Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(8,929)
- Faculty Publications (2,513)
- 2021
- Working Paper
No-fault Default, Chapter 11 Bankruptcy, and Financial Institutions
By: Robert C. Merton and Richard T. Thakor
This paper analyzes the costs and benefits of a no-fault-default debt structure as an alternative to the typical bankruptcy process. We show that the deadweight costs of bankruptcy can be avoided or substantially reduced through no-fault-default debt, which permits a... View Details
- January 2021
- Article
The Effects of Menu Costs on Retail Performance: Evidence from Adoption of the Electronic Shelf Label Technology
By: Ioannis Stamatopoulos, Achal Bassamboo and Antonio Moreno
We use the adoption of electronic shelf labels (ESLs) by an international grocery retailer in 2015 to identify the effects of physical menu costs (i.e., labor and material costs of price adjustment) on retail performance. We find that the installation of ESLs increased... View Details
- Article
Towards Robust and Reliable Algorithmic Recourse
By: Sohini Upadhyay, Shalmali Joshi and Himabindu Lakkaraju
As predictive models are increasingly being deployed in high-stakes decision making (e.g., loan
approvals), there has been growing interest in post-hoc techniques which provide recourse to affected
individuals. These techniques generate recourses under the assumption... View Details
- December 2020 (Revised March 2022)
- Teaching Note
Forecasting ClimaCell
By: Joshua Lev Krieger, Christopher Stanton and James Barnett
A weather technology startup, ClimaCell considers the R&D trade-offs and financing implications of pursuing a proposed contract with a major automobile maker, rather than continuing its focus on building a scalable, all-purpose weather prediction engine. View Details
- December 2020 (Revised December 2021)
- Case
Komatsu and Smart Construction
By: Rajiv Lal, David J. Collis and Akiko Saito
Komatsu, Japan's leading construction equipment manufacturer, is considering investing in a digital platform "Smart Construction" that will digitise the entire work process on a construction site, allowing for substantial reductions in cost and time while improving... View Details
- December 2020 (Revised February 2021)
- Supplement
The Tulsa Massacre and the Call for Reparations
By: Mihir A. Desai and Suzanne Antoniou
How should historic social injustices be addressed? Survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Massacre and their descendants, including Representative Regina Goodwin of Tulsa, believe they should be addressed through reparations and have consequently continued to push the government... View Details
Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Decision Choices and Conditions; Decisions; Judgments; Race; Fairness; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Governance; Policy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government Legislation; Government and Politics; Government Administration; Lawsuits and Litigation; Legal Liability; Leading Change; Mission and Purpose; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Conflict and Resolution; Conflict Management; Loss; Motivation and Incentives; Perspective; Prejudice and Bias; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Welfare; Tulsa; Oklahoma; United States
- December 2020 (Revised February 2021)
- Teaching Note
The Tulsa Massacre and the Call for Reparations
By: Mihir A. Desai and Suzanne Antoniou
How should historic social injustices be addressed? Survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Massacre and their descendants, including Representative Regina Goodwin of Tulsa, believe they should be addressed through reparations and have consequently continued to push the government... View Details
Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Decision Choices and Conditions; Decisions; Judgments; Race; Fairness; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Governance; Policy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government Legislation; Government and Politics; Government Administration; Lawsuits and Litigation; Legal Liability; Leading Change; Mission and Purpose; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Conflict and Resolution; Conflict Management; Loss; Motivation and Incentives; Perspective; Prejudice and Bias; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Welfare; Tulsa; Oklahoma; United States
- December 2020 (Revised May 2021)
- Case
Riverstone
By: David E. Bell and Natalie Kindred
In 2020, Luke Minion and the leadership team at Riverstone, a hog producer founded in 2013 in Shandong, China, were evaluating Riverstone’s strategy as it rebounded from outbreaks of African Swine Fever (ASF) in two of its three farm complexes. Riverstone was a joint... View Details
Keywords: Strategy; Globalization; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Consumer Behavior; Demand and Consumers; Disruption; Risk and Uncertainty; Risk Management; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Consulting Industry; United States; China
- 2020
- Working Paper
An Empirical Guide to Investor-Level Private Equity Data from Preqin
By: Juliane Begenau, Claudia Robles-Garcia, Emil Siriwardane and Lulu Wang
This note provides guidance on the use of investor-level private equity data from Preqin for empirical research. Preqin primarily sources its cash flow data through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests with U.S. public pensions. Our focus is on the components of... View Details
- Article
