Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(2,113)
- Faculty Publications (387)
- January 2023
- Case
Rentokil: The Terminix Acquisition
By: Ted Berk, Emily R. McComb and Julia Kelley
When announcing their agreement to merge in December 2021, creating a clear leader in global pest control, UK-based Rentokil and Tennessee-based Terminix described extensive benefits of the cross-border combination. The companies touted the advantages of their combined... View Details
- December 2022
- Article
Cost Standard Set Program: Moving Forward to Standardization of Cost Assessment Based on Clinical Condition
By: Anna Paula Beck da Silva Etges, Richard D. Urman, Anne Geubelle, Robert Kaplan and Carisi Anne Polanczyk
This communication announces the International Cost Standard Set Program. Its goal is to establish global standardized frameworks for measuring the costs of treating specific clinical conditions. A scientific committee, including 16 international healthcare cost... View Details
- November 2022
- Case
Hiring with the Community in Saint Paul
By: Mitchell B. Weiss and Sarah Mehta
This case reviews Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter’s decision to involve the community in the process of hiring his cabinet members. Rather than relying on an executive recruiting firm or choosing cabinet heads from his own network, Carter recruited 100 community members... View Details
- November 2022
- Case
Arcos Dorados’ Quest for the Digitalization of Last-Mile Delivery in Colombia
By: Jorge Tamayo, Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago and Mariana Cal
In 2018, Francisco Staton, Managing Director of Arcos Dorados in Colombia had to decide on the company’s strategy to expand its food ordering and delivery business in the country. Arcos Dorados stood as McDonald’s largest independent franchisee, and Colombia was one of... View Details
Keywords: Digital Transformation; Delivery; McDonald's; Latin America; Quick Serve Restaurants; QSR; Transformation; Decision Making; Decision Choices and Conditions; Global Strategy; Technological Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Agreements and Arrangements; Negotiation Tactics; Logistics; Service Delivery; Organizational Culture; Performance Improvement; Partners and Partnerships; Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry; Latin America; South America; Colombia
- 2024
- Working Paper
The Retail Habitat
By: Toomas Laarits and Marco Sammon
Retail investors trade hard-to-value stocks. Controlling for size, stocks with a high share of retail-initiated trades are composed of more intangible capital, have longer duration cash-flows and a higher likelihood of being mispriced. Consistent with retail-heavy... View Details
Keywords: Retail; Retail Trade; Intangible Capital; Mispricing; Investment; Valuation; Business Earnings
- October 2022 (Revised June 2024)
- Case
Driving Decarbonization at BMW
The case describes BMW’s electrification and decarbonization strategy, and how the company measured carbon emissions throughout the life cycle of its vehicles and used tools like carbon abatement cost curves to evaluate decarbonization opportunities. In mid-2022,... View Details
Keywords: Decarbonization; Climate Change; Environment; Sustainability; Carbon Accounting; Carbon; Carbon Abatement; Electric Vehicles; Automobiles; Transportation; Environmental Accounting; Environmental Management; Environmental Sustainability; Accounting; Strategy; Technological Innovation; Supply Chain; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Transportation Industry; Auto Industry; Battery Industry; Germany; China; United States; Europe
- September 2022
- Case
HPP: Tapping the Netherlands’ Potential
By: Brian Trelstad and Idelès Kaandorp
Stichting Het Potentieel Pakken (HPP) was launched to solve a systemic problem in the Dutch Labor Market: gender inequity that was leading to a large number of women to work part-time in fields that were in desperately short supply of labor, like health care, child... View Details
Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Grants; Scaling And Growth; Nonprofit Organizations; Opportunities; Gender; Income; Employment; Health Care and Treatment; Human Capital; Mission and Purpose; Motivation and Incentives; Growth and Development Strategy; Employment Industry; Health Industry; Education Industry; Consulting Industry; Europe; Netherlands
- July 2022 (Revised January 2025)
- Case
Call of Fiduciary Duty: Microsoft Acquires Activision Blizzard
By: Jonas Heese, Joseph Pacelli and James Barnett
In January 2022, Microsoft announces its acquisition of the video game company Activision Blizzard, in a deal valued at $68.7 billion, which would make Microsoft the world’s third largest video game company. The deal came as Activision Blizzard faced gender pay... View Details
Keywords: Accounting; Goodwill Accounting; Analysis; Decision Making; Talent and Talent Management; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Ethics; Leadership; Risk and Uncertainty; Mergers and Acquisitions; Lawsuits and Litigation; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Video Game Industry; North America; California
- 2022
- Working Paper
Social Protection and Social Distancing During the Pandemic: Mobile Money Transfers in Ghana
By: Dean Karlan, Matt Lowe, Robert Osei, Isaac Osei-Akoto, Benjamin N. Roth and Christopher Udry
We study the impact of mobile money transfers to a representative sample of low-income
Ghanaians during the COVID-19 pandemic. The announcement of the upcoming transfers
affects neither consumption, well-being, nor social distancing. Once disbursed,... View Details
- June 2022 (Revised August 2022)
- Case
Sustainability Reporting at Dollar Tree, Inc.
