Publications

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March 2024
Case

Unintended Consequences of Algorithmic Personalization

By: Eva Ascarza and Ayelet Israeli

“Unintended Consequences of Algorithmic Personalization” (HBS No. 524-052) investigates algorithmic bias in marketing through four case studies featuring Apple, Uber, Facebook, and Amazon. Each study presents scenarios where these companies faced public criticism for... View Details

Keywords: Race; Gender; Marketing; Diversity; Customer Relationship Management; Prejudice and Bias; Customization and Personalization; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; United States

06 Feb 2023
Blog Post

Meet the Black Investment Club

early-stage venture capital while at HBS, Coates is an active member of the Boston innovation ecosystem from the investor side as a Venture Fellow, now Managing Partner, at Rough Draft Ventures (student fund... View Details

Keywords: Investment Management / Hedge Fund; Investment Management / Hedge Fund; Investment Management / Hedge Fund

01 Sep 2017
News

Is Private Equity Blockchain’s Killer App?

that the blockchain application could enable Northern Trust to achieve productivity savings of “somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 to 35 percent.” The firm—which has $1 trillion in assets under management View Details

Keywords: Dan Morrell

10 May 2016
First Look

May 10, 2016

prowess. This narrative stresses that Britannica’s management faced organizational diseconomies of scope between supporting lines of business in the old and new markets, which generated internal conflicts.... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

11 Apr 2000
Research & Ideas

Financial Services 24/7

week for it to clear will be equally unfathomable. Technology is transforming the banking industry so rapidly that anything less than around-the-clock electronic access to bank accounts seems unthinkable. While predictions vary widely as... View Details

Keywords: by Susan Young

September 17, 2021
Article

AI Can Help Address Inequity—If Companies Earn Users' Trust

By: Shunyuan Zhang, Kannan Srinivasan, Param Singh and Nitin Mehta

While companies may spend a lot of time testing models before launch, many spend too little time considering how they will work in the wild. In particular, they fail to fully consider how rates of adoption can warp developers’ intent. For instance, Airbnb launched a... View Details

Keywords: Artificial Intelligence; Algorithmic Bias; Technological Innovation; Perception; Diversity; Equality and Inequality; Trust; AI and Machine Learning

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September 2020 (Revised July 2022)
Teaching Note

Algorithmic Bias in Marketing

By: Ayelet Israeli and Eva Ascarza

Teaching Note for HBS No. 521-020. This note focuses on algorithmic bias in marketing. First, it presents a variety of marketing examples in which algorithmic bias may occur. The examples are organized around the 4 P’s of marketing – promotion, price, place and... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Race; Ethnicity; Gender; Diversity; Prejudice and Bias; Decision Making; Ethics; Customer Relationship Management; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; Technology Industry; United States

October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Fantuan

By: Feng Zhu and David Lane

In 2023, CEO Randy Wu was considering the optimal growth strategy for Fantuan, a restaurant food delivery platform that had expanded from its 2014 founding in Vancouver, Canada to serve the Chinese demand for Asian cuisine in urban markets across Australia, Canada, the... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Focus and Relationships; Diasporas; Entrepreneurship; Digital Platforms; Growth Management; Business Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; Canada; United Kingdom; Australia

September 2021 (Revised December 2021)
Case

Telepass: From Tolling to Mobility Platform

By: Chiara Farronato, Stefano Denicolai and Sarah Mehta

Telepass, until very recently the sole processor of electronic toll payments on Italy’s highways, has ambitions beyond tolling. Since the mid-2010s, the company has been expanding into adjacent services. In 2017, Telepass launched TelepassPay—a mobile payment... View Details

February 2024
Supplement

Can Cities Beat the Heat? (B5): Detroit Climate Action Snapshot

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Jacob A. Small

Climate snapshots provide a summary of climate actions that occurred between 2018 and 2024, highlighting major green initiatives, innovations, carbon mitigation strategy, and action across multiple levels of government and the private sector. Snapshots also provide an... View Details

Keywords: Mitigation Policies; Carbon Footprint; Climate Finance; Mobility; Adaptation; Renewable Energy; Climate Change; Problems and Challenges; Sustainable Cities; City; Innovation Strategy; Investment; United States; Detroit

04 Oct 2004
Research & Ideas

Start to Measure Your E-commerce Success

is not much historical data and experience for managers to draw upon when developing or applying metrics, and many economic benefits of e-commerce projects are seen as... View Details

Keywords: by Marc J. Epstein

August 2011
Supplement

InnoCentive.com (B)

By: Karim R. Lakhani and Eric Lonstein

InnoCentive.com enables clients to tap into internal and external solver networks to address various business issues. In 2008, InnoCentive introduced "InnoCentive@Work" (lC@W), which recognized clients' reluctance to share problems and solutions with an external... View Details

Keywords: Digital Platforms; Cost vs Benefits; Intellectual Property; Networks; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Product; Groups and Teams; Communication Technology

Keywords: crowdsourcing; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools

05 May 2009
First Look

First Look: May 5, 2009

must be nurtured and the transition to high growth must be managed. Once breakthrough innovations catch hold, growth must be funded and managed... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

01 Jun 2013
News

Collective Wisdom

according to Karim R. Lakhani, is that thanks to the Internet, crowdsourcing has moved into new and unexpected industries and organizations, establishing itself as a mainstream strategy for View Details

01 Mar 2017
News

Students Forecast Climate Change’s Impact

MORE Watch three students discuss their approach to the climate change challenge MORE Watch three students discuