Publications
Publications
Show Results For
- All HBS Web
(10,240)
- Faculty Publications (2,759)
- 2019
- Article
Go-Shops Revisited
By: Guhan Subramanian and Annie Zhao
A go-shop process turns the traditional M&A deal process on its head: rather than a pre-signing market canvass followed by a post-signing “no shop” period, a go-shop deal involves a limited pre-signing market check, followed by a post-signing “go shop” process to find... View Details
- January–February 2020
- Article
Competing in the Age of AI
By: Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani
Today’s markets are being reshaped by a new kind of firm—one in which artificial intelligence (AI) runs the show. This cohort includes giants like Google, Facebook, and Alibaba, and growing businesses such as Wayfair and Ocado. Every time we use their services, the... View Details
- 2020
- Book
Experimentation Works: The Surprising Power of Business Experiments
By: Stefan Thomke
Don’t fly blind. See how the power of experiments works for you. When it comes to improving customer experiences, trying out new business models, or developing new products, even the most experienced managers often get it wrong. They discover that intuition,... View Details
- July 2020
- Article
Exploring the Effect of Environmental Orientation on Financial Decisions of Businesses at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Evidence from the Microlending Context
By: Anton Shevchenko, Xiaodan Pan and Goran Calic
Existing research has accumulated substantial evidence on the effect that an environmental orientation has on businesses' economic performance. Yet this research does not cover small businesses from bottom‐of‐the‐pyramid (BOP) markets. In fact, despite increasing... View Details
- Article
Seize the Power
By: Stefan Thomke
A company’s ability to create and refine its products, customer experiences, processes, and business models—in other words, to compete—is deeply affected by its ability to experiment. Digital giants such as Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Booking.com have found... View Details
- January 2020
- Case
Lunchclub: Algorithmic Networking
By: Scott Duke Kominers and George Gonzalez
Algorithmic networking startup Lunchclub coordinates in-person meetings between professionals who would have been unlikely to meet. The company faces marketplace design, growth, and monetization challenges: The executive team has to refine Lunchclub's marketplace... View Details
- January 2020
- Case
Ninja: Which Platform Wins Esports' Biggest Star?
By: Anita Elberse and Michal T. Leszczynski
It is July 2019, and the business of esports and gaming is booming. Tyler Blevins—better known as Ninja—has risen to stardom playing the immensely popular shooter game Fortnite. He has become the most followed streamer in the world and, helped by his management company... View Details
- January 2020 (Revised April 2020)
- Teaching Note
Brandless: Disrupting Consumer Packaged Goods
By: Jill Avery
Brandless, an online direct-to-consumer seller of upscale private-label consumer packaged goods (CPG), offered consumers a limited assortment of values-conscious products delivered directly to their homes with the simplicity of one fixed $3.00 price point that promised... View Details
- 2020
- Working Paper
Reinventing Retail: The Novel Resurgence of Independent Bookstores
By: Ryan Raffaelli
This study examines how community-based brick-and-mortar retailers can achieve sustained market growth in the face of online and big box retail competition. The appearance of Amazon.com in 1995 led to a significant decline in the number of independent bookstores in the... View Details
- January 2020
- Case
The Origins of Bell Labs
By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko
In 1947, scientists at Bell Labs invented the transistor—a tiny signal amplifier that would go on to become the fundamental building block of the digital age. But, confounding most traditional economic assumptions, it was not a vigorous startup that made this momentous... View Details
- January 2020 (Revised January 2025)
- Case
Freelancer, Ltd.
