Publications

21 Apr 2016
Cold Call Podcast

Walmart: Changing the World for Better or Worse?

Keywords: Re: Rebecca M. Henderson

Research Summary

Comparative Financial Systems and Corporate Governance

One implication of the inherent logic of a financial system lies in the effects on corporate governance. Differences in financial systems across countries -- for instance, in terms of the role of banks, equity markets, and shareholder voting systems -- result in... View Details

January 2009 (Revised May 2010)
Case

Altoona State Investment Board: December 2008

By: Josh Lerner

Rod Calhoun, the head of the Altoona State Investment Board's private equity investment program, considered the communication he had just received. It was from Permira, the leading European buyout fund, and concerned its fourth fund, to which Altoona had made a £ 100... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Financial Management; Financial Strategy; Investment Funds; Partners and Partnerships

November 2005 (Revised October 2012)
Case

The Auction for Burger King (A)

By: Carliss Y. Baldwin and James Quinn

Paul Walsh, CEO of Diageo, must evaluate bids received in an auction of the Burger King restaurant unit. Describes how Diageo came to own Burger King, the attempts to turn the unit around, the strategic reasons for its sale, the auction process, and various bidders'... View Details

Keywords: Management Teams; Leveraged Buyouts; Bids and Bidding; Valuation; Auctions; Decision Choices and Conditions; Negotiation Tactics; Service Industry; Food and Beverage Industry

January 2004 (Revised October 2006)
Case

Electronic Arts in Online Gaming

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Justin Wong

Electronic Arts (EA), the world's largest independent video-game publisher, must decide whether to support Microsoft's initiatives in online gaming. Historically, EA has been platform-agnostic, releasing versions of its titles for all major console platforms. However,... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy; Digital Platforms; Network Effects; Policy; Customer Focus and Relationships; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Revenue; Segmentation; Sales; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Electronics Industry

19 Feb 2014
News

Choosing the Right Customer

04 Nov 2018
News

Why Large Companies Continue To Struggle With Innovation

23 Feb 2024
Video

Rethinking Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Moving Beyond the Business Case Approach

27 Sep 2019
HBS Seminar

Kevin Boudreau (D'Amore-McKim Sch of Business, Northeastern U), raemarie.copan@harvardbusiness.org

January 2025
Case

Driving Efficiency and Sustainability at P&G China

By: Feng Zhu, Philip Kuai and Billy Chan

P&G China’s business had reached new heights thanks to the explosive growth of e-commerce in the country, but the rapidly increasing volume of shipments to customers had created operational and environmental challenges in terms of packaging waste, shipping damage, and... View Details

Keywords: Transformation; Customer Value and Value Chain; Environmental Sustainability; E-commerce; Logistics; Product Design; Value Creation; Order Taking and Fulfillment; Supply Chain Management; Consumer Products Industry; China

March 2022 (Revised September 2022)
Case

Can Papaya Global Keep Scaling Fast?

By: Daniel Isenberg and William R. Kerr

Companies that employ people all around the world also need to pay those people. That can be an exceedingly complex task, though - defining terms of employment, complying with global regulations, and working with huge quantities of data, among other obstacles,... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Scaling And Growth; Job Design and Levels; Compensation and Benefits; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Global Range

January 2016
Article

Making Do with Less: Working Harder During Recessions

By: Edward P. Lazear, Kathryn L. Shaw and Christopher Stanton

Why did productivity rise during recent recessions? One possibility is that average worker quality increased. A second is that each incumbent worker produced more. The second effect is termed "making do with less." Using data from 2006 to 2010 on individual worker... View Details

Keywords: Performance Productivity; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation

Read Now

February 2001 (Revised May 2001)
Case

Wipro Technologies (A)

By: Lynn S. Paine, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Suma Raju

The new general manager of Wipro's software services division has been brought on board from General Electric to develop the division into a leading provider of software services to the world's largest corporations. A native of India who received management training in... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Transformation; Change Management; Human Resources; Software; Information Technology Industry; India

March 2022 (Revised January 2025)
Technical Note

Exploratory Data Analysis

By: Iavor I. Bojinov, Michael Parzen and Paul Hamilton

This module note provides an overview of exploratory data analysis for an introduction to data science course. It begins by defining the term "data", and then describes the different types of data that companies work with (structured v. unstructured, categorical v.... View Details

Keywords: Data Analysis; Data Science; Statistics; Data Visualization; Exploratory Data Analysis; Analytics and Data Science; Analysis

April 1996 (Revised May 2000)
Case

Bed Bath & Beyond

By: Amy P. Hutton and James Weber

This case examines how accurately investors have incorporated information about the growth strategy of Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY) into share price, especially given the changing competitive environment in the housewares industry and the recent Barron's article pointing... View Details

Keywords: Analysis; Valuation; Financial Statements; Consumer Products Industry; Retail Industry

Article

De Gustibus non est Taxandum: Heterogeneity in Preferences and Optimal Redistribution

By: Benjamin B Lockwood and Matthew Weinzierl

The prominent but unproven intuition that preference heterogeneity reduces redistribution in a standard optimal tax model is shown to hold under the plausible condition that the distribution of preferences for consumption relative to leisure rises, in terms of... View Details

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Income; Decision Choices and Conditions; Consumer Behavior; Taxation; Microeconomics; Macroeconomics