Publications

24 Mar 2002
Lessons from the Classroom

Case Study: A Lesson in Private Venture Financing

With few opportunities for IPOs, a developing infrastructure, low transparency, and a limited labor market, the environment for private venture financing in Africa could be described as "challenging" at best. Yet if the demands... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

04 Feb 2020
Cold Call Podcast

Why Backstage Capital Invests in ‘Underestimated’ Entrepreneurs

Keywords: Financial Services

2012
Other Unpublished Work

Lost in the Clouds: The Impact of Copyright Scope on Investment in Cloud Computing Ventures

By: Josh Lerner and Greg Rafert

Our analysis seeks to understand the impact of changes in copyright scope on investment in new firms. We begin by analyzing the investment effects of the Cartoon Network, et al. v. Cablevision decision in the U.S. and court rulings in France and Germany on venture... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Venture Capital; Internet and the Web; Investment; Business Startups; Copyright; France; Germany; United States; European Union

Web

Winners & Success Stories | New Venture Competition

Winners & Success Stories The New Venture Competition has been the launching pad for many ventures, and not just from the winning teams. With more than half of Harvard Business School alumni classifying themselves as entrepreneurs at some... View Details

January 2019
Teaching Note

Yale University Investments Office: February 2015

By: Josh Lerner, Nori Gerardo Lietz and Terrence Shu

Teaching Note for HBS No. 815-124. View Details

Keywords: Asset Management; Venture Capital; Private Equity; Investment Fund; Investment Strategy

March 1997
Article

Transactions Costs and Capital Structure Choice: Evidence from Financially Distressed Firms

By: S. C. Gilson

This study provides evidence that transactions costs discourage debt reductions by financially distressed firms when they restructure their debt out of court. As a result, these firms remain highly leveraged and one-in-three subsequently experience financial distress.... View Details

Keywords: Cost; Capital Structure; Decision Choices and Conditions; Information; Finance; Business Ventures

August 2021 (Revised November 2021)
Case

The NCB Capital Turnaround: Waking the Sleeping Giant

By: Sandra J. Sucher, Gamze Yucaoglu, Shalene Gupta and Fares Khrais

The case opens in 2019, five years after, Sarah Al Suhaimi, CEO of NCB Capital (NCBC), the investment arm of Saudi’s largest bank, NCB, took the helm. Having successfully turned the business to make it the market leader, she was contemplating her next steps as... View Details

Keywords: Turnaround; Investment Banking; Financial Institutions; Change Management; Leadership; Business Model; Strategy; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Management Teams; Asset Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Saudi Arabia

September 2020
Teaching Plan

Harlem Capital: Changing the Face of Entrepreneurship

By: George Serafeim

Jarrid Tingle and Henri Pierre-Jacques had spent the summer between their first and second years of their MBA program fund raising for their start-up venture capital (VC) firm, Harlem Capital Partners. Harlem Capital was founded upon the principle that addressing the... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital Firm Compensation; Entrepreneurial Finance; Entrepreneurial Financing; Black Entrepreneurs; Black Leadership; Black Inventors; Inclusion; Minority-owned Businesses; Race And Ethnicity; Race Characteristics; Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Diversity; Race; Gender; Mission and Purpose; Social Enterprise; Financial Services Industry; United States

July 2017
Case

A Green Forest Grows in Brooklyn: Joint Venturing with the Chinese

By: Charles F. Wu

MaryAnne Gilmartin, President and CEO of Forest City Ratner (“Forest City”) was planning for yet another protracted discussion over the merits of a green roof for part of her $5 billion dollar new development in Brooklyn. While the low seven-figure cost overrun was to... View Details

Keywords: Real Estate Development; Real Estate; EB-5; Sustainability; Promote; Waterfall; Joint Ventures; Environmental Sustainability; Relationships; Real Estate Industry; China

March–April 1997
Article

Virtuous Capital: What Foundations Can Learn From Venture Capitalists

By: Allen Grossman

Keywords: Capital; Venture Capital; Learning

28 Sep 2023
News

What Ray Dalio Can Teach Us About Global Venture and Startups

global business in the future. Writing for his Substack newsletter 99% Tech, Lazarow, a managing partner at Fluent Ventures and author of Out-Innovate, notes, “Dalio believes that existing reserve currencies, including the US dollar,... View Details

June 2021
Case

Building the Governance to Take Capital SAFI to the Next Level

By: V.G. Narayanan, Asis Martinez Jerez and Mariana Cal

Asset management firm Capital SAFI wanted to attract new strategic investors and expand to other countries. Having the right corporate governance in place was critical to achieve this goal. View Details

Keywords: Board Of Directors; Transparency; Sustainable Finance; South America; Latin America; Corporate Governance; Governance Controls; Governing and Advisory Boards; Business Organization; Corporate Strategy; Transformation; Investment Funds; Financial Services Industry; Bolivia; South America; Latin America

23 Aug 2020
News

In the UK, She Leads the Search for a COVID Vaccine

told the Daily Mail. In fact, Bingham’s role—working with pharmaceutical firms, planning manufacturing facilities, and making investment decisions—ties in directly with her career experience. “As a venture capitalist, I have to write a... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19; vaccines; leadership; biomedicine; venture capital; operations; public health; government innovation; Finance; Scientific Research and Development Services

March 2001 (Revised August 2001)
Exercise

Ginny's Restaurant: An Introduction to Capital Investment Valuation

An individual is considering the development of a new restaurant. To make the decision, she uses NPV analysis to determine whether she should undertake the investment, and, if so, the optimal size of the investment. View Details

Keywords: Valuation; Decision Making; Business Startups

August 2009
Article

Multinational Firms, FDI Flows and Imperfect Capital Markets

By: Pol Antras, Mihir Desai and C. Fritz Foley

Keywords: Business Ventures; Capital; Markets

December 2002
Article

Learning about Internal Capital Markets from Corporate Spinoffs

By: Robert Gertner, Eric Powers and David S. Scharfstein

Keywords: Capital; Markets; Business Ventures

01 Jun 2011
Working Paper Summaries

The First Deal: The Division of Founder Equity in New Ventures

Keywords: by Thomas F. Hellmann & Noam Wasserman

28 May 2015
Working Paper Summaries

Lost in the Clouds: The Impact of Changing Property Rights on Investment in Cloud Computing Ventures

Keywords: by Josh Lerner & Greg Rafert; Technology

September 2020 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and The Cost of Capital

By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher

In 2000, Eaton Corporation was a broadly diversified industrial conglomerate. But its strategy was evolving and its focus was narrowing around “power management” and more recently on “intelligent power,” the use of digitally enabled products and services designed to... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Business Divisions; Cost of Capital; Corporate Finance; Value; Valuation; Industrial Products Industry; United States; Denmark; Republic of Ireland