Publications

Find at Harvard

2022
Working Paper

Flight to Safety: How Economic Downturns Affect Talent Flows to Startups

By: Shai Bernstein, Richard Townsend and Ting Xu

Using proprietary data from AngelList Talent, we study how individuals’ job search and application behavior changed during the COVID-19 downturn. We find that job seekers shifted their searches toward more established firms and away from early-stage startups, even... View Details

Keywords: Startup Labor Market; Flight To Safety; COVID-19; Recession; Business Startups; Human Capital; Business Cycles; Health Pandemics

SSRN

Read Now

02 Mar 2010
First Look

First Look: March 2

legal change applied). These reductions in agency costs were followed by an increase in average leverage and a reduction in interest costs. Finally, we can estimate the welfare implications of agency costs, because firm values increased... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

12 Dec 2018
News

Impact Investing Could Accelerate the Fight Against Cancer

June 2010 (Revised December 2010)
Case

Hôpital de Pontoise

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer, Daniela Beyersdorfer and Simon Harrow

In 2010, Andre Razafindranaly, managing director of a large French public hospital, considers which organizational structure will help them adjust to the changing health sector environment. The move from global budget to activity-based funding has led his and many... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Governance Controls; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Health Care and Treatment; Leading Change; Service Delivery; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Health Industry; France

Find at Harvard

December 2010 (Revised January 2013)
Case

Triple Point Technology

By: Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

The founding CEO of Triple Point Technology, Peter Armstrong, was considering the sale of the company. The company specialized in providing its clients with software used for transaction processing and risk management in various commodity markets. Triple Point... View Details

Keywords: Business Exit or Shutdown; Private Equity; Financial Management; Negotiation Offer; Sales; Valuation

September 2018 (Revised January 2019)
Teaching Note

Gemini Investors

By: Richard S. Ruback, Royce Yudkoff and Ahron Rosenfeld

Teaching Note for HBS No. 211-066. Gemini Investors was a private equity firm that targeted equity investments of between $4 million to $6 million per firm. In the period from 2000 to 2015, Gemini had successfully deployed four funds, all licensed as Small Business... View Details

Keywords: Small ＆ Medium-sized Enterprises; Small Business; Private Equity; Investment Funds; Decision Making; Financial Services Industry; United States

May 2, 2024
Article

Require Hospitals to Disclose Their Pandemic Plans Now

By: Regina E. Herzlinger, Richard J. Boxer and Ben Creo

The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated that U.S. hospital and health care systems were ill-prepared for the surge of patients who overwhelmed available health care resources. An overlooked resource deserves more attention: the availability of intensive care unit (ICU)... View Details

Keywords: COVID-19 Pandemic; Crisis Management; Knowledge Sharing; Governance Compliance; Planning; Health Industry; United States

Read Now

May 2024
Supplement

gWorks (A)

By: Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

In January of 2019, Joe Heieck, CEO of gWorks, was deciding whether to proceed with his acquisition of Data Tech, that was a business roughly the same size as gWorks. gWorks, which provided geospatial software to small city and rural county governments, was acquired by... View Details

24 May 2011
First Look

First Look: May 24

PublicationsClusters and Competitiveness: Porter's Contribution Authors:Christian H.M. Ketels Publication:Chap. 10 in Competition and Competitive Advantage: The Ideas of Michael Porter, edited by Robert Huggins and Hiro Izushi, 173-192.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

November 2019 (Revised May 2021)
Case

DeepGreen - the Metals Company and Polymetallic Nodules

By: Richard H.K. Vietor

The world has begun a “green transition”—a move to reduce carbon emissions. Part of this will entail a growing shift to electric vehicles. Huge amounts of metals—cobalt, nickel, and copper—will be needed to supply electric vehicles. Mining these on land, however, is... View Details

Keywords: Polymetallic Nodules; Seabed Mining; Entrepreneurial Finance; Metals and Minerals; Mining; Entrepreneurship; Finance; Problems and Challenges

14 Nov 2017
First Look

New Research and Ideas: November 14, 2017

experts to discuss how researchers can impact a broader audience, by lending their scientific expertise to pressing social issues, current events, and public debates. The landmark Brown v. Board of Education case, in which the Supreme... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

November 2006 (Revised August 2009)
Case

Malaysia: Halfway to 2020

By: Richard H.K. Vietor

This country case on Malaysia extends forward by seven years the case “Malaysia: Capital and Control” (702-040). It is based on Malaysia's ninth plan, which took effect in 2006. The ninth plan proposed five thrusts—moving the economy to higher value-added goods and... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Growth and Development Strategy; Strategic Planning; Welfare; Equality and Inequality; Malaysia

January 2017 (Revised August 2017)
Case

Mexico's Energy Reform

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Haviland Sheldahl-Thomason

Energy—both petroleum and electricity—had been terribly managed for decades in Mexico. The two national monopolies—PEMEX and CFE—were inefficient, overstaffed, corrupt, rife with subsidies, and losing money. Finally, in 2012, President Enrique Peña Nieto announced his... View Details

Keywords: Energy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Performance Improvement; Energy Industry; Mexico

May 2023
Case

Legacy Partners

By: Royce Yudkoff and Richard S. Ruback

Stephen Holbrook and Austin Pulsipher (both HBS '19) had been leading Nutrishare since acquiring the company six months earlier in mid-2021. The company, based in Sacramento CA, was a compounding pharmacy serving Total Parenteral Nutrition ("TPN") patients nationwide.... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Growth and Development Strategy; Competitive Strategy; Business or Company Management; Pharmaceutical Industry

August 2024 (Revised November 2024)
Case

Commonwealth Fusion Systems: Born at Scale

By: Joshua Lev Krieger, Jim Matheson, Kyle Myers, Gunnar Trumbull and Richard Vietor

This case study chronicles the journey of Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) on its ambitious mission to commercialize fusion energy and become the world’s leading provider of fusion power plants. Emerging from a “special arrangement” with MIT's Plasma Science and... View Details

Keywords: Nuclear Energy; Innovation; Entrepreneurship; Entrepreneurial Finance; Energy Generation; Commercialization; Science-Based Business; Technological Innovation; Market Entry and Exit; Energy Industry

October 1999
Case

Overhead Reduction Task Force, The

By: J. Richard Hackman, Ruth Wageman and John J. Gabarro

A middle manager is about to meet with his boss to discuss her request that he head up a task force to determine how overhead can be reduced by 20%. He must decide what to address in that meeting and how the task force should be launched and led. The focus is on team... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Leadership Style; Management Teams; Management Style; Groups and Teams