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August 2019
Case

The Allstate Corporation, 2019

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In July 2019, Allstate, the United States’ number-three property and casualty (P/C) insurer, released its second-quarter earnings, which reported first-half revenues of $22.1 billion, up 11.4% year-over-year. Shareholders cheered the top-line growth, but P/C premiums... View Details

Keywords: Insurance Companies; Strategic Analysis; Strategic Change; Insurance; Strategy; Strategic Planning; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Competitive Strategy; Insurance Industry; North America

January 2009 (Revised November 2011)
Case

The Tip of the Iceberg: JP Morgan Chase and Bear Stearns (A)

By: Clayton S. Rose, Daniel Baird Bergstresser and David Lane

"Bear Stearns & Co. burned through nearly all of its $18 billion in cash reserves during the week of March 10, 2008, and an unprecedented provision of liquidity support from the Federal Reserve on Friday, March 13 was insufficient to reverse the decline in Bear's... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Financial Crisis; Capital; Financial Liquidity; Financial Strategy; Corporate Governance; Crisis Management; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Competition; Valuation; Financial Services Industry

06 Sep 2004
Research & Ideas

The Innovator’s Battle Plan

asymmetric battles often is the seemingly sudden end of a great firm. From the incumbent's perspective, every action it takes is rational. But the outcome is devastating. Disruption is the strategy that creates and capitalizes on... View Details

Keywords: by Clayton M. Christensen, Scott D. Anthony & Erik A. Roth

August 2010
Article

Sell-Side School Ties

By: Lauren H. Cohen, Christopher J. Malloy and Andrea Frazzini

We study the impact of social networks on agents' ability to gather superior information about firms. Exploiting novel data on the educational backgrounds of sell-side equity analysts and senior officers of firms, we test the hypothesis that analysts' school ties to... View Details

Keywords: Investment Return; Investment Portfolio; Corporate Disclosure; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Knowledge Acquisition; Social and Collaborative Networks

21 Oct 2014
First Look

First Look: October 21

Publications October 2014 Harvard Business Review Press Aligning Strategy and Sales: The Choices, Systems, and Behaviors That Drive Effective Selling By: Cespedes, Frank V. Abstract—There are many books that provide View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

23 Mar 2010
First Look

First Look: March 23

(1990) and Petersen-Rajan (1995) models of information acquisition in credit markets. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/10-077.pdf Strategies to Fight Ad-sponsored Rivals Authors: Ramon... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

July 2021
Teaching Note

Digital Transformation 2.0: CEO Elie Girard at Atos

By: Tsedal Neeley

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 421-024. Elie Girard has taken the helm as CEO of multinational IT giant Atos to lead the company into the next era of digital transformation. Noticing that customers’ digital needs were evolving to become even more specialized and global... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Leading Change; Mergers and Acquisitions; Environmental Sustainability; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Digital Transformation; Information Technology Industry

December 2006
Case

Southern Company's Investment in CEMIG

In the spring of 1997, Southern Company had the opportunity to acquire a significant portion of the electric utility in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. The shares in the utility, CEMIG, were being sold by the state government as part of a comprehensive... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy; Privatization; Investment; Acquisition; Globalized Markets and Industries; Utilities Industry; Brazil

Find at Harvard

June 2011 (Revised November 2011)
Case

The Expansion of Ping An

By: Robert C. Pozen and Nina Yang

In June 2010, Mingzhe Ma, chairman and chief executive officer of Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China ("Ping An" or "the Company"), sat down with Sun Jianyi, vice chief executive officer and executive vice president at Ping An, to discuss the future direction of... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Business Conglomerates; Conferences; Banks and Banking; Financial Strategy; Insurance; Global Strategy; Leadership Style; Strategic Planning; Opportunities; Diversification; Expansion; China

April 2002
Background Note

Consolidation of Highly Fragmented Service Industries, The

Designed to familiarize students with the consolidation of highly fragmented labor-dependent service industries, offering insights into service firm growth and the ways services can, and cannot, increase their efficiency and effectiveness. Two frameworks are presented... View Details

Keywords: Consolidation; Acquisition; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Industry

08 Feb 2011
First Look

First Look: Feb. 8

Srikant M. Datar, and Madhav Rajan Publication:14th ed. Prentice Hall, forthcoming (2012) Abstract Emphasizing the "different costs for different purposes," this text focuses on strategy and the decision-making process.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

April 1998 (Revised November 1999)
Case

Hambrecht & Quist

By: Thomas J. DeLong and Nicole Tempest

Hambrecht & Quist (H&Q), an investment bank headquartered in San Francisco, has a very unique culture relative to its Wall Street counterparts. Firm members and even competitors describe the culture as entrepreneurial, team-driven, non-bureaucratic, and... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Investment Banking; Growth and Development Strategy; Emerging Markets; Organizational Culture; Competitive Advantage; Banking Industry; San Francisco

December 2021 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Collaboration Wars: Slack vs. Microsoft Teams

By: David B. Yoffie, Kriti Gupta, Mehek Punatar, Poonam Sacheti and Poorvi Vijay

In 2021, Slack was acquired by Salesforce. While widely viewed as the best corporate collaboration and messaging software, Slack was being challenged by Microsoft, which was giving away its competitive product, Microsoft Teams, for free with a subscription to... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Applications and Software; Technology Adoption; Acquisition; Business Model; Business Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Competition; Expansion; Technology Industry

03 Mar 2009
First Look

First Look: March 3, 2009

magnified in the online channel. Customer analysis suggests that opening retail stores paves the way for higher rates of customer acquisition and higher rates of repeat purchasing among existing customers in the direct channels in the... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

25 Sep 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, September 25, 2018

behavior and election outcomes. Download working paper: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=55006 Harvard Business School 518-108 Casper Sleep Inc. (B): Growth Strategy No abstract available. Purchase this... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

February 2022 (Revised March 2022)
Case

MicroStrategy's Investment in Bitcoin

By: C. Fritz Foley

At the end of the second quarter of 2020, MicroStrategy, a Virginia based provider of analytics software and services, announced plans to acquire and hold bitcoin as a part of the firm’s treasury reserve policy and corporate strategy. Within a year, the firm purchased... View Details

Keywords: Bitcoin; Corporate Strategy; Acquisition; Investment Portfolio; Capital Structure; Equity