When Google bought Nest, a maker of digital thermostats, for $3.2 billion just a few months ago, it was a clear indication that digital transformation and connection are spreading across even the most traditional industrial segments and creating a staggering array of... View Details
- 2016
- Working Paper
The Search for Peer Firms: When Do Crowds Provide Wisdom?
By: Charles M.C. Lee, Paul Ma and Charles C.Y. Wang
In knowledge-based economies, many business enterprises defy traditional industry boundaries. In this study, we evaluate six "big data" approaches to peer firm identifications and show that some, but not all, "wisdom-of-crowd" techniques perform exceptionally well. We... View Details
- October 2014 (Revised February 2017)
- Case
Europe, Russia, and the Age of Gas Revolution
By: Rawi Abdelal, Leonardo Maugeri and Sogomon Tarontsi
The 2014 Ukraine crisis once again exposed the mutually limiting knot—a web of commercial relationships and oil and gas pipelines—that historically tied the European Union and Russia closely. In this crisis, a familiar conundrum preoccupied minds in the corridors of... View Details
- September 2014
- Case
Balanced Scorecard at Delta/Signal Corp.
By: V.G. Narayanan
This auto parts company has just ousted its longtime CEO and founder, and the new, professional CEO is badly in need of a coherent strategy, clear objectives and metrics, and initiatives that are aligned with the strategy and objectives. Will the balanced scorecard... View Details
- September 2014 (Revised June 2016)
- Case
edX: Strategies for Higher Education
By: David Collis, Matthew Shaffer and Ashley Hartman
In May 2012, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) founded edX, a new non-profit joint venture that would provide a platform for massive open online courses (MOOCs). edX did not produce original courses or instructional content—it made... View Details
- September 2014 (Revised June 2017)
- Case
Google Inc. in 2014
By: Benjamin Edelman and Thomas R. Eisenmann
Describes Google's history, business model, governance structure, corporate culture, and processes for managing innovation. Reviews Google's recent strategic initiatives and the threats they pose to selected competitors. Asks what Google should do next. View Details
- September 2014
- Case
Google Inc. in 2014 (Abridged)
By: Benjamin Edelman and Thomas R. Eisenmann
Describes Google's history, business model, governance structure, corporate culture, and processes for managing innovation. Reviews Google's recent strategic initiatives and the threats they pose to Yahoo, Microsoft, and others. Asks what Google should do next. View Details
- September 2014 (Revised March 2015)
- Case
Managing Multi-Media Audiences at WHDH (Boston)
By: Thales Teixeira and V. Kasturi Rangan
WHDH's Channel 7 News rose to the #1 position in Boston-area news broadcasting through its embrace of an innovative format and for affiliating with NBC. Since the early 2000s, however, other news programs had copied their format, and young audiences had begun to use... View Details
Keywords: Online News; Television Advertising; Attention Economics; Cross-media Efforts; Competition; Internet and the Web; Consumer Behavior; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Change Management; Marketing Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Digital Marketing; Television Entertainment; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Boston
- August 2014 (Revised October 2014)
- Case
Beyoncé
By: Anita Elberse and Stacie Smith
In December 2013, music superstar Beyoncé is about to surprise her fans with the release of her self-titled album. The team at her company Parkwood Entertainment, which general manager Lee Anne Callahan-Longo described as "a management, music, and production company... View Details
- August 2014
- Teaching Plan
The Huffington Post
In February 2010, management of the Huffington Post, a fast-growing but not-yet-profitable Internet newspaper that aggregates blog posts from unpaid contributors and excerpts of stories originally published by other news sites, faces a number of decisions about its... View Details
- July 2014 (Revised August 2015)
- Case
Qihoo
By: Feng Zhu
Qihoo, one of the largest Internet companies in China today, was founded in 2005. The company started its business by offering a security software product, and quickly dominated the market in China after its unusual move of giving its product away for free in 2009.... View Details