Publications

June 2024
Case

Growing Foodology into Latin America's Largest Platform for Virtual Restaurants

By: Jorge Tamayo, Rembrand Koning and Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago

This case delves into the expansion strategy of Foodology, a cloud kitchen startup based in Bogotá that operated across four Latin American countries (Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, and Peru). Co-founders Daniela Izquierdo and Juan Guillermo Azuero (both HBS, 2019) grappled... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Food; Digital Platforms; Product Launch; Growth and Development Strategy; Business Strategy; Business Model; Business Startups; Profit; Marketing Strategy; Expansion; Diversification; Food and Beverage Industry; Latin America; South America; Colombia; Brazil; Mexico; Peru

2012
Article

Wider dem sauren Mund. Beiersdorfs U.S.-Geschaeft mit der Zahnpastamarke Pebeco

By: G. Jones and Christina Lubinski

This article examines the growth and ultimate demise of the toothpaste brand Pebeco, which was created by the German personal care company Beiersdorf in 1903. The brand was an enormous international success, becoming for a time the largest toothpaste brand in the... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development; Market Entry and Exit; Problems and Challenges; Marketing Strategy; Markets; Change; Customers; Social Psychology; Science; Brands and Branding; Competitive Strategy; Consumer Products Industry; United States; Germany

Find at Harvard

November 2021 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Hitting Home: Amazon and Mary's Place

By: Paul M. Healy, Debora L. Spar and Amy Klopfenstein

In 2020, Amazon, the $386 billion online retail behemoth, built an eight-story shelter for women and families experiencing homelessness on its expanding headquarters in Seattle, Washington. The shelter, operated in partnership with a non-profit organization known as... View Details

Keywords: Business Ethics; Homelessness; Business And Society; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Social Issues; Corporate Accountability; Urban Development; Society; Information Technology; Ethics; Technology Industry; Seattle; United States; North America

May 2009 (Revised July 2011)
Case

Daqi

By: Robert C. Pozen, Richard Franklyn Armbrust and Ziquan Zhang

In 2008, Daqi was one of the largest Internet portals for user-generated content and the leading word-of-mouth marketing provider in China. Grace Zhou, Daqi's CEO, was contemplating the risks and benefits of expanding Daqi's services into three new content areas—news,... View Details

Keywords: Information Publishing; Growth and Development Strategy; Risk Management; Marketing; Business and Government Relations; Expansion; Internet; Information Industry; China

March 2006
Supplement

Geeli (CW)

By: Kenneth A. Froot and Li Jin

A well-performing Chinese manufacturer faces major impediments raising funding to grow. Highlights various imperfections that shape the financing decision. View Details

Keywords: Capital Costs; Diversification; Cost of Capital; Financing and Loans; Financial Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Manufacturing Industry; China

February 2005 (Revised November 2006)
Case

InfoVision (A): Technology Transfer at Georgia Tech

InfoVision illustrates university technology transfer through the choices of a graduating doctoral student. Also explores the challenges of working across the scientific, business, and legal disciplines in the Georgia Tech transfer program. View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Problems and Challenges; Transformation; Higher Education; Science-Based Business; Commercialization; Research and Development; Education Industry; Georgia (state, US)

12 Sep 2016
Research & Ideas

What Brands Can Do to Monitor Factory Conditions of Suppliers

View Video Video by Amelia Kundhardt They keep on coming—corporate scandals involving revelations of deplorable working conditions at overseas factories. If it’s not the Foxconn factories that Apple employs in China, then it’s Gap’s garment workers in Bangladesh. When... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

November 2002 (Revised August 2003)
Case

MedSource Technologies

By: Robert S. Huckman

Considers the issues facing Richard Effress, MedSource's chairman and CEO, as the firm approaches the Precision Cut project--the first test of MedSource's capabilities as an integrated, contract manufacturer in the medical device industry. MedSource Technologies was... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Production; Mergers and Acquisitions; Product Design; Supply Chain Management; Management Teams; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; United States

