Publications

October 2024
Article

Founder-CEO Compensation and Selection into Venture Capital-Backed Entrepreneurship

By: Michael Ewens, Ramana Nanda and Christopher Stanton

We show theoretically that a critical determinant of the attractiveness of VC-backed entrepreneurship for high-earning potential founders is the expected time to develop a startup’s initial product. This is because founder-CEOs’ cash compensation increases... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Executive Compensation

2023
Working Paper

Founder-CEO Compensation and Selection into Venture Capital-Backed Entrepreneurship

By: Michael Ewens, Ramana Nanda and Christopher Stanton

We show theoretically that a critical determinant of the attractiveness of VC-backed entrepreneurship for high-earning potential founders is the expected time to develop a startup’s initial product. This is because founder-CEOs’ cash compensation increases... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Executive Compensation

SSRN

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Profile

Bruce Gago

plan to execute, the bigger risk would in fact be to abandon that to pursue a "safe" career path. HBS is not insurance against entrepreneurial failure but it certainly increases the probability of... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Other Financial Services; Real Estate; Services

August 1987 (Revised June 1989)
Background Note

Note on Financial Contracting: ""Deals""

By: William A. Sahlman

Describes the issues involved in designing and evaluating financial contracts between users and suppliers of capital and between companies and employees. A simple conceptual framework is introduced and some critical issues addressed: 1) How is cash allocated? 2) How is... View Details

Keywords: Contracts; Framework; Problems and Challenges; Corporate Finance

23 Mar 2010
First Look

First Look: March 23

catastrophic risks to patients, physicians, pharmaceutical firms, and regulators. Between the early 1960s and the present, national systems were built to collect, standardize, and respond to individual reports of side effects, with the... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

12 Feb 2001
Research & Ideas

Creating Value Across Borders

Business sat down with HBS associate professor Walter Kuemmerle to discuss the entrepreneurial process in an international setting. Kuemmerle, a Novartis Fellow, holds a joint appointment in Entrepreneurial... View Details

Keywords: by Staff

10 May 2011
First Look

First Look: May 10

NEAD). NEAD chains create "bridge donors" whose incompatible recipients receive kidneys before the bridge donor donates, and so risk reneging by bridge donors, but offer the opportunity to create more transplants by overcoming... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 1997 (Revised May 2002)
Case

MicroAge, Inc.: Orchestrating the Information Technology Value Chain

By: Lynda M. Applegate and Kirk A. Goldman

MicroAge, Inc. started as a storefront in Tempe, AZ in 1976 selling personal computer kits to hobbyists. During their first year of operation, founders Jeff McKeever and Alan Hald sold $1.5 million worth of computer kits, priced at under $1,000 each. Twenty years... View Details

Keywords: Transformation; Growth Management; Risk Management; Product; Opportunities; Horizontal Integration; Information Infrastructure; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Technology Industry; Arizona

Find at Harvard

06 Jan 2003
What Do You Think?

China: The Next Big Market Opportunity or the Next Big Bubble?

opportunities and substantial returns on investment of the kind suggested by some are years, perhaps even decades, away. It will require not only caution but also a great deal of patience as barriers to economic development are lowered. The View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

18 Dec 2007
First Look

First Look: December 18, 2007

a social loss function. Purchase the paper from SSRN.com ($5): http://papers.nber.org/papers/w13622 New Framework for Measuring and Managing Macrofinancial Risk and Financial Stability Authors:Dale F. Gray, Robert C. Merton, and Zvi Bodie... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

Profile

Michael R. Bloomberg

city into a thriving entrepreneurial environment. “Mayor Bloomberg has been a great champion of the startup community,” said Neil Blumenthal, co-founder of Warby Parker. “He used his bully pulpit to promote the New York-startup scene... View Details

22 Sep 2014
Op-Ed

Online Banks Fill Funding Needs for Small Business

lending in this market. Traditional bank loans may yield a return of 5 to 7 percent, but many alternative lending platforms charge yields ranging from 30 to 120 percent of the loan value, depending on the size, term duration, and risk... View Details

Keywords: by Karen Mills; Banking; Financial Services

March 2020
Case

Forbidden City: Launching a Craft Beer in China

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Carole Carlson

This case describes a difficult choice faced by Victor Wang, Managing Director of Singapore-based Eurasian Brewing Company (EBC), concerning the competing product launch plans of Le Jie, Vice President of EBC's China and East Asian operations, and Vivian Chin, EBC's... View Details

Keywords: Subsidiary Management; Craft Brewing; Strategy; Decision Making; Organizational Structure; Business Model; Growth and Development Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Management Style; Food and Beverage Industry; China; East Asia

21 Aug 2012
Research & Ideas

How to Sink a Startup

forks in the road, Rich options directly conflict with King options. For example, on the one hand, founders who do not raise money risk handicapping their venture if money dwindles or dries up completely. On the other hand, founders who... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons

September 2009 (Revised May 2011)
Case

Acumen Fund: Measurement in Impact Investing (A)

By: Alnoor Ebrahim and V. Kasturi Rangan

Acumen Fund is a global venture capital firm with a dual purpose: it looks for a return on its investments, and it also seeks entrepreneurial solutions to global poverty. This case examines Acumen's new projects in Kenya. The organization's investment committee and its... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Venture Capital; Investment Return; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Risk Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Government Relations; Social Enterprise; Financial Services Industry; Kenya

March 1994 (Revised October 1994)
Case

Reading Energy

By: Forest L. Reinhardt

Reading Energy builds facilities that produce energy from nontraditional fuels. A privately held, entrepreneurial organization, it has spent six years developing a plan to build a waste-to-energy plant in the town of Robbins, Illinois. The plant would burn municipal... View Details

Keywords: Energy Generation; Wastes and Waste Processing; Business and Community Relations; Business Plan; Agreements and Arrangements; Contracts; Risk and Uncertainty; Government and Politics; Environmental Sustainability; Business Strategy; Energy Industry; Utilities Industry; Illinois