Publications

October 1992 (Revised August 1994)
Case

Allied-Signal: Managing the Hazardous Waste Liability Risk

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Edward Prewitt

Allied-Signal, Inc., one of the world's oldest chemical companies and today a diversified conglomerate, is liable for clean-up costs of old hazardous waste sites. These costs are substantial: reserves grew to nearly $500 million in 1991. Attempting to avoid further... View Details

Keywords: Wastes and Waste Processing; Environmental Sustainability; Programs; Cost Management; Policy; Government Legislation; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Governance Compliance; Legal Liability; Chemical Industry; United States; Europe

March 2001 (Revised November 2005)
Case

Cisco Systems Architecture: ERP and Web-enabled IT

By: Richard L. Nolan, Kelley Porter and Christina Akers

In a seven-year process, Cisco built its strategic I-Net. Beginning in 1994, Cisco completely replaced its back-office legacy systems. At that time, the company standardized Internet protocols. In addition, the company shifted strategic focus from IT back-office... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Information Technology; Technological Innovation; Internet and the Web; Management Practices and Processes; Technology Adoption; Information Technology Industry

05 Mar 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, March 5, 2019

second largest e-commerce company by gross merchandise volume (GMV) after Alibaba, had expanded rapidly from 2012 to 2016. When the company celebrated its 13th birthday in 2017, Richard Liu, its founder,... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

2007
Other Unpublished Work

Competitiveness at the Crossroads: Choosing the Future Direction of the Russian Economy

By: Michael E. Porter, Christian H.M. Ketels, Mercedes Delgado and Richard Bryden

In early 2006, the Center for Strategic Research (CSR) in Moscow commissioned Professor Michael Porter and his team to conduct a review of the existing evidence on Russian competitiveness. The objective of this report is to synthesize, interpret, and draw implications... View Details

Keywords: Economics; Growth and Development; Russia

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Web

2024 Reunion Presentations - Alumni

Reunions 2024 Reunion Presentations At Reunions, HBS faculty and other thought leaders address a range of issues facing business and society. Program recordings and materials (slide deck, handouts, etc.) are made available only when permission is given View Details

June 2024
Supplement

Zeswitz Music (B)

By: Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

Pre-Abstract: Instructors should consider the timing of making videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details.
Abstract: In July of 2013, Randy Shayler (HBS, 2012) acquired Zeswitz Music, a musical instrument rental company based in Reading,... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Customer Focus and Relationships; Business Strategy; Revenue; Marketing; Music Industry; Retail Industry

June 2018
Teaching Note

ALAC International

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

ALAC International (ALAC) was awarded the U.S. distributorship of di-isononyl phthalate (DINP) which provided ALAC an opportunity to increase its sales and profits. But the opportunity required a significant additional investment in working capital. The DINP, shipped... View Details

Keywords: Working Capital; Financing and Loans; Growth Management

September 2022
Article

Find and Replace: R&D Investment Following the Erosion of Existing Products

By: Joshua L. Krieger, Xuelin Li and Richard T. Thakor

How do innovative firms react when existing products experience negative shocks? We explore this question with detailed project-level data from drug development firms. Using FDA Public Health Advisories as idiosyncratic negative shocks to approved drugs, we first... View Details

Keywords: R＆D Investments; Drug Development; Product Shocks; M＆A; Biopharmaceutical Industry; FDA; System Shocks; Research and Development; Investment; Decision Making; Pharmaceutical Industry

September 2002 (Revised April 2006)
Case

Istituto Clinico Humanitas (A)

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer, Gary P. Pisano and Ning Tang

Istituto Clinico Humanitas is a newly built private hospital, south of Milan, Italy, that has attained unusual profitability while treating public system patients. The hospital was built and is managed by Techosp, a subsidiary of Techint, a global engineering and... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Management Systems; Infrastructure; Managerial Roles; Integration; Performance; Health Industry; Milan

15 Feb 2011
First Look

First Look: Feb. 15

experiments offer evidence that debates about the relative costs and benefits of self-deception are informed by adopting a temporal view that assesses the cumulative impact of self-deception over time. Download the paper:... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

26 Jul 2016
First Look

July 26, 2016

Mela, a three-month-long Hindu festival. We estimate that the festival was attended by 61 million people, making it the largest gathering in the history of humanity. While we find strong overall evidence for both types of homophily for... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

June 2018
Case

Japan: Deficits, Deflation and Debt

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

In April 2018, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was again in Washington to petition Donald Trump. After years of rapid, export-led growth, Japan had slumped into recession in 1991 and never really recovered. For the past 27 years, its economy has grown at 1.1% annually,... View Details

Keywords: Deflation; Debt; Country Analysis; Monetary Expansion; Population Growth; Inflation and Deflation; Borrowing and Debt; Economy; Energy; National Security; Japan

03 Nov 2009
First Look

First Look: Nov. 3

Working PapersContracting in the Self-reporting Economy (revised) Authors:Romana L. Autrey and Richard Sansing Abstract This paper examines the effect of accounting on the use of intellectual property. We analyze the licensing of... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

30 Jul 2013
First Look

First Look: July 30

programs requires more than providing accessible, affordable care; it requires understanding what makes both end users and providers tick. By understanding the cognitive processes underlying our choices and applying the tools of... View Details

Keywords: Anna Secino

March 2000
Background Note

Fall Before Rising, A: The Story of Jai Jaikumar (A)

By: H. Kent Bowen, Richard Compton Squire, Sarah Patricia Vickers-Willis and Harry James Wilson

What is the relationship between good fortune, professional success, and a moral obligation to other people? Jai Jaikumar, who as a youth was saved by a shepherd woman after a tragic mountaineering accident in the Himalayas, and who later rose to the top of his... View Details

Keywords: Moral Sensibility; History; Personal Development and Career; Relationships; Familiarity; Perception; Welfare

2016
Working Paper

Collusion in Markets with Syndication

By: John William Hatfield, Scott Kominers and Richard Lowery

Markets for IPOs and debt issuances are syndicated, in the sense that a bidder who wins a contract may invite losing bidders to join a syndicate that together fulfills the contract. We show that in markets with syndication, standard intuitions from... View Details

Keywords: Collusion; Antitrust; IPO Underwriting; Syndication; ＂Repeated Games＂

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14 Aug 2017
Conference Presentation

A Convex Framework for Fair Regression

By: Richard Berk, Hoda Heidari, Shahin Jabbari, Matthew Joseph, Michael J. Kearns, Jamie Morgenstern, Seth Neel and Aaron Roth

We introduce a flexible family of fairness regularizers for (linear and logistic) regression problems. These regularizers all enjoy convexity, permitting fast optimization, and they span the range from notions of group fairness to strong individual fairness. By varying... View Details

Keywords: Regression Models; Machine Learning; Fairness; Framework; Mathematical Methods

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20 Jan 2010
First Look

First Look: Jan. 20

Working PapersContracting in the Self-reporting Economy (revised) Authors:Romana L. Autrey and Richard Sansing Abstract This paper examines the effect of accounting on the use of intellectual property. We analyze the licensing of... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

June 2018 (Revised February 2019)
Teaching Note

Home Nursing of North Carolina

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

In 2011, immediately after graduating HBS, Ari Medoff began a self-funded search for a small firm to buy and run as its CEO. After just three month of searching, he identified Home Nursing of North Carolina (HNNC), a home care agency based in Greensboro, NC, as a... View Details

Keywords: Small Firms Management; Acquisition; Negotiation Process; Investment; Small Business; Management; Personal Development and Career