Beyond Individualized Recourse: Interpretable and Interactive Summaries of Actionable Recourses
By: Kaivalya Rawal and Himabindu Lakkaraju
As predictive models are increasingly being deployed in high-stakes decision-making, there has been a lot of interest in developing algorithms which can provide recourses to affected individuals. While developing such tools is important, it is even more critical to... View Details
- December 2020
- Article
Monetary Policy and Global Banking
By: Falk Bräuning and Victoria Ivashina
When central banks adjust interest rates, the opportunity cost of lending in local currency changes, but—in absence of frictions—there is no spillover effect to lending in other currencies. However, when equity capital is limited, global banks must benchmark domestic... View Details
- November 2020 (Revised February 2021)
- Case
Wes Hall and the BlackNorth Initiative
By: Shikhar Ghosh, Marilyn Morgan Westner and Reza Satchu
Wes Hall founded Kingsdale Advisors and built it into one of Canada’s leading shareholder services and advisory firms. Influenced by the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and a series of social injustices—specifically the death of George Floyd in police custody—Hall... View Details
- November 2020 (Revised May 2023)
- Case
Holaluz: Taking on the Spanish Energy Market
By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini, Oded Koenigsberg, Elena Corsi and Emer Moloney
In 2020, the three cofounders of Holaluz, a newcomer to Spain’s electricity retail market, are preparing to launch a new offering: installing and managing solar panels on households' roofs at no extra cost for the consumer, who would still benefit from the energy... View Details
- November 2020 (Revised April 2021)
- Case
Roll-Ups and Surprise Billing: Collisions at the Intersection of Private Equity and Patient Care
By: Trevor Fetter and Kira Seiger
This case describes the increasing investment by private equity (PE) firms in patient care and other healthcare services. The case focuses on investments in physician staffing firms and roll-up strategy investments in physician practice management (PPM). Included in... View Details
Keywords: Business Ventures; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Model; Change; Disruption; Fluctuation; Trends; Customers; Customer Value and Value Chain; Ethics; Fairness; Finance; Equity; Insurance; Private Equity; Geography; Geographic Scope; Health; Health Care and Treatment; Markets; Demand and Consumers; Supply and Industry; Industry Structures; Ownership; Ownership Type; Private Ownership; Relationships; Agency Theory; Business and Community Relations; Business and Shareholder Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Networks; Strategy; Competition; Consolidation; Expansion; Integration; Horizontal Integration; Vertical Integration; Value; Value Creation; Health Industry; Insurance Industry; United States
- 2020
- Working Paper
Determinants of Early-Stage Startup Performance: Survey Results
To explore determinants of new venture performance, the CEOs of 470 early-stage startups were surveyed regarding a broad range of factors related to their venture’s customer value proposition, product management, marketing, technology and operations, financial... View Details
- November–December 2020
- Article
Lifting the Veil: The Benefits of Cost Transparency
By: Bhavya Mohan, Ryan W. Buell and Leslie K. John
Firms do not typically disclose information on their costs to produce a good to consumers. However, we provide evidence of when and why doing so can increase consumers’ purchase interest. Specifically, building on the psychology of disclosure and trust, we posit that... View Details
- Article
Returnable Reciprocity: Returnable Gifts Are More Effective than Unreturnable Gifts at Promoting Virtuous Behaviors
By: J.J. Zlatev and Rogers, T.
Increasing virtuous behaviors, such as initiating healthy habits, is an important goal for policymakers and social scientists. To promote compliance with requests to perform virtuous behaviors, we study “returnable reciprocity.” Whereas traditional reciprocity involves... View Details
Keywords: Nudges; Reciprocity; Want-should Conflicts; Wellness; Health; Behavior; Change; Well-being
- October 2020
- Case
TowerBrook: ESG in Action (A)
By: Victoria Ivashina, Brian Trelstad and Meaghan Conway
This case is the first of a two-part series that follows Ramez Sousou and his team at TowerBrook Capital Partners as they face a challenging investment decision in February of 2013. Since its founding, TowerBrook has prided itself on its purpose-driven investing... View Details
Keywords: ESG; Finance; Private Equity; Corporate Governance; Value Creation; Investment; Decision Making
- October 2020
- Supplement
TowerBrook: ESG in Action (B)
By: Victoria Ivashina, Brian Trelstad and Meaghan Conway
This case is the second of a two-part series that follows Ramez Sousou and his team at TowerBrook Capital Partners as they face a challenging investment decision in February of 2013. It is intended to be distributed at the end of the discussion of “TowerBrook: ESG in... View Details
- October 2020 (Revised December 2020)
- Case
AfricInvest: A Pan-African Investment Platform
By: Victoria Ivashina and Youssef Abdel Aal
The case is set in December 2018, when Ziad Oueslati, co-managing director and co-founder of AfricInvest, a leading pan-African private equity firm headquartered in Tunisia, was reflecting on the future direction of his firm. AfricInvest started as a traditional small... View Details