Publications

16 May 2023
HBS Case

How KKR Got More by Giving Ownership to the Factory Floor: ‘My Kids Are Going to College!’

One thing that stuck with Pete Stavros from the dinner-table conversations of his youth was that capitalism seemed fundamentally broken for his father, who earned an hourly wage working construction. The incentive was not there for... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman

August 2021
Supplement

Aligning Mission and Margin at Southern Bancorp

By: Brian Trelstad

Video Supplement for HBS Case No. 321-099. In October 2020, after spending almost a decade to turnaround Southern Bancorp, an Arkansan bank founded with the mission to provide financial services to rural, underserved communities, CEO Darrin Williams is wondering how... View Details

Keywords: Racial Wealth Gap; Banks and Banking; Growth and Development; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Going Public; Investment Return; Social Issues; Wealth and Poverty; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; United States; Arkansas

18 Mar 2014
First Look

First Look: March 18

un‐cited or self-cited, suggesting that incumbents are more likely to engage in incremental innovation compared to VC-backed startups. Third, we document a rising share of patenting by startups that coincided with the surge in venture View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

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

2012
Other Unpublished Work

Towards Efficiencies in Canadian Internet Traffic Exchange

By: Benjamin Edelman and Bill Woodcock

Canadian Internet access is heavily and unnecessarily dependent upon foreign infrastructure, especially U.S. infrastructure. This dependence imposes significant burdens upon Canadian Internet users:

* Service prices are higher than would be the case if... View Details

Keywords: Networks; Canada; Privacy; Technology Networks; Rights; Communication Technology; Internet; Ethics; Telecommunications Industry; Canada

Read Now

07 Jul 2022
HBS Case

How a Multimillion-Dollar Ice Cream Startup Melted Down (and Bounced Back)

Creamery in 2010, a Brooklyn ice cream parlor that would grow to 16 stores in four states by 2020. Smith’s clever flavors—mixing pecan pie and Sufganiyah jelly donuts in “Thanksgivukkah,” for example—were so enticing that Walt Disney... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

10 Sep 2021
Blog Post

Perspectives on Anti-Racism in the HKS Curriculum

In fall 2020, the Harvard Kennedy School incorporated a two-week module on Race and Racism in the Making of the United States as a Global Super power into the MPP core curriculum. The school created this module in response to calls by the... View Details

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

13 Dec 2022
Research & Ideas

The Color of Private Equity: Quantifying the Bias Black Investors Face

Black venture capital and growth investors have a much harder time getting funding than white investors, because—despite efforts to bring more racial diversity to financial services—private equity’s gatekeepers remain mostly white,... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds; Financial Services

March 2010 (Revised January 2012)
Case

Microsoft's IP Ventures

By: Josh Lerner and Ann Leamon

Microsoft's IP Ventures program, through which Microsoft spun out promising but unused technologies into new companies, is a new approach to corporate venture capital. The program provides "IP for equity" and has proven very successful in achieving its main... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Equity; Financing and Loans; Investment; Intellectual Property; Rights; Software; Washington (state, US)

September 2011 (Revised February 2014)
Case

Duke Energy and the Nuclear Renaissance

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Forest L. Reinhardt

Duke Energy, an American investor-owned electric utility, confronts multibillion dollar decisions about its future fuel mix. In particular, its leaders are considering building new nuclear capacity. Whether this is sensible depends, among other things, on demand... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Expansion; Policy; Business Strategy; Energy Sources; Utilities Industry; Energy Industry; United States

Web

Organizational Behavior - Faculty & Research

Job Design and Levels ; Employment ; Human Capital ; Management Practices and Processes ; United States Citation Educators Related Groysberg, Boris, Nicole Zelazko, Tom Quinn, Robin Abrahams, Izzy Yeoh, and... View Details

February 2003 (Revised May 2003)
Case

Accel Partners' European Launch

By: G. Felda Hardymon and Josh Lerner

In spring 2001, with the venture market crashing all around, the London office of Accel Partners, a major west coast venture capital firm, needs to make a decision about investing in an Irish software company. As the first investment of the new European operation, the... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Growth and Development Strategy; Venture Capital; Global Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Expansion; Management Practices and Processes; Partners and Partnerships; Financial Services Industry; London; United States

September 2008
Case

Yucheng Technology

By: Li Jin, Li Liao, Chang Chen and Aldo Sesia

The founder and CEO of an IT company servicing the needs of the financial services industry in China needs to raise capital for the company to grow and survive. He has two options. He can try and obtain financing from private equity investors, or he can accept a... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Private Equity; Growth and Development Strategy; Information Technology; Financial Services Industry; China; United States

October 2012 (Revised October 2016)
Case

Predilytics

By: Robert F. Higgins and Annelena Lobb

The management team at Predilytics, a healthcare analytics firm, must decide whether to accept a Series A venture capital financing deal. The company provided analytic services to healthcare plans, typically Medicare Advantage plans, in efforts to draw conclusions from... View Details

Keywords: Analytics; Healthcare; Medicare; Health Care and Treatment; Mathematical Methods; Health Industry; New England; United States

Web

Fellowships - Business History

Business School. The fellowship enables established scholars from around the world whose primary interest is the business and economic history of the United States to spend time in residence at Harvard Business School. The main activities... View Details

January 2023
Case

Proday: Calling the Right Play

By: Lindsay N. Hyde, Thomas R. Eisenmann and Tom Quinn

Sarah Kunst knew the elements of a successful startup from her tenure at venture capital firms. In April 2018, however, her own app – Proday, a home fitness platform featuring exercises filmed by professional sports stars – was floundering. Kunst theorized that... View Details

Keywords: Social Media; Entrepreneurship; Advertising; Digital Marketing; Product Launch; Social Marketing; Failure; Sports; Applications and Software; Business Startups; Technology Industry; United States

July 2021
Teaching Plan

Aligning Mission and Margin at Southern Bancorp

By: Rebecca Henderson, Brian Trelstad and Eren Kuzucu

Teaching Plan for HBS Case No. 321-099. In October 2020, after spending almost a decade to turnaround Southern Bancorp, an Arkansan bank founded with the mission to provide financial services to rural, underserved communities, CEO Darrin Williams is wondering how... View Details

Keywords: Racial Wealth Gap; Banks and Banking; Growth and Development; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Going Public; Investment Return; Social Issues; Wealth and Poverty; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; United States; Arkansas