By: Suraj Srinivasan and Li-Kuan Ni
The cases discusses the ESG strategy of Dollar Tree Inc., a U.S. Fortune 500 company in the deep discount retail industry and the and shareholder pressure faced by the company. In 2022, the company faced a shareholder resolution from a renowned shareholder advocacy... View Details
Keywords: ESG; Sustainability; Shareholder Activism; Dollar Tree; Sustainability Reporting; ESG Reporting; Board Of Directors; Shareholder Engagement; GHG; Environmental Accounting; Integrated Corporate Reporting; Trends; Communication; Announcements; Voting; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Values and Beliefs; Corporate Accountability; Corporate Disclosure; Corporate Governance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Reports; Business or Company Management; Risk Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Outcome or Result; Strategic Planning; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Situation or Environment; Opportunities; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Public Opinion; Strategy; Adaptation; Alignment; Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Value Creation; Retail Industry; United States; Virginia
- June 9, 2023
- Article
A Radical Treatment for Insulin Pricing
By: Leemore S. Dafny
In 2021, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the first interchangeable biosimilar for long-acting insulin, which many hoped would be substantially cheaper than the reference branded product. I explain why prices have barely changed, and argue that a... View Details
- June 2022 (Revised August 2022)
- Case
Dollar Tree: Breaking the Buck
By: Jill Avery and Marco Bertini
For thirty-five years, Dollar Tree, a discount retail chain selling general merchandise, had held its fixed price point steady, pricing all of its household items, food, stationery, books, seasonal items, gifts, toys, and clothing that made up its diverse and... View Details
- 2022
- Working Paper
Retail Investors’ Contrarian Behavior Around News, Attention, and the Momentum Effect
By: Cheng (Patrick) Luo, Enrichetta Ravina, Marco Sammon and Luis M. Viceira
Using a large panel of U.S. brokerage accounts trades and positions, we show that a large fraction of retail investors trade as contrarians after large earnings surprises, especially for loser stocks, and that such contrarian trading contributes to post earnings... View Details
- 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
- May 2022
- Case
From GOP to NFT: Anthony Scaramucci and the Launch of Flatter NFT
By: Lauren Cohen, Richard Ryffel and Grace Headinger
Anthony Scaramucci, Managing Director of SkyBridge Capital, considered whether he should officially greenlight the launch of SkyBridge’s own NFT platform — Flatter NFT. He had led the investment firm to push first into Bitcoin and then Ethereum to make SkyBridge a... View Details
Keywords: Business Startup; Fintech; Technology; Cryptocurrency; Web3; Business Startups; Volatility; Decision Making; Entertainment; Entrepreneurship; Investment; Strategic Planning; Adoption; Competitive Advantage; Technology Adoption; Finance; Currency; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; Technology Industry; New York (city, NY)
- 2022
- Working Paper
Passing the Mic: Career and Firm Outcomes of Executive Interactions
By: Wei Cai, Ethan Rouen and Yuan Zou
We exploit a unique feature of conference calls to study one type of interaction among executives—directly inviting colleagues to respond to analysts’ questions. We find that the frequency of initiating interaction is positively associated with an executive’s ability,... View Details
- March 2022 (Revised February 2024)
- Case
El Salvador: Launching Bitcoin as Legal Tender
By: Laura Alfaro, Carla Larangeira and Ruth Costas
In June 2021, Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president, surprised the world with the announcement that the country would adopt bitcoin as legal tender, becoming the first nation to do so. Bitcoin was mostly used for trading and had one of the most volatile track records... View Details
- March 2022
- Teaching Note
Tomorrow.io Goes To Space
By: Joshua Lev Krieger, Abhishek Nagaraj and James Barnett
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 822-005. In March 2021, the weather company Tomorrow.io announced a new project to develop satellites equipped with radar for weather monitoring and launch them into Earth’s orbit. Company leadership considers execution strategies. View Details
- March 2022 (Revised November 2022)
- Case
When Should CEOs Speak Out Publicly? The 2021 Georgia Voting Law
By: William W. George, Hubert Joly and Amram Migdal
This case describes the March 2021 passage of a voting and elections law in the U.S. state of Georgia and reactions by corporations and corporate leaders to the law. Included are a brief history of voting rights in the United States and Georgia and an overview of the... View Details
Keywords: Voting Rights; CEO Activism; Communication; Communication Intention and Meaning; Communication Strategy; Forms of Communication; Announcements; Spoken Communication; Decision Making; Judgments; Voting; Demographics; Nationality; Race; Geography; Geographic Location; Geopolitical Units; Country; Government and Politics; Government Administration; Government Legislation; Political Elections; History; Law; Laws and Statutes; Rights; Leadership; Leadership Style; Management; Management Skills; Relationships; Business and Community Relations; Business and Government Relations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Social Psychology; Status and Position; Society; Civil Society or Community; Culture; Public Opinion; Social Issues; Societal Protocols; United States; Georgia (state, US)
- February 2022
- Case
Corporate Divestitures and Spinoffs
By: David J. Collis, Ashley Hartman and Terrence Shu
Increasingly in the 2010s, corporations turned to divestitures and spinoffs to streamline their operations. Over the course of one week in November 2021, conglomerates General Electric, Johnson & Johnson, and Toshiba announced plans for separation. The news reflected... View Details