Publications

Find at Harvard

September 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Case

RightHand Robotics: Choosing the First Market

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Stacy Straaberg

In early 2015, RightHand Robotics’s (RHR) leadership faced a set of decisions in commercializing the startup’s robotic picking solution. RHR’s central product was the RightPick integrated robotic picking system which featured a robotic arm, a three-fingered robotic... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Market Entry and Exit; Product; Research and Development; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Information Infrastructure; Technological Innovation; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; United States; Massachusetts

11 Aug 2003
Research & Ideas

Cheap, Fast, and In Control: How Tech Aids Innovation

experimentation and are triggering fundamental changes in R&D processes and performance in such fields as integrated circuit design, automotive development, and pharmaceutical drug discovery. Computer modeling and simulation, rapid... View Details

Keywords: by Wendy Guild

2007
Working Paper

Bandwidth Allocation in Peer-to-Peer Filesharing Networks

By: Albert Creus-Mir, Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane

We present a model of bandwidth allocation in a stylized peer-to-peer file sharing network with s peers (sharers) who share files and download from each other and f peers (freeriders) who download from sharers but do not contribute files. Assuming that upload bandwidth... View Details

Keywords: Information Infrastructure; Resource Allocation

October 1986 (Revised January 1991)
Case

Manac Systems International Ltd.

Manac Systems International is confronting a decision about how best to market one of its computer software product lines to small law firms. In the past, Manac has focused on traditional personal selling approaches to market software products that ran on IBM... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Communications; Marketing Channels; Software; Product Marketing; Information Technology Industry

March 2025 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Xfund and Sam Altman: Finding Harvard's Best Generative AI Founders

By: Suraj Srinivasan

On May 1, 2024, Xfund Managing Partners Patrick Chung and Brandon Farwell, hosted a high-stakes venture pitch session designed to select one startup for a minimum $100,000 investment. This “Xperiment Stake” competition, dedicated to startups in the Generative AI... View Details

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Venture Capital; Innovation Leadership; Technological Innovation; Business Startups; Competition; Technology Industry; United States

December 2012
Case

Blink Booking

By: William R. Kerr, Magnus Thor Torfason and Alexis Brownell

Rebeca Minguela hopes to create an arbitrage platform, similar to Rocket Internet, that can bring start-up ideas and opportunities to Spain. However, Blink Booking, her first venture and proof of concept, is rocked by a co-founder's breach of confidence and departure.... View Details

Keywords: Clones; Cloning; Rocket Internet; Start-up; Equity Split; Arbitrage; Incubator; Mobile App; Expansion; Spain; Europe; Entrepreneurship; Ethics; Internet and the Web; Information Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry; Information Technology Industry; Spain; Europe

June 2021
Case

Akira Fukabori and Kevin Kajitani at avatarin (A) (Abridged)

By: Linda A. Hill and Emily Tedards

In 2016, Akira Fukabori and Kevin Kajitani, aeronautical engineers at All Nippon Airways Co., Ltd., began to wonder why, in a world of accelerating globalization and digital connectivity, those who lived in far-remote villages or impoverished urban areas could not... View Details

Keywords: Agility; Ecosystem; Innovation Ecosystems; Innovation; Crowdsourcing; XPRIZE; Open Innovation; Partnership; Government; Collaboration; Co-creation; Purpose; Impact; Social Impact; Movement; Organizational Behavior; Organizational Ambidexterity; Ambidexterity; Culture; Culture Change; Global Teams; Experimentation; Space; Space Industry; Airline Industry; Start-up; Platform Business; Platform Strategy; Platform; Digital; Robotics; Robots; Avatar; Telepresence; Innovation Lab; Mobility; COVID-19; Intrapreneurship; Public-private Partnership; Innovation and Invention; Technological Innovation; Partners and Partnerships; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Alignment; Leadership; Leading Change; Diversity; Organizational Culture; Change Management; Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Digital Platforms; Transportation Industry; Aerospace Industry; Japan

June 2005 (Revised January 2008)
Case

Good Technology: Empowering Mobility Around the Globe (A)

By: Geoffrey G. Jones and Adam Minnick

Describes the global growth of Good Technology, a Silicon Valley start-up in wireless handheld computing software and service. Reviews the evaluation of wireless standards, the emergence of the world wireless market for voice and data, and the growth of the major firms... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Entrepreneurship; Globalized Firms and Management; Partners and Partnerships; Expansion; Wireless Technology; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; California

Find at Harvard

03 Oct 2006
First Look

First Look: October 3, 2006

social norms shift away from single-sex education, the school's enrollment is falling and deficits are becoming the norm. At the same time, the modern vision for girls' education requires an even greater investment in science and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

April 2015
Teaching Plan

Codecademy: Monetizing a Movement?

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Lisa Mazzanti

This is a Teaching Plan for the case on 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,... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Internet and the Web; Open Source Distribution; Social Entrepreneurship; Education

19 Sep 2023
HBS Case

How Will the Tech Titans Behind ChatGPT, Bard, and LLaMA Make Money?

Microsoft also deserves a lot of credit for making a decision to work with OpenAI and getting access to leading technology that they can integrate both into their applications and as a way to sell cloud View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand; Technology; Technology

25 Nov 2008
First Look

First Look: November 25, 2008

Amazon.com, Inc., specializing in the provision of web-based storage and computing services to web developers. The case focuses on the issues facing Andy Jassy, the head of AWS, in 2008 as AWS faces increased competition from established... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

May 2004 (Revised July 2004)
Case

IBM On Demand Community

By: John A. Quelch

The vice-president of IBM Corporate Community Relations is developing the launch program for IBM On Demand Community, a suite of 140 technology tools designed to enable IBM employees to assist nonprofit community organizations and schools worldwide. View Details

Keywords: Nonprofit Organizations; Social Marketing; Computer Industry

October 2023
Teaching Note

Timnit Gebru: 'SILENCED No More' on AI Bias and The Harms of Large Language Models

By: Tsedal Neeley and Tim Englehart

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 422-085. Dr. Timnit Gebru—a leading artificial intelligence (AI) computer scientist and co-lead of Google’s Ethical AI team—was messaging with one of her colleagues when she saw the words: “Did you resign?? Megan sent an email saying that... View Details

Keywords: Ethics; Employment; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Technological Innovation; AI and Machine Learning; Diversity; Prejudice and Bias; Technology Industry