Publications
Publications
Show Results For
- All HBS Web
(2,556)
- Faculty Publications (595)
- 2010
- Working Paper
Making the Numbers? 'Short Termism' and the Puzzle of Only Occasional Disaster
By: Nelson P. Repenning and Rebecca Henderson
Much recent work in strategy and popular discussion suggests that an excessive focus on "managing the numbers"—delivering quarterly earnings at the expense of longer-term investments—makes it difficult for firms to make the investments necessary to build competitive... View Details
- 2016
- Working Paper
The Impact of Supplier Inventory Service Level on Retailer Demand
By: Nathan Craig, Nicole DeHoratius and Ananth Raman
To set inventory service levels, suppliers must understand how changes in inventory service level affect demand. We build on prior research, which uses analytical models and laboratory experiments to study the impact of a supplier's service level on demand from... View Details
- June 2010 (Revised September 2013)
- Case
IDFC India: Infrastructure Investment Intermediaries
By: John D. Macomber and Viraal Balsari
Indian financial intermediary matching international capital to local infrastructure decides how to balance range of services, risk-adjusted return, margin pressure, and nation building. IDFC was chartered with partial ownership from the Indian government to help... View Details
- Article
Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and the Market for Digital Information Goods
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane
We study competitive interaction between two alternative models of digital content distribution over the Internet: peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing and centralized client-server distribution. We present microfoundations for a stylized model of p2p file sharing where all... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
Trade Policy and Firm Boundaries
By: Laura Alfaro, Paola Conconi, Harald Fadinger and Andrew F. Newman
We study how trade policy affects firms' ownership structures. We embed an incomplete contracts model of vertical integration choices into a standard perfectly-competitive international trade framework. Integration decisions are driven by a trade-off between the... View Details
- May 2010
- Article
Bye Bye Bundles: The Unbundling of Music in Digital Channels
By: Anita Elberse
Fueled by digital distribution, unbundling is prevalent in many information industries. What is the effect of this unbundling on sales? And what bundle characteristics drive this effect? I empirically examine these questions in the context of the music industry, using... View Details
- April 2010
- Case
A Giant Among Women
By: Willy C. Shih, Ethan S Bernstein, Maly Hout Bernstein, Jyun-Cheng Wang and Yi-Ling Wei
Few CEOs successfully manage the evolution of their companies from OEM outsourcer to branded manufacturer to expert consumer marketer as well as Tony Lo, CEO of Giant Manufacturing Co. Ltd., now the largest bicycle manufacturer in the world. In the mid-1980s, Giant... View Details
- April 2010 (Revised September 2011)
- Case
Supply Chain Partners: Virginia Mason and Owens & Minor (A) (Abridged)
By: V.G. Narayanan and Lisa Brem
Owens & Minor (O&M) performed lean inventory services for Virginia Mason (VM) as its Alpha Vendor, but the outdated industry pricing model created perverse incentives and could not capture O&M's costs. Together, O&M and VM created an activity-based pricing model: Total... View Details
- April 2010
- Article
From Strategy to Business Models and onto Tactics
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Joan Enric Ricart
The notion of business model has been used by strategy scholars to refer to "the logic of the firm, the way it operates and how it creates value for its stakeholders." On the surface, this notion appears to be similar to that of strategy. We present a conceptual... View Details
- March 2010 (Revised April 2014)
- Case
American Well: The Doctor Will E-See You Now
By: Elie Ofek and Ron Laufer
What is next for healthcare IT provider American Well, whose innovative Online Care technology allows physicians to deliver care to patients online in real time? Using American Well's platform, patients with non-emergency health concerns can communicate with physicians... View Details
- March 2010 (Revised June 2010)
- Case
Dassault Systemes
By: Stefan H. Thomke and Daniela Beyersdorfer
Dassault Systèmes, a leader in product lifecycle management software, has enjoyed a very profitable business model in 3D engineering design. In the past, it has successfully managed market disruptions and opportunities through acquisition and organic innovations. Its... View Details
- March 2010 (Revised July 2010)
- Case
The Economist
By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Bharat N. Anand and Lizzie Gomez
In 2009 the Economist continued to experience impressive growth and operating margins while many of its peers reeled from both a cyclical downturn and structural threats to print publishing. The case describes the history, organization, and business model of the... View Details
- March 2010 (Revised June 2019)
- Case
Major League Baseball Advanced Media: America's Pastime Goes Digital
By: Anita Elberse and Brett Laffel
In January 2010, Bob Bowman, chief executive officer of Major League Baseball Advanced Media -- MLB's digital arm -- is facing a number of decisions related to its 'app' for Apple's new iPad. What are the best name, price, and set of features for MLBAM's iPad app? The... View Details
- February 2010 (Revised September 2011)
- Case
Local Motors: Designed by the Crowd, Built by the Customer
By: Michael I. Norton and Jeremy Dann
In the wake of the meltdown among U.S. auto manufacturers in 2009, Jay Rogers, CEO of Local Motors, has a new approach for the automotive industry: decide which models are produced through online design competitions, and then allow customers to "build their own cars"... View Details
- February 2010
- Case
Go Mobile: The Phirbol Franchise
By: Rajiv Lal and Natalie Kindred
To grow Phirbol, a telecom retail franchise chain in Delhi, India's underdeveloped markets, its founders were exploring ways to offer more value to the franchisees. In mid-2009, the Phirbol franchise was comprised of some 150 franchisees that had converted their small... View Details
- February 2010
- Case
Shurgard Self-Storage: Expansion to Europe (Abridged)
Shurgard, a U.S.-based firm that rents storage facilities to consumers and small businesses, is considering financing options for rapid expansion of its European operations. Five years after entering Europe, Shurgard Europe has opened 17 facilities in Belgium, France,... View Details
- 2010
- Article
Competing against Online Sharing
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane
This paper aims to explore online sharing of copyrighted content over peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing networks and its impact on the music industry and to assess the viable business models for the industry in the future. View Details
- January 2010
- Article
Open vs. Closed Innovation: A Model of Discovery and Divergence
By: Esteve Almirall and Ramon Casadesus-Masanell
When is open innovation superior to closed innovation? Through a formal simulation model, we show that an open approach to innovation allows the firm to discover combinations of product features that would be hard to envision under integration. However, when partners... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
The Architecture of Complex Systems: Do Core-periphery Structures Dominate?
By: Alan MacCormack, Carliss Y. Baldwin and John Rusnak
Any complex technological system can be decomposed into a number of subsystems and associated components, some of which are core to system function while others are only peripheral. The dynamics of how such "core-periphery" structures evolve and become embedded in a... View Details
- December 2009 (Revised September 2014)
- Case
TD Canada Trust
By: Dennis Campbell and Brent Kazan
The case illustrates the role of performance measurement and analytics in translating TD-Canada Trust's service model of "comfortable banking" into operational terms. In 2000, in a banking market where consumers and regulators were typically hostile to mergers and... View Details