Publications

January 2014 (Revised May 2015)
Case

Open English

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Lisa Mazzanti

Open English, a Miami-based startup offering online English language learning services, had more than 30,000 active students across Latin America in 2012. The company had just closed a $43 million financing round in order to rapidly scale its service to the next level.... View Details

Keywords: Technology Strategy; Product Management; Startup; Online Learning; Digital Platforms; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Technology Industry; Miami; Venezuela

23 May 2013
News

I’m Out of the Office. No, Really. I Am.

07 Apr 2021
News

Zoom meetings, hybrid work models: What to expect when returning to the office

22 Sep 2016
News

Innovation Under Constraint: Constructing a Turnaround at Lego

September 2023
Case

The Meteoric Rise of Skims

By: Ayelet Israeli, Jill Avery and Leonard A. Schlesinger

Since its founding in 2019 by Kim Kardashian and Jens Grede, Skims, a solutions-oriented brand creating the next generation of underwear, loungewear, and shapewear with an eye toward body-type and skin-tone inclusivity, has experienced a meteoric rise. Kardashian, who... View Details

September 2002
Case

Align Technology, Inc.: Matching Manufacturing Capacity to Sales Demand

By: H. Kent Bowen and Jonathan P Groberg

Align Technology is a four-year-old medical products company that has invented a new product requiring new manufacturing processes. Demand for the new product has grown more slowly than initial forecasts predicted, and the cost structure is preventing the company from... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Problems and Challenges; Product; Forecasting and Prediction; Marketing Strategy; Sales; Demand and Consumers; Production; Health Industry

14 Jul 2022
Research & Ideas

When the Rubber Meets the Road, Most Commuters Text and Email While Driving

automated driverless car.” The research results, detailed in “Multitasking While Driving: A Time Use Study of Commuting Knowledge Workers to Assess Current and Future Uses,” were published in the June issue of International Journal of... View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald

December 2019
Case

The Business of Pain: Johnson & Johnson and the Promise of Opioids

By: Erik Snowberg, Trevor Fetter and Amy W. Schulman

This case is designed to provide an engrossing overview of stakeholder capitalism through a vigorous discussion of the conflicts that can arise when trying to serve multiple stakeholders. In 2007, Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) subsidiary Janssen has to decide whether or... View Details

Keywords: Opioids; Addiction; Stakeholder Capitalism; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Product Launch; Decision Making; Ethics; Social Issues; Pharmaceutical Industry

11 Jan 2021
Research & Ideas

Is A/B Testing Effective? Evidence from 35,000 Startups

School. “Instead, we find that firms that adopt A/B testing both scale and fail faster. Sometimes founders just have bad ideas and, in these cases, experimentation helps them move onto their next opportunity faster.” Indeed, companies of... View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz

November 2006 (Revised March 2007)
Case

Lifan Group - Automobile Production in China

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Tarun Khanna and Elizabeth Raabe

Lifan Group, one of China's premier motorcycle companies, considers entering automobile production. The company plans to assemble a midsize sedan, hoping it will be able to sell this car to affluent families in China and to export it. Domestic demand for cars is... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Decision Making; Demand and Consumers; Price; Auto Industry; Manufacturing Industry; China

08 Mar 2012
News

How Star Women and Star Men Fare Differently in the Workplace

2008
Simulation

Strategic Innovation Simulation: Back Bay Battery

By: Willy C. Shih and Clayton Christensen

This online simulation allows students to play the role of a business unit manager at Back Bay Battery Company who faces the dilemma of balancing a portfolio of investment strategies across products in the rechargeable battery space. Players have to manage R&D... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Strategy; Disruptive Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Innovation and Management; Investment; Product Development; Research and Development; Battery Industry

Leslie K. John is a Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. Currently, she teaches on the topics of Negotiation, Marketing and Behavioral Economics in various Executive Education courses, including in the Program for Leadership Development.... View Details

Keywords: diet services; health care; internet; marketing industry

12 May 2011
News

Powerlessness is as corrupting as power

16 Oct 2023
HBS Case

Advancing Black Talent: From the Flight Ramp to 'Family-Sustaining' Careers at Delta

carrier in 1929. The company changed its name and moved to Atlanta in 1941, just in time to get lucrative World War II contracts that fueled its first expansion. Hartsfield-Jackson Airport, where Delta is... View Details

Keywords: by Lane Lambert; Air Transportation

September 2024
Supplement

Revenue Solutions, LLC (A)

By: Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

Pre-Abstract: Instructors should consider the timing of making videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details.

Abstract: Ari Wasserman and Nick esayian were both dissatisfied with their future prospects in their current careers. Wasserman,... View Details

Keywords: Personal Development and Career; Partners and Partnerships; Ownership

October 2000
Case

Framework Technologies Corp.

By: G. Felda Hardymon, Ann Leamon, Ashesh Shah and David Waller

Dan Slavin, CEO of Framework Technologies, is contemplating a complete restart for his company to erase the impact of its shift in product and business strategy since inception. This case describes the issues he must consider, which include the impact of such a change... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Innovation and Invention; Cost vs Benefits; Venture Capital; Technology Industry

January 2017
Case

Expanding Ecommerce at Technos

By: Thales Teixeira, Rohit Deshpandé, Ruth Costas and Priscilla Zogbi

Technos was the market leader in the Brazilian watch market. Its CEO had made a firm commitment to evolve the company’s marketing and commercial practices by focusing less on pushing product to retail clients and more on branding to end consumers to pull watches from... View Details

May 2008
Case

Sensors Unlimited: Bringing InGaAs Technology to the Market

By: Willy C. Shih

Sensors Unlimited was a small start-up in short-wavelength infrared imaging. Its learning base came out of Bell Labs, RCA's Sarnoff Lab, and the Rockwell Science Center, and as it built its capabilities and ventured into new application areas, it discovered a “killer... View Details

Keywords: Applied Optics; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Science-Based Business; Commercialization; Aerospace Industry; Technology Industry