Publications

2024
Article

Half the Firms, Double the Profits: Public Firms' Transformation, 1996–2022

By: Mark J. Roe and Charles C.Y. Wang

The number of public firms in the United States has halved since the beginning of the twenty-first century, causing consternation among corporate and securities law regulators. The dominant explanations, often advanced by Securities and Exchange commissioners when... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Law; Securities Regulation; Sarbanes-Oxley Act; Concentration Levels; Antitrust; Initial Public Offering; Public Ownership; Private Equity; Venture Capital; Mergers and Acquisitions; Monopoly; United States

July 2007 (Revised March 2008)
Case

ABRY Fund V

By: Nabil N. El-Hage, Richard S. Ruback and Leslie Pierson

In January 2006, Andrew Banks and Royce Yudkoff were considering raising a 5th fund for their media-focused private equity firm, ABRY Partners. ABRY had a strong track record that the co-founders attributed to their group's deep knowledge of the media industry and... View Details

Keywords: Cooperative Ownership; Venture Capital; Customer Relationship Management; Asset Management; Private Equity; Judgments; Competitive Strategy; Media; Corporate Finance; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry

February 2009
Case

Avid Radiopharmaceuticals: The Venture Debt Question

By: Matthew Rhodes-Kropf and Ann Leamon

The CEO of a promising biotech company must decide how to respond to the macro-economic slump of late 2008. He had planned to pursue an aggressive schedule, moving the firm's Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease imaging compounds through clinical trials and into the... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Entrepreneurship; Borrowing and Debt; Venture Capital; Financial Management; Investment; Health Testing and Trials; Expansion; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

April 2002 (Revised March 2006)
Background Note

Economics of Retail Banking Note

By: Frances X. Frei and Dennis Campbell

Explains the financial operations of retail banking, highlighting profitability challenges facing the industry. For U.S. banks, it is quite common for more than half of the customer base to be unprofitable and to have relatively few customers make up the vast majority... View Details

Keywords: Customers; Economics; Cost; Banks and Banking; Profit; Revenue; Service Operations; Banking Industry; United States

12 Aug 2002
Research & Ideas

‘Let the Buyer Beware’ Doesn’t Protect Investors

need substantial additional financing before ever becoming profitable. But the prospectus certainly included pages of disclaimers, reviewed and approved by a law firm, that were intended to protect the bank... View Details

Keywords: by D. Quinn Mills

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

December 1990 (Revised December 1993)
Supplement

Australian Paper Manufacturers (B)

By: David M. Upton and Joshua D. Margolis

Describes events that occur after the decision point in Australian Paper Manufacturers (A). With these facts and more detailed market projections, this case intensifies the long-term financial, strategic, and ethical decisions confronting the invader. View Details

Keywords: Forecasting and Prediction; Finance; Strategy; Ethics; Pulp and Paper Industry; Australia

20 Sep 2011
First Look

First Look: September 20

associated with risky lending in the corporate loan market by examining the performance of individual loans held by CLOs. We employ two different datasets that identify loan... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

January–March 2000
Article

Un nuevo índice de precios para México, 1886-1929 [A New Price Index for Mexico, 1886-1929]

By: Aurora Gómez-Galvarriato and Aldo Musacchio

We present new price indices for the period 1886-1929. These indices have several advantages with respect to the previous ones: i) they cover the whole period with the same methodology, and by reaching 1929 these series can be joined with contemporary price indices,... View Details

Keywords: Price; Inflation and Deflation; Macroeconomics; Mexico

Find at Harvard

Read Now

November 2000
Case

Reuters Greenhouse Fund

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter and Daniel Galvin

Reuters Greenhouse Fund had successfully invested in a portfolio of 79 companies working in areas relevant to Reuters Group's strategic interests. It had itself facilitated a powerful network among the companies and become a respected global venture capital firm.... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Investment; Investment Portfolio; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Financial Strategy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Transition; Partners and Partnerships; Networks; Internet; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry

Originally trained in brokerage under his father’s tutelage, Schiff joined Kuhn, Loeb and Company at a time when the firm was seeking to exit the shadow of JP Morgan. Under Schiff’s leadership, Kuhn, Loeb View Details

Keywords: Finance

December 2024
Case

Core Innovation Capital: Investing in Fintech for Good

By: Ray Kluender, Natalia Rigol, Benjamin Roth and Nicole Tempest Keller

In 2017, Arjan Schütte, founder of Core Innovation Capital, faced a decision on whether to invest in Hugo Insurance, an auto insurance startup. Core, an early-stage social impact VC firm, focused on “fintech for good,” by investing in financial services for low- to... View Details

Keywords: Fintech; Venture Capital; Social Entrepreneurship; Insurance; Measurement and Metrics; Investment; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Product Positioning; Financial Services Industry; Technology Industry; Insurance Industry; United States

Morgan was a major financier and power broker at the beginning of the 20th century. Through his elaborate financing programs, he controlled numerous corporations including General Electric, AT&T View Details

Keywords: Finance

19 Apr 2016
First Look

April 19, 2016

link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=50837 Covenant-Light Contracts and Creditor Coordination By: Becker, Bo, and Victoria Ivashina Abstract—In 2015, 70% of newly issued leveraged View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

July–August 2016
Article

How to Pay for Health Care

By: Michael E. Porter and Robert S. Kaplan

The United States stands at a crossroads in how to pay for health care. Fee for service, the dominant model in the United States and many other countries, is now widely recognized as perhaps the biggest obstacle to improving health care delivery. A battle is currently... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Finance; Health Industry; United States

Find at Harvard

Register to Read

20 Mar 2012
First Look

First Look: March 20

whether or not employees are selected via channels that are likely to sort on the alignment of their preferences with organizational objectives. I find that employees selected through such channels are more likely to use decision-making authority in the granting View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

01 Dec 2012
News

Fine-Tuning

music of such quality that it has been performed to critical acclaim in major venues around the world. "I never resolved the two avocations," Flügelman told the Washington Times (August 2, 2012). "I just hoped the cocktail of music and... View Details

Keywords: Securities, Commodities, and Other Financial Investments; Securities, Commodities, and Other Financial Investments

February 2001 (Revised June 2001)
Case

ClubTools, Inc.

By: Paul W. Marshall and Kristin Perry

Discusses the development of an Internet start-up by a recent HBS graduate. Details the company's business plan, incubation, technology development, marketing strategy, and search for funding. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Business Plan; Cash Flow; Marketing Strategy; Financing and Loans; Technological Innovation; Internet and the Web; Forecasting and Prediction

Find at Harvard

January 2018
Supplement

Blue Harbour's Activism at Babcock & Wilcox (B)

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Quinn Pitcher

Follow-up case detailing the changes and performance upswing at BWX Technologies after hedge fund Blue Harbour Group's investment and when the fund’s Managing Director Robb LeMasters (MBA’05) joined its board of directors. View Details

Keywords: Investment Activism; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Energy Industry; Construction Industry; United States