By: Christopher Stanton, Karim R. Lakhani, Jennifer L. Hoffman, Jin Hyun Paik and Nina Cohodes
Over the course of the 2010s, the rapid advancement of mobile technologies and the rise of online freelancing platforms seemed to portend a radical transformation of labor markets into on-demand, flexible talent pools. Even though several Fortune 500... View Details
- January 2020 (Revised July 2020)
- Supplement
MoviePass: The 'Get Big Fast' Strategy
By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher
In August 2017, MoviePass dramatically lowered its subscription price from $50 per month to just $10 for up to one movie per day. The idea was to rapidly scale the business to the point where they could generate incremental revenue streams form related businesses... View Details
Keywords: Market Entry; Growth Strategy; Profit Vs. Growth; Subscription Business; Cash Burn; Data Analytics; Get-big-fast; Buyer Power; Strategy Implementation; Movie Industry; Racing; Business Strategy; Value Creation; Consolidation; Cash Flow; Growth Management; Business Startups; Entrepreneurship; Disruptive Innovation; Mobile Technology; Motion Pictures and Video Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Advertising Industry; Information Industry; United States
- January 2020
- Background Note
Climate Change in 2020: Implications for Business
By: Rebecca M. Henderson, Sophus A. Reinert and Mariana Oseguera
This note provides general information about climate change and its implications for business. Included is an overview of climate change science and a number of its impacts, including rising sea levels, changing weather patterns and extreme weather, pressure on water... View Details
Keywords: Climate Change; Environmental Accounting; Agribusiness; Economic Growth; Energy Conservation; Energy Generation; Renewable Energy; Energy Sources; Non-Renewable Energy; Globalized Markets and Industries; National Security; Government Legislation; Operations; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Problems and Challenges; Risk and Uncertainty; Natural Disasters; Natural Environment; Environmental Sustainability; Pollutants; Science-Based Business; Weather; Society; Technology
- January 2020 (Revised May 2020)
- Case
Direct to Consumer Brands
By: Sunil Gupta
Recent years have seen the dramatic rise of direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands by several startups. Many of these brands, such as Dollar Shave Club, Harry’s, Glossier, and Allbirds, entered mature markets dominated by established companies, and yet they grew rapidly to... View Details
- January 2020 (Revised March 2020)
- Case
LOLA: Do You Know What's in Your Tampon?
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Aldo Sesia
LOLA is a direct-to-consumer (DTC) business launched in 2015. What started as a company to provide women with organic and transparent material-labeled tampons via a subscription model, had, by 2019 evolved to include additional menstrual and sexual wellness products.... View Details
- January 2020 (Revised October 2021)
- Case
Zara: An Integrated Store and Online Model (A)
By: Antonio Moreno
In 2010, amidst the growth of ecommerce and the emergence of new, purely online, fashion players, Zara launched its first online store, Zara.com. Since then, Zara’s online business had grown at a fast pace. By 2018, 12% of Inditex Group’s total sales came from the... View Details
Keywords: Stores; Integration; Operations; Business Model; Strategy; E-commerce; Retail Industry; Fashion Industry; Europe
- January 2020
- Case
The June Oven
By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Christian Godwin
The June Oven was a smart oven which was capable of identifying food and cooking it accordingly. This type of smart oven represented the next step in the long history of oven and stove development. Due to the widespread use of traditional ovens, the market for the June... View Details
Keywords: Business Ventures; Trends; Customers; Design; Entrepreneurship; Food; Goods and Commodities; Innovation and Invention; Marketing; Brands and Branding; Demand and Consumers; Distribution; Product Development; Sales; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Consumer Products Industry; Retail Industry; Technology Industry; Electronics Industry; Manufacturing Industry; United States
- December 2019
- Case
CME Group in 2019
By: José B. Alvarez, Forest Reinhardt and Natalie Kindred
Chicago-based CME Group is the world’s largest futures and options marketplace, with annual trading volume of over 4.8 billion contracts in 2018. This case is set in late 2019, as heightened perceptions of risk stemming from the U.S.-China trade war are driving record... View Details
- December 2019 (Revised March 2021)
- Case
Carroll Family Farms
By: Forest Reinhardt, Christian Godwin and James Weber
The Carroll Family, U.S. pig and grain farmers, needed to decide what to plant, whether to purchase land, emphasize pigs or grain, or other investments.
Seven family members across three generations owned and operated Carroll Family Farms (CFF). In... View Details
Seven family members across three generations owned and operated Carroll Family Farms (CFF). In... View Details
- December 2019
- Case
Walmart Ecommerce (B): Omnichannel Pursuits
By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Karen Elterman
This case is an abridged version (part 2 of 2) of "Walmart's Omnichannel Strategy: Revolution or Miscalculation?" HBS Case No. 720-370. The (B) case describes Walmart’s omnichannel strategy in 2018 as it battled Amazon for online retail market share. Walmart aimed to... View Details