Publications

November 2014
Case

BRAC in 2014

By: Tarun Khanna, Rachna Tahilyani, Reeti Roy and Aldo Sesia

In the early 1970s BRAC was a startup nongovernmental organization (NGO) working in Bangladesh. By 2014, it was the world's largest NGO. It had a strong presence in Bangladesh and had begun to deliver social development programs in nine other countries. Its founder and... View Details

Keywords: BRAC; Bangladesh; NGO; Strategy; Business Model; Business Organization; Social Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Enterprise; Social Issues; Poverty; Bangladesh

January 2011 (Revised November 2015)
Case

The National Geographic Society (A)

By: David A. Garvin and Carin-Isabel Knoop

In January 2010, John Fahey, president, CEO, and chairman of the board of trustees' executive committee of the Washington, D.C.-based National Geographic Society (NGS), must decide how best to organize the 121-year old mission-driven organization for a world of... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Information Publishing; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Growth and Development Strategy; Managerial Roles; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Organizational Structure; Internet; Publishing Industry

June 2010
Teaching Note

American Well: The Doctor Will E-See You Now (TN)

By: Elie Ofek

Teaching Note for 510061. View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Information Technology; Innovation and Invention; Online Technology; Revenue; System; Opportunities; Technology Adoption; Growth and Development; Brands and Branding; Business Model; Health Industry; United States

November 2007 (Revised April 2008)
Case

Hariyali Kisaan Bazaar: A Rural Business Initiative

By: David E. Bell, Nitin Sanghavi, Virginia Fuller and Mary L. Shelman

In rural India, farmers historically had limited access to quality input items for both their fields and homes. Indian conglomerate DSCL has undertaken a Rural Business Initiative to address this issue, establishing a chain of retail outlets throughout rural India... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business Conglomerates; Agribusiness; Rural Scope; Customer Relationship Management; Business Strategy; Service Operations; Networks; Alliances; Retail Industry; India

September–October 2022
Article

Should Your Company Sell on Amazon?: Reach Comes at a Price

By: Ayelet Israeli, Leonard A. Schlesinger, Matt Higgins and Sabir Semerkant

Selling on Amazon allows brands to reach millions of consumers—but that exposure comes with costs. They include smaller margins, more competition, the risk of commoditization, and less knowledge about customers. In this article, the authors present a scorecard to... View Details

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January 2014 (Revised March 2015)
Technical Note

The Market Power of Platform-Mediated Networks

By: Benjamin Edelman

This note provides criteria to evaluate the power of a platform-mediated network. For a company considering building such a network or an investor considering funding such an effort, this analysis reveals the scope and desirability of the opportunity. Meanwhile, for a... View Details

Keywords: Intermediaries; Platforms; Platform Strategy; Business Model; Agreements and Arrangements; Distribution Channels; Networks; Technology Platform; Telecommunications Industry; Travel Industry; Financial Services Industry

May 2001 (Revised January 2010)
Case

Submarino.com (A)

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Meredith Collura and Luiz Felipe Monteiro

Enables a thorough analysis of Submarino.com, a B2C e-commerce company with a presence in Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Spain, and Portugal. Examines the company's global operations as well as its organizational design and operating and management capabilities. Considers... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Globalized Firms and Management; Operations; Organizational Design; Strategy; Internet; Retail Industry; Portugal; Spain; Mexico; Argentina; Brazil

05 Mar 2014
What Do You Think?

When Will the Next Dot.com Bubble Burst?

monetize concepts, many of them apps for Android and IOS, driving doubtful revenue models in packed market segments with little differentiating code." Nol Perreira asked, "What will prick the bubble? The timing of that is, one... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Publishing; Retail

12 Feb 2007
Lessons from the Classroom

‘UpTick’ Brings Wall Street Pressure to Students

although the real world outcome ends up being quite close to the prediction of a model that assumes everyone is identical," he says. "But students aren't going to take your word for that. They'll believe the assumptions are... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Financial Services; Education

22 Apr 2002
Research & Ideas

Work, Family, Private Life: Why Not All Three?

power and sexual prowess. Between then and now, he asserted, women have fought for equality and in so doing have lost their souls. They have responded to the model of the classical hero—the man who battled his enemies and reaped the... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

01 Feb 2000
Research & Ideas

Keeping Track: Performance Measurement, Control & Strategy

materials into the classroom and refined the concepts and models through discussions with students in my MBA course, Achieving Profit Goals and Strategies. The result is the fourteen chapters of this book, which includes contributions by... View Details

Keywords: Re: Robert Simons

Profile

Adam Kanner

live events without cannibalizing full price tickets or hurting the brand, he could fill a huge market niche. In 2009, Kanner, MBA ‘98, started ScoreBig, an online ticketing service with a “name-a-ticket-price” model that... View Details

Profile

Angela R. Hicks Bowman

categories, from plumbers to roofers to exterminators, and created a membership model that they spread into an increasing number of geographies. As a startup venture, being able to get its customers exactly what they wanted was crucial... View Details

Web

South Asia - Global Activities 2020

South Asia South Asia Immersion Offers Students Insight on Development in Sri Lanka Pictured: Students in front of a model of the Port City Colombo Project in Colombo, Sri Lanka. During the final leg of a three-country immersive course... View Details

01 Apr 2002
News

Pamela Thomas Graham

height of the civil rights movement, Thomas-Graham's parents held up Thurgood Marshall and other lawyers as role models who created peaceful change at a time when racial tensions were running high. "Our family heroes were African... View Details

Keywords: Amusement, Gambling, and Recreation Industries; Arts, Entertainment

October 2000 (Revised October 2001)
Case

adM@rt(A)

By: F. Warren McFarlan, Carin-Isabel Knoop and David Lane

Describes the complex policy alternatives facing an online Hong Kong grocery company as it tries to apply Webvan-type concepts in the Hong Kong marketplace. Captures the extraordinary process of adaptation the company is going through as it tries to find the right... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Markets; Marketing; Business Strategy; Business Model; Decisions; Problems and Challenges; Retail Industry; Web Services Industry; Hong Kong

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June 2022
Teaching Note

Bespoken Spirits: Disrupting Distilling

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 721-419. On October 7, 2020, Bespoken Spirits publicly announced it had received $2.6 million of seed funding for its “sustainable maturation process,” a process that could produce award-winning whiskeys in just days rather than years... View Details

Keywords: B2B Vs. B2C; Technological Innovation; Business Startups; Cost Management; Business Model; Consumer Products Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Service Industry