Publications

18 Jan 2019
Blog Post

Exploring the Tech World Through WesTrek

Director. The Companies Throughout WesTrek I visited eight companies, from fintech startup Wealthfront to the female-founded VC Aspect Ventures. I wandered through Airbnb’s office and marveled at the conference rooms, which were View Details

September 1998 (Revised July 1999)
Case

Discovery Health (B)

By: Samuel S. Chun and Shaun Matisonn

A South African health insurance company grapples with designing a financially viable coverage solution for a new prescription drug treatment for male impotence. View Details

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Service Delivery; Insurance; Health Care and Treatment; Insurance Industry; South Africa

12 Feb 2025
Blog Post

How risk can be the key to a sustainable future with Sophie Levin (MS/MBA: Engineering Sciences 2022)

What were you doing prior to HBS? What made you decide to go to HBS? Before HBS, I worked at Tesla as a design engineer and project manager. I had the opportunity to work on groundbreaking products alongside some of the smartest and most... View Details

November 2000
Case

University Technology Ventures: October 2000

By: Josh Lerner

The founders of University Technology Ventures, a fund of funds designed for university professors, face numerous challenges in raising their first fund. The role, economics, and structure of funds-of-funds are examined in the course of examining the partners' dilemma. View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Problems and Challenges; Partners and Partnerships; Financial Services Industry

May 2008 (Revised August 2009)
Case

Intel NBI: Handheld Graphics Organization

By: Willy C. Shih and Thomas Thurston

The Handheld Graphics Organization (HGO) was an internal start-up under Intel's New Business Incubator program. The unit designed a graphics co-processor for the handheld PDA market, to be sold with Intel's Xscale processor. Though NBI ventures were designed for a high... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Resource Allocation; Business Processes; Organizational Structure; Semiconductor Industry; United States

Find at Harvard

October 1991 (Revised January 2000)
Case

Workplace Safety at Alcoa (A)

By: Kim B. Clark and Joshua D. Margolis

Examines the challenge facing the managers of a large aluminum manufacturing plant in its drive to improve workplace safety. The CEO of the company has made safety a top priority. The plant has made good progress in reducing the injury rate, but now confronts the need... View Details

Keywords: Working Conditions; Safety; Problems and Challenges; Change Management; Operations; Resignation and Termination; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Manufacturing Industry; United States

William Sahlman is a Baker Foundation Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.

Mr. Sahlman received an A.B. degree in Economics from Princeton University (1972), an M.B.A. from Harvard University (1975), and a Ph.D. in Business... View Details

September 1996
Case

Silicon Graphics, Inc. (B)

By: Marco Iansiti and Alan D. MacCormack

After the release of the "Challenge" computer in 1993, Silicon Graphics executives meet to discuss the follow-up project. Should they pursue an incremental improvement to the Challenge, or opt for a radically new design recently demonstrated at Stanford University? View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Technological Innovation; Management Practices and Processes; Product Development; Hardware; Computer Industry

March 2008 (Revised November 2008)
Case

Databank in Africa

By: Jordan Siegel and Yi Kwan Chu

This case tackles issues of regional strategy and strategic institutional arbitrage. Databank is a financial services firm designing its regional strategy for Africa and seeking to benefit from institutional arbitrage. View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Local Range; Emerging Markets; Service Operations; Business Strategy; Financial Services Industry; Africa

September 2003 (Revised February 2004)
Case

Electronic Arts: The Blockbuster Strategy

Describes the process that the firm employs to allocate resources to new product development projects. Examines whether the firm can sustain its competitive advantage given its existing game design process. View Details

Keywords: Resource Allocation; Competitive Advantage; Decision Making; Product Development; Video Game Industry

August 2015
Case

Building an e-Commerce Brand at Wayfair

By: Thales Teixeira and Elizabeth Anne Watkins

Wayfair, Inc. comprised five home goods, furniture, and décor e-commerce brands. Wayfair.com, the main brand, which was responsible for the majority of sales, targeted the mass-middle home-goods market. AllModern, DwellStudio, Joss & Main, and Birch Lane were niche... View Details

September 2023
Supplement

Fighting the Battle of the Bulge—Evaluating Do Good/Do Well Innovations in Morbid Obesity Treatment

By: Regina E. Herzlinger

This PowerPoint accompanies Regina E. Herzlinger's "Fighting the Battle of the Bulge – Evaluating Do Good/Do Well Innovations in Morbid Obesity Treatment" teaching note (HBS Case No.324-013) and is designed for instructors to use in the classroom when teaching this... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Delivery; Obesity; Weight Loss; Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Management; Health Care and Treatment; Medical Specialties; Health Industry

31 Mar 2020
Blog Post

Know Your Audience – Recruiting HBS Students for Investment Management

firms that post roles in our recruiting platform receive large numbers of applications from talented candidates, but often only have the headcount for one or two interns or full-time hires. Given the supply/demand imbalance across investment management, the majority of... View Details

Keywords: Investment Management / Hedge Fund

May 2004 (Revised July 2004)
Case

IBM On Demand Community

By: John A. Quelch

The vice-president of IBM Corporate Community Relations is developing the launch program for IBM On Demand Community, a suite of 140 technology tools designed to enable IBM employees to assist nonprofit community organizations and schools worldwide. View Details

Keywords: Nonprofit Organizations; Social Marketing; Computer Industry

13 Jun 2012
HBS Case

HBS Cases: A Startup Takes On the Credit Ratings Giants

studied the credit ratings industry in the wake of the financial crisis. In a paper published in the Journal of Financial Economics, he examined the role of competition between raters. One important distinction, in his view, is between... View Details

Keywords: by Maggie Starvish; Banking; Financial Services

November 2006 (Revised March 2010)
Case

Two Ways to Fly South: Lan Airlines and Southwest Airlines

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Tarun Khanna, Jorge Tarzijan and Jordan Mitchell

To maximize their effectiveness, color cases should be printed in color. Looks at the different business models of two highly successful and profitable airlines: Chilean-based Lan Airlines and U.S.-based Southwest Airlines. Lan Airlines pursues a hub-to-spoke... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Service Operations; Competitive Advantage; Air Transportation Industry; United States; Chile

April 1998
Case

Citibank Hong Kong--Capital Arbitrage in the Emerging Markets

Describes how a credit derivative may be used to structure a profitable transaction between a bank and its client. Design and risk management issues are discussed in the context of this new class of derivative security. View Details

Keywords: Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Investment Banking; Financial Services Industry; Hong Kong