Publications

2005
Chapter

Environmental Protection and the Social Responsibility of Firms: Perspectives from the Business Literature

By: Forest Reinhardt

Keywords: Environmental Sustainability; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

February 2005
Article

Managing the Ecosystem

By: Marco Iansiti

The days of the corporate lone wolf are over. In our increasingly interconnected world, standing alone is no longer a viable business model. Instead, smart companies rely heavily on networks of partners, suppliers, and customers to achieve market success and sustain... View Details

Keywords: Integrated Corporate Reporting; Partners and Partnerships; Industry Clusters; Customers; Markets; Situation or Environment; Banks and Banking; Insurance; Software

December 2004 (Revised May 2005)
Case

Nestle: Sustainable Agriculture Initiative

By: Forest L. Reinhardt

Swiss food giant Nestle attempts to improve the performance of its suppliers of agricultural commodities to raise quality, lower costs, and contribute to sustainable development. Its initiatives focus first on coffee, cocoa, and milk. Nestle managers assert that the... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Social Issues; Business and Community Relations; Corporate Strategy; Agribusiness; Supply Chain Management; Marketing Strategy; Value Creation; Food and Beverage Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

November 2004 (Revised May 2005)
Case

Marvel Enterprises, Inc.

By: Anita Elberse

The management team of Marvel Enterprises, known for its universe of superhero characters that includes Spider-Man, the Hulk, and X-Men, must reevaluate its marketing strategy. In June 2004, only six years after the company emerged from bankruptcy, Marvel has amassed a... View Details

Keywords: Intellectual Property; Business Model; Brands and Branding; Marketing Strategy; Opportunities; Growth and Development Strategy; Rights; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

September 2004 (Revised June 2005)
Case

QUALCOMM, Inc. 2004

By: David B. Yoffie, Pai-Ling Yin and Elizabeth Kind

QUALCOMM, Inc. had transitioned from a fledgling startup into a Fortune 500 wireless technology leader. Its CDMA technology was considered the preeminent technology and was the world's fastest growing wireless communications technology. CEO Irwin Jacobs had a number of... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Government and Politics; Leadership Style; Resource Allocation; Product Positioning; Problems and Challenges; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; China; India

July 2004 (Revised May 2008)
Case

Beacon Lakes

By: Arthur I Segel, Robert Barlick Jr and Jose Gonzalez

In September 2001, Armando Codina, the CEO and chairman of Codina Group, is facing the decision of whether to go ahead as planned with its $220 million Beacon Lakes project, a 6.6-million-square-foot warehouse and office park in Miami's Airport West submarket. Although... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Urban Scope; Business and Government Relations; Natural Environment; Expansion; Environmental Sustainability; Real Estate Industry; Everglades National Park; Miami

2004
Book

The Keystone Advantage: What the New Dynamics of Business Ecosystems Mean for Strategy, Innovation, and Sustainability

By: Marco Iansiti and Roy Levien

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Strategy; Innovation and Invention

May 2004
Article

Environmental Implications of Wireless Technologies: News Delivery and Business Meetings

By: Michael W. Toffel and Arpad Horvath

Keywords: Information Technology; Communication; Information; Environmental Sustainability; Business Ventures; Technology Industry

February 2004 (Revised March 2004)
Case

Fuel Cells: The Hydrogen Revolution?

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Ryland Matthew Willis

The challenges faced in establishing hydrogen fuel cell-powered transportation in the United States, which promises to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and dependence on imported oil is examined. Foremost among these challenges is a "chicken-and-egg" dynamic: consumers... View Details

Keywords: Taxation; Environmental Sustainability; Infrastructure; Government Administration; Energy Sources; Business and Government Relations; Network Effects; Transportation; Green Technology Industry; Energy Industry; European Union; Japan; United States

February 2004
Case

The Making of Verizon

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter, Douglas A Raymond and Ryan Raffaelli

Through a series of mergers, Ivan Seidenberg, Verizon chairman and CEO, successfully shared the co-CEO title twice while building the largest telecom company in the United States. The strong and complementary cultures of the companies that Seidenberg and a key group of... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Change Management; Transition; Leading Change; Organizational Culture; Risk Management; Telecommunications Industry; United States

January 2004
Background Note

Beyond the IT Monolith

By: Marco Iansiti and Gregg Rotenberg

Leading companies are employing a radical new approach to IT--an approach that points the way to a new model of software architecture and deployment. These companies' successes seem to indicate that the problems IT critics have correctly identified are not, in fact,... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Business Processes; Change

January 2004
Article

Corporate Venturing: The Origins of Unilever's Pregnancy Test

By: Geoffrey Jones and Alison Kraft

The relative ability of different sizes of firm and organisational designs to develop and sustain dynamic capabilities in innovation and create new businesses remains a matter of contention. While Chandler among many others has emphasised the pre-eminent role of large... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Organizational Design; Technological Innovation; Business Startups; Venture Capital; Brands and Branding; Multinational Firms and Management; Product Development; Product Launch; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Great Britain

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

September 2003 (Revised June 2005)
Case

Learning from LeapFrog: Creating Educational and Business Value

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Christopher Dede and Susan Saltrick

Explores the success factors leading to one's company's rise to the number three ranking in the aggressively competitive toy industry. LeapFrog has made the strategic decision to exploit its educational model in two industry sectors: consumer toys and educational... View Details

Keywords: Transformation; Decisions; Education; Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Invention; Growth Management; Media; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Research; Value Creation

September 2003 (Revised May 2006)
Case

Eyeblaster: Enabling the Next Generation of Online Advertising

By: Elie Ofek

Eyeblaster management has to decide on the best course of action to sustain its momentum from enabling online rich media advertising. Pressure from competitors is forcing the company to re-evaluate its previous marketing strategy that focused primarily on getting... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Marketing Strategy; Market Entry and Exit; Performance Evaluation; Digital Marketing; Growth and Development Strategy

2003
Book

What Really Works: The 4+2 Formula for Sustained Business Success

By: William F. Joyce, Nitin Nohria and Bruce Roberson

Keywords: Success

February 2003
Other Article

The Emergence and Sustainability of Abnormal Profits

By: Michael E. Porter and Anita M. McGahan

In this paper, we examine the emergence and the sustainability of abnormal profits among businesses that were part of U.S. public corporations between 1981 and 1994 and that reported financial results for at least six years. Our results reveal strong asymmetries... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; United States

2003
Article

BMW Group's Sustainability Management System: Preliminary Results, Ongoing Challenges, and the UN Global Compact

By: Michael W. Toffel, Natalie Hill and Kellie McElhaney

This article describes preliminary results and ongoing challenges faced by Designworks/USA, an industrial design subsidiary of BMW Group, in its sustainability management efforts since it implemented the world's first certified Sustainability Management System (SMS).... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Sustainability; Management Systems; Standards; Social Issues; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Outcome or Result; Auto Industry

2003
Article

Developing a Management Systems Approach to Sustainability at BMW Group

By: Michael W. Toffel, Natalie Hill and Kellie McElhaney

This article describes how Designworks/USA, a subsidiary of BMW Group, developed a Sustainability Management System (SMS) by integrating the management of environmental, social, and traditional business issues. After several months of deploying the SMS throughout its... View Details

Keywords: Environmental Sustainability; Management Systems; Standards; Operations; Auto Industry