May 1992 (Revised January 2000)
Case

Asea Brown Boveri: The ABACUS System

By: Robert L. Simons

Describes the computer-based information system (ABACUS) used to monitor and control business operations in a complex, global company. Describes the technical attributes of the database system, financial reporting requirements, target setting and profit calculations on... View Details

Keywords: Financial Reporting; Profit; Business Growth and Maturation; Analytics and Data Science; Design; Accounting Audits; Growth and Development; Globalized Firms and Management; Complexity; Technology Industry

May 2008
Supplement

Finansbank 2006 (CW)

By: C. Fritz Foley and Linnea Meyer

How do financial policy requirements and benefits of ownership concentration affect the need for and process of corporate restructuring? This case provides students with an opportunity to analyze the restructuring of a Turkish multinational business group by way of a... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Restructuring; Financing and Loans; Policy; Compensation and Benefits; Growth and Development Strategy; Ownership; Business and Shareholder Relations; Banking Industry; Russia; Turkey; Romania; Switzerland; Ukraine

April 2007 (Revised July 2011)
Case

The Tale of the Lynx (A)

By: Noam Wasserman

The founders of Lynx Solutions have survived major challenges within their board of directors, the firing of Lynx's founder-CEO and departure of its successor CEO, and a crisis sparked by media allegations that it had been spying on its users. Now that the company is... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Decision Choices and Conditions; Governing and Advisory Boards; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Teams; Conflict and Resolution; Business Strategy; Computer Industry

June 2010 (Revised May 2017)
Teaching Note

Sydney IVF: Stem Cell Research

By: Robert Simons and Kathryn Rosenberg

Teaching Note for 109017. View Details

Keywords: Strategy And Execution; Management Control Systems; Levers Of Control; Strategy; Risk Management; Decisions; Cooperative Ownership; Product Development; Moral Sensibility; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Expansion; Science-Based Business; Research; Management Practices and Processes; Business Subsidiaries; Biotechnology Industry; Sydney

23 Aug 2004
Research & Ideas

New Challenges for Long-Term Investors

Is there a single best investment allocation strategy for the long-term investor? Some theories favor a one-portfolio-for-all investors approach, emphasizing a best-mix-of-assets program. The more traditional approach, which developed out... View Details

Keywords: by Ann Cullen

November 1999 (Revised June 2006)
Case

DLJdirect: "Putting Our Reputation Online"

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Gillian Morris

Online broker DLJdirect faced two decisions during the fall of 1999: what customer segments should it target and how much should it spend on marketing? Unlike its competitors, who focused either on day traders or more mainstream investors, DLJdirect differentiated its... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Marketing Communications; Competitive Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Investment; Cost Management; Business Plan; Research and Development; Customers; Budgets and Budgeting; Online Advertising; Internet; Financial Services Industry

20 Feb 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, February 20, 2018

that suppliers that extend significant amounts of trade credit hold private information about their trade partners. Trade creditors who are geographically closer or in similar industries tend to lend the most, suggesting that these are... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

March 2010 (Revised November 2010)
Case

Pandora Radio: Fire Unprofitable Customers?

By: Willy C. Shih and Halle Alicia Tecco

Pandora Radio is at a crossroads. Founder Tim Westergren has just been told by a well known VC to get rid of his unprofitable customers in order to get his costs down, but Westergren is not sure that such actions are consistent with his company's business model.... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customer Satisfaction; Music Entertainment; Venture Capital; Profit; Growth and Development Strategy; Consumer Behavior; Internet; Media and Broadcasting Industry

March 2007
Teaching Note

Canyon Johnson Urban Fund (TN)

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee

Teaching note to 706442. View Details

Keywords: Partners and Partnerships; Investment; Projects; Urban Development; Business and Community Relations; Price; Economics; Financial Services Industry; Los Angeles

October 2024
Case

Grain Management

By: Archie Jones, Michael Norris, Alliyah Gary and Chelsea Grain-Jefferson

Keywords: Family Business; Entrepreneurship; Private Equity; Management Succession; Ownership Stake; Retirement; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; United States