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December 2019 (Revised January 2020)
Case

Boll & Branch

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Mel Martin

Boll & Branch is a direct-to-consumer (DTC) business launched in 2015. It was the first Fair-Trade Certified manufacturer of linens. The case provides background on the company, its start, business model, and evolution through 2019. View Details

Keywords: Direct-to-consumer; Channels; Disruption; Business Model; Brands and Branding; Internet and the Web; Strategy; Retail Industry; United States; Canada

28 May 2019
News

Future Source

Seni Sulyman (MBA 2014) wants to rescript Africa’s role in the world. “For too long the continent has been seen as a place people give things to,” he says. “I want to connect Africa to the world on equal terms.” As vice president of global operations at tech company... View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna

05 Aug 2014
First Look

First Look: August 5

current state of access to bank capital for small business from the best available sources. We explore both the cyclical impact of the recession on small business and access to credit and several structural issues in that impede the full recovery of bank credit View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

March 2012
Article

The Influence of Prior Industry Affiliation on Framing in Nascent Industries: The Evolution of Digital Cameras

By: Mary J. Benner and Mary Tripsas

New industries sparked by technological change are characterized by high technological, market, and competitive uncertainty. In this paper we explore how a firm's conceptualization of products in this context, reflected in its introduction of product features, is... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Transformation; Risk and Uncertainty; Competitive Strategy; Product; Values and Beliefs; Mathematical Methods; Power and Influence; Behavior; Experience and Expertise; Design; Market Entry and Exit; Employment Industry; Computer Industry

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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

Keywords: Business History; Innovation Leadership; Technological Innovation; Patents; Monopoly; Organizational Structure; Competitive Strategy; Telecommunications Industry; Boston; Massachusetts; New York (city, NY)

July 2018 (Revised November 2018)
Case

Hidrovias do Brasil: Navigating Unchartered Waters

By: Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott

Since its founding eight years earlier, Hidrovias do Brasil (“Hidrovias”), an integrated logistics provider serving corporate customers exporting products from South America via the Atlantic Ocean, had grown to 900 employees and $253 million in annual revenues.... View Details

Keywords: Human Resources; Private Equity; Brazil; Entrepreneurial Organizations; Operation Management; General Management; Entrepreneurship; Finance; Growth and Development; Leadership; Operations; Problems and Challenges; Transportation; Human Capital; Strategy; Emerging Markets; Brazil

02 Jul 2012
Research & Ideas

Why Good Deeds Invite Bad Publicity

really pay off when companies need that goodwill from the public? In a recent working paper, No News Is Good News: CSR Strategy and Newspaper Coverage of Negative Firm Events, Oberholzer-Gee set out to test the insurance hypothesis using... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Energy

11 Dec 2018
Research & Ideas

Free Trade Needs Nurturing—and Other Lessons from History

Question: What patterns emerge from history that can help us better understand where we are today? Sophus Reinert: To many people, globalization is teleological, something that necessarily becomes stronger over time and leads to an ever-more economically interconnected... View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Auto; Aerospace; Chemical; Consumer Products; Electronics; Energy; Industrial Products; Manufacturing; Shipping; Transportation

June 2013
Supplement

Can PACIV (Puerto Rico) Serve European Customers? (Video Supplement)

By: Jim Sharpe

This is Video Supplement for Can PACIV (Puerto Rico) Serve European Customers? HBS Case #808099. View Details

June 2012 (Revised February 2014)
Case

Low-Carbon, Indigenous Innovation in China

By: Richard H.K. Vietor

For the past seven years or so, the Chinese government has been powering ahead with industrial policies to promote low-carbon energy technologies—wind, solar, electric batteries and vehicles, nuclear power, and even carbon capture and sequestration. In 2009, the... View Details

Keywords: Energy; Renewables; Carbon; Environment; Industrial Policy; Competitiveness; Environmental Sustainability; Policy; Renewable Energy; Competition; Globalized Markets and Industries; Energy Industry; China

July 2008
Teaching Note

Hilton Hotels: Brand Differentiation through Customer Relationship Management (TN)

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Gabriele Piccoli and Chekitan Dev

Teaching Note for [809029]. View Details

Keywords: History; Strategy; Customer Relationship Management; Information Technology; System; Privatization; Brands and Branding; Accommodations Industry

01 Dec 2018
News

Research Is the Foundation

Supporting Faculty Research Endeavors When Tsedal Neeley joined the HBS faculty in 2007 as an assistant professor, she was already deeply interested in the impact that corporate common language practices have in global businesses. “I had an ambitious research agenda,”... View Details

March 1992
Case

Applied Materials

By: Steven C. Wheelwright

Describes three subsequent generations of product development effort at an equipment firm supplying the semiconductor industry. The firm is partway into the third generation development and must decide whether and how to accelerate product development to respond to... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Competitive Strategy; Decision Making; Industry Structures; Industrial Products Industry; Semiconductor Industry

February 1998
Teaching Note

Aladdin Knowledge Systems TN

By: Das Narayandas

Teaching Note for (9-598-018). View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Competition; Marketing; Sales; Distribution; Safety; Globalization; Integration; Information Technology Industry; Europe; United States

01 Dec 1996
News

Laurel without Hardy? A Lesson for Business

paying attention to complements is a necessity. Without key complements, the market may never take off. In established markets, attending to complements has less dramatic but still valuable results. Here, complements most likely exist,... View Details

01 Jan 2004
News

A. G. Lafley, MBA 1977

historians—not just modern business gurus—if you're interested in mastering the power of strategy and the power of execution in your job." CURRENT READING Bush at War, by Bob Woodward A.G. Lafley has been credited with turning around... View Details

June 2005 (Revised March 2007)
Case

ACHAP (African Comprehensive HIV/AIDS Partnerships): the Merck/Gates Initiative in Botswana

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

By June 2004, ACHAP, a three-way partnership of The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Merck, and the Botswana government, had committed nearly $60 million of the $100 million toward various AIDS education, prevention, and treatment programs. It was time to evaluate... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Growth and Development Strategy; Social Marketing; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Performance Evaluation; Business and Government Relations; Partners and Partnerships; Health Industry