Publications

14 Jul 2023
Blog Post

Harvard Business School Announces Its 2023-2024 Blavatnik Fellows

offers HBS alumni and Harvard-affiliated postdocs the opportunity to work closely with leading biotech industry and biomedical authorities, receive mentorship, and join a community of entrepreneurs shaping the future of science. To date,... View Details

March 2002 (Revised July 2004)
Case

Price of Light, The: Privatization, Regulation and Valuation in Brazil

Asks students to produce a valuation for Rio Light, a Brazilian power company that is state owned and to be sold in March 1996. If successful, the privatization would bring in over $2 billion to the Brazilian treasury. But success was far from assured. Members of the... View Details

Keywords: Valuation; Energy Generation; Privatization; Corporate Governance; Energy Industry; Brazil

2006
Book

Design-Inspired Innovation

By: James Utterback, Bengt–Arne Vedin, Eduardo Alvarez, Sten Ekman, Susan Walsh Sanderson, Bruce Tether and Roberto Verganti

When an innovation is inspired by design, it transcends technology and utility. The design delights the user, seamlessly integrating the physical object, a service, and its use into something whole. A design-inspired innovation is so simple that it becomes an extension... View Details

Keywords: Innovation and Invention; Product Design; Product Development

12 Dec 2012
Research & Ideas

Book Excerpt: Strength in Numbers

Professor Gunnar Trumbull disagrees. In his new book, Strength in Numbers: The Political Power of Weak Interests, Trumbull shows how groups such as consumers can effect change by forming interest-driven alliances among activists,... View Details

Keywords: Re: Gunnar Trumbull

December 2018 (Revised January 2020)
Case

Husk Power: Scaling the Venture

By: Benjamin N. Roth, Joseph B. Lassiter III and Natalia Rigol

In January 2018, Manoj Sinha—founder and CEO of Husk Power—was contemplating raising $20 million to scale operations for a second time. From 2007 through 2013, Husk built 80 biomass waste plants that provided electricity to 250,000 villagers and shop owners spread... View Details

Keywords: Scaling; Energy; Entrepreneurship; Emerging Markets; Growth and Development Strategy; Energy Industry; India

01 Aug 2018
What Do You Think?

Are Free Trade and Free Markets Quaint Ideas From the Past?

maximize the purchasing power of consumers or if it is to reinforce certain government favoured industries and, indirectly, the people who work and invest in those industries. After more than thirty years... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

July – August 2009
Article

Restoring American Competitiveness

By: Gary P. Pisano and Willy C. Shih

For decades, U.S. companies have been outsourcing manufacturing in the belief that it held no competitive advantage. That's been a disaster, maintain Harvard professors Pisano and Shih, because today's low-value manufacturing operations hold the seeds of tomorrow's... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Advantage; Value; Production; Innovation and Invention; Product Development; Government and Politics; Social Issues; Management Practices and Processes; Investment; Research and Development; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Competency and Skills; Service Industry; United States

05 Jun 2012
First Look

First Look: June 5

characteristics. However, most industries with a significant presence of multi-location firms are oligopolistic in nature, which suggests that strategic interaction among firms plays an important role in firms' decision-making processes.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2016
Book

Innovation Equity: Assessing and Managing the Monetary Value of New Products and Services

By: Elie Ofek, Eitan Muller and Barak Libai

This book bridges the gap between what academics know, and what innovation stakeholders—from managers, to investors, to analysts, to consumers—need to know about how new products and services are expected to perform in the marketplace. The book develops a compelling... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Technology Diffusion; New Products; Customer Lifetime Value; Monetization Strategy; Social Influence; Innovation Adoption; Forecasting Demand; Commercialization; Marketing Strategy; Practice; Customer Value and Value Chain; Research; Innovation and Management; Technology Adoption; Forecasting and Prediction; Product Development

14 Sep 2016
Blog Post

The Alumni Network at HBS

the industry. During my time at HBS, I have learned first-hand the power of the alumni base. They are a remarkable group of people who share a “pay it forward” mentality. I have contacted many alumni during my second year, most of whom I... View Details

October 2009
Case

Medisys Corp.: The IntensCare Product Development Team

By: Anne Donnellon and Joshua D. Margolis

Key topics include designing teams, managing teams, managing conflict, group dynamics, project management, product development, interdepartmental relations, and organizational change. MediSys, a U.S.-based medical equipment maker, has been developing IntensCare, a new... View Details

Keywords: Project Management; Interdepartmental Relations; Organizational Change; Leadership; Conflict Management; Interpersonal Communication; Groups and Teams; Product Design; Product Development; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Health Care and Treatment; Power and Influence; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; United States

23 Dec 2002
Research & Ideas

Partnering and the Balanced Scorecard

different people. The power of measurement was to take the ambiguity out of words so that everyone had a clear, coherent picture of exactly what the strategy is. Partnering With Employees Several forces highlight the importance of... View Details

Keywords: by Robert S. Kaplan & David P. Norton

May 2014
Article

Information and Two-Sided Platform Profits

By: Andrei Hagiu and Hanna Halaburda

We study the effect of different levels of information on two-sided platform profits under monopoly and competition. One side (developers) is always informed about all prices and therefore forms responsive expectations. In contrast, we allow the other side (users) to... View Details

Keywords: Responsive Expectations; Passive Expectations; Wary Expectations; Information; Performance Expectations; Two-Sided Platforms; Monopoly

SSRN

January 2002
Exercise

Socrates, Inc.

By: Alan D. MacCormack and Kerry Herman

Socrates, Inc., a provider of e-learning tools and technologies to educational institutions and, potentially, corporations, must decide which of several opportunities to pursue next and which priorities to focus on in terms of better structuring the firm's processes... View Details

Keywords: Business Plan; Business Startups; Internet and the Web; Opportunities; Business Processes; Organizational Structure; Decision Choices and Conditions; Organizational Design; Education Industry; Education Industry

November 2002 (Revised May 2003)
Case

Education in Chile: A Venue for Individual, Business and Community Involvement

Describes the alliance between a private businessman in Chile and a municipality to manage the local public education system. Describes the institution of a performance-based culture, including the use of management tools to align visions and incentives among key... View Details

Keywords: Partners and Partnerships; Social Entrepreneurship; Social Issues; Education; Business and Community Relations; Education Industry; Chile

19 Jul 2004
Research & Ideas

Your Customers: Use Them or Lose Them

Frei. Their customers are better off and the organizations earn a disproportionate share of the profits over their competitors. Frei, who spoke with HBS alumni on June 4 in a session titled "Capitalizing on the Power of the... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

November 2019 (Revised April 2021)
Technical Note

Rechargeable Batteries, 2017: Gigafactory Wars in the Offing?

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In 2017, the global market for rechargeable lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries was 126 gigawatt-hours (GWh) valued at $37 billion, growing by $10 billion in two years. Once confined largely to consumer electronics and appliances, the rapid increase in demand was spurred by... View Details

2019
Article

Overcoming Cultural Resistance to Open Source Innovation

By: John Winsor, Jin Hyun Paik, Michael Tushman and Karim R. Lakhani

Purpose: This article offers insight on how to effectively help incumbent organizations prepare for global business shifts to open source and digital business models.
Design/methodology/approach: Discussion related to observation, experience and case studies... View Details

Keywords: Open Source Innovation; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Business Model; Technological Innovation; Collaborative Innovation and Invention

2008
Book

On Competition

By: M. E. Porter

Competition is one of society's most powerful forces for making things better in many ﬁelds of human endeavor. The study of competition and the creation of value, in their full richness, have preoccupied me for several decades. Competition is pervasive, whether it... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Practice; Competitive Strategy; Theory; Value Creation