Publications

09 Jan 2020
Book

Rethinking Business Strategy in the Age of AI

and NASA. Iansiti says in the following interview that the book provides a guide for all businesses—from startups to long-standing legacy companies—for thriving in the new digital rat race. Dina Gerdeman: Explain what you mean when you... View Details

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

11 Mar 2019
Research & Ideas

Branding Sells Cereal, Handbags, and Vacations. Can It Sell a Country?

complicated history still dominate public consciousness. Memories of failed peace talks tend to loom larger than Israel’s image as a startup nation. Thousands of Instagram posts from Tel Aviv’s gay pride festivities or the buzz from... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost; Tourism

16 Apr 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, April 16, 2019

Management Review What to Do When Industry Disruption Threatens Your Career By: Groysberg, Boris, Eric Lin, and Whitney Johnson Abstract—This article discusses how to diagnose the risks that disruptive industry forces pose to individual... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

February 2006 (Revised December 2009)
Case

Pixamo-Inc., AG, or OOO?

Andrew Prihodko is forming a new venture, Pixamo, the next generation of online photo management and sharing sites. Pixamo's alpha site has generated over 1,000 users and a lot of information about registration and usage patterns. Prihodko must address a number of... View Details

Keywords: Geographic Location; Globalized Firms and Management; Internet and the Web; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Web Services Industry; Delaware; Switzerland; Ukraine

Find at Harvard

August 2023
Case

WayCool: Reimagining the Food Supply Chain

By: Paul Gompers and Kairavi Dey

Founded in 2015, WayCool, is an Indian agri-tech start-up that built a B2B operation acquiring fruits and vegetables from product-specific agriculture companies and small-holding farmers. It sold them to business customers, such as local retail stores, restaurants, and... View Details

Keywords: Agribusiness; Digital Transformation; Operations; Business Strategy; Supply Chain; Performance; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Technology Industry; Web Services Industry; Asia; South Asia

13 Dec 2022
Interview

Why Some Start-Ups Fail to Scale

By: Jeffrey Rayport and Curt Nickisch

Managing rapid growth is a huge challenge for young businesses. Even start-ups with glowing reviews and skyrocketing sales can fail. That’s because new ventures and corporate initiatives alike have to sustain profitability at scale, according to Harvard Business School... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Growth Management; Outcome or Result; Transition

Read Now

September 1991
Case

Momenta Corp. (B)

Momenta is a one-year-old corporation that has sought to build a distinct culture and identity through a structured process and organized rituals. The company is seeking to be a major player in the highly competitive pen-based computer market and has attracted... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Organizational Culture; Business Startups

November 2020 (Revised March 2023)
Case

Zipline: The World's Largest Drone Delivery Network

By: Tarun Khanna and George Gonzalez

Zipline established the world's largest logistics network in Rwanda and Ghana by delivering medical supplies to hospitals via automated drones. The company is now looking to expand in the U.S. and partnered with Walmart to expand into home delivery. Zipline must... View Details

Keywords: Drones; Business Startups; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; United States; Africa

04 Apr 2012
Research & Ideas

When Founders Recruit Friends and Family as Investors

Editor's note: Seasoned entrepreneurs know that a great idea for a new company is no guarantee of a successful exit. Startups fail more often than not, largely due to hubris-fueled mistakes by an inexperienced founding team. Alas, the... View Details

Keywords: by Noam Wasserman

23 Sep 2022
Research & Ideas

8 Strategies to Sustain Business Innovation

help leaders more successfully innovate and change in their industries as they parse mixed messages about the global economy, with rampant inflation wearing on consumers and investors preparing for recession. Productive Tensions covers all stages of business, from... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert

March 1995 (Revised July 1996)
Case

Mattson Foods, Inc. (Revised): The Bardolini Division

By: Steven C. Wheelwright

The Bardolini Division of Mattson Foods, with plants in the northeast and midwest, wants to open up the western market for its pizza. Management must decide whether to build a new plant on the West Coast, and what type of technology to put in the plant if they decide... View Details

Keywords: Logistics; Emerging Markets; Business Startups; Decision Choices and Conditions; Business Plan; Capital Budgeting; Expansion; Buildings and Facilities; Strategic Planning; Marketing Strategy; Technology; Economic Systems; Food and Beverage Industry

11 Oct 2016
First Look

October 11, 2016

controlling for current performance, and that this relation is driven by the perceptions of middle management and professional staff rather than senior executives, hourly, or commissioned workers. Taken together, these results suggest... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

December 2016
Case

thredUP: Think Secondhand First

By: Thomas Eisenmann, Allison Ciechanover and Jeff Huizinga

In the fall of 2016, the management team at thredUP, the largest U.S. online retailer of second hand clothing, is deciding whether to expand into international markets. Over the past 12 months the 7-year-old startup, which had raised over $130 million in venture... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Start-ups; International Expansion; Online Consignment; Apparel; Internet and the Web; Expansion; Entrepreneurship; Global Strategy; Business Startups; E-commerce; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Retail Industry; San Francisco

31 Jan 2012
First Look

First Look: Jan. 31

avoidable ways. This article is based on the analysis of hundreds of work diaries from professionals describing everyday events that involved high-level managers in their companies. The analysis uncovered four major types of actions that... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne & Carmen Nobel

18 Sep 2019
Op-Ed

WeWork—The IPO That Shouldn’t?

No IPO in recent memory has received as much negative pre-public publicity as WeWork, which provides shared workspaces and services for startups and other enterprises. The outpouring of criticism has focused on a number of items including... View Details

Keywords: by Nori Gerardo Lietz; Financial Services; Real Estate

April 2006 (Revised March 2007)
Case

Black Duck Software

By: Constance E. Bagley and David Lane

Black Duck Software involves a venture-backed start-up that converted software developers' concerns about violating copyright licensing agreements or open source protocols into an opportunity to help firms use technology to better manage their compliance efforts.... View Details

Keywords: Value Creation; Law; Open Source Distribution; Applications and Software; Business Startups; Copyright

February 2007
Case

Orientation for Viewing "Startup.com"

By: Noam T. Wasserman

Introduces founders Kaleil Isaza Tuzman and Tom Herman as they start and grow govWorks.com. The movie "Startup.com" documents the challenges that these founders face in building their company while dealing with tensions within the founding team and managing a demanding... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Corporate Governance; Management Teams; Relationships; Familiarity

03 Nov 2015
First Look

November 3, 2015

integral component of management control systems and play a significant role in achieving desirable performance outcomes. We focus on a key environmental performance objective—reduction of carbon emissions—as a setting in which to examine... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

June 2024
Case

Aidoc: Building a Hospital-Centric AI Platform

By: Ariel D. Stern and Susan Pinckney

In 2023, Israel-based AI health care company Aidoc evaluated its future. The company, founded in 2016, had grown from commercializing a single AI product for radiologists to a software platform that could detect 20 conditions and immediately notify care teams of... View Details