Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(771)
- Faculty Publications (89)
- December 2011 (Revised June 2013)
- Supplement
Bananas (B)
As owner and CEO, Wim Van der Borght had grown Bananas in 8 years from a 4.5 million euro company into a 40 million euro group of companies with a range of field marketing activities in Belgium and the Netherlands. The core of the group consisted of two companies —... View Details
- July 2011
- Article
Mixed Source
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Gaston Llanes
We study competitive interaction between a profit-maximizing firm that sells software and complementary services and a free open source competitor. We examine the firm's choice of business model between the proprietary model (where all software modules are... View Details
- April 2011 (Revised July 2014)
- Case
Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd.: Driving Change Through Internal Communication
By: Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind
Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL), confronted in 2003 with an urgent need to change how it operated externally, adopted a highly innovative approach to communicating internally. This case, set in 2010, presents an overview of the new, more interactive model of employee... View Details
- January – February 2011
- Article
How to Design a Winning Business Model
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Joan E. Ricart
Most executives believe that competing through business models is critical for success, but few have come to grips with how best to do so. One common mistake is enterprises' unwavering focus on creating innovative models and evaluating their efficacy in standalone... View Details
- 2011
- Teaching Note
UFIDA (A) (TN)
By: F. Warren McFarlan, Bin Yang and E. Chen
The five-case UFIDA series is about China's largest supplier of management/ERP software, its 20-year evolution, and current strategic challenges. The (A) case is the cornerstone of the series. It introduces the company's history, strategic turning points, current... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
Agglomerative Forces and Cluster Shapes
By: William R. Kerr and Scott Duke Kominers
We model spatial clusters of similar firms. Our model highlights how agglomerative forces lead to localized, individual connections among firms, while interaction costs generate a defined distance over which attraction forces operate. Overlapping firm interactions... View Details
- October 2010 (Revised May 2011)
- Case
Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc.
By: Sunil Gupta and Kerry Herman
In September 2010, faced with increasing threat from social game companies such as Zynga, Ben Feder, the CEO of Take-Two Interactive Software. Inc., had to decide the long-term strategy of his video-game company. As a publisher of traditional video games for Xbox 360,... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
Mixed Source
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Gaston Llanes
We study competitive interaction between a profit-maximizing firm that sells software and complementary services and a free open source competitor. We examine the firm's choice of business model between the proprietary model (where all software modules are... View Details
- July 2010
- Case
Metabical: Positioning and Communications Strategy for a New Weight Loss Drug
By: John A. Quelch and Heather Beckham
Cambridge Sciences Pharmaceuticals (CSP) expects final approval for its revolutionary weight loss drug, Metabical. Metabical will be the only weight loss drug with FDA approval that is also clinically proven to be effective for moderately overweight people. Barbara... View Details
- 2011
- Working Paper
Business Model Innovation and Competitive Imitation: The Case of Sponsor-Based Business Models
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Feng Zhu
We study sponsor-based business model innovations where a firm monetizes its product through sponsors rather than setting prices to its customer base. We analyze strategic interactions between an innovative entrant and an incumbent where the incumbent may imitate the... View Details
- Article
Peer-to-Peer File Sharing and the Market for Digital Information Goods
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane
We study competitive interaction between two alternative models of digital content distribution over the Internet: peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing and centralized client-server distribution. We present microfoundations for a stylized model of p2p file sharing where all... View Details
- 2010
- Working Paper
Competing Complements
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Barry Nalebuff and David B. Yoffie
In Cournot's model of complements, the producers of A and B are both monopolists. This paper extends Cournot's model to allow for competition between complements on one side of the market. Consider two complements, A and B, where the A + B bundle is valuable only when... View Details
- June 2009 (Revised February 2010)
- Case
Cirque du Soleil -- The High-Wire Act of Building Sustainable Partnerships
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Maxime Aucoin
The case describes the history and business model of Cirque du Soleil (CdS). The case allows for a rich discussion and analysis of Cirque du Soleil's business model with an emphasis on how it interacts with that of MGM Mirage. Le Cirque and MGM's business models... View Details
- April 2009 (Revised August 2009)
- Case
Backchannelmedia: Making Television 'Clickable'
By: Sunil Gupta, Kavita Shukla and Zachary Scott Clayton
Backchannelmedia (BCM), a three-year-old start-up, intended to completely disrupt the world of advertising by transforming the way Americans watched television. BCM had developed a technology to make television "clickable," enabling viewers to interact with the content... View Details
- February 2009 (Revised September 2011)
- Case
Big Spaceship: Ready to Go Big?
By: Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind
Big Spaceship, a digital marketing agency, faced a rather big challenge: How to scale the distinctive culture that was essential to its competitive strategy? Renowned for the cutting-edge websites that it developed to market major Hollywood movies and leading consumer... View Details
- December 2008
- Case
Responding to Imitation: Intel vs. AMD in 1991
By: Dennis A. Yao
This case examines Intel's response to imitative entry by Advanced Micro Devices into the 386 microprocessor product category in which Intel had been the sole producer. The case is set in 1991 when AMD first introduces its Intel-compatible 386 processor and before... View Details
- May 2008
- Article
When Winning Is Everything
By: Deepak Malhotra, Gillian Ku and J. Keith Murnighan
In the heat of competition, executives can easily become obsessed with beating their rivals. This adrenaline-fueled emotional state, which the authors call competitive arousal, often leads to bad decisions. Managers can minimize the potential for competitive arousal... View Details
- January 2008 (Revised August 2009)
- Module Note
Competing through Business Models (C): Interdependence, Tactical & Strategic Interaction
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Joan E. Ricart
- April 2007
- Article
Wintel: Cooperation and Conflict
We study competitive interactions between Intel and Microsoft, two producers of complementary products. In a system of complements, like the PC, the value of the final product depends on how well the different components work together. This, in turn, depends on the... View Details
- 2007
- Working Paper
Global Competitors as Next-Door Neighbors: Competition and Geographic Concentration in the Semiconductor Industry
By: Minyuan Zhao and Juan Alcacer
Despite the many advantages offered by technology clusters, firms located in them face the risk of losing valuable knowledge to nearby competitors. In this study, we argue that multi-location firms strategically organize their R&D activities to appropriate the value of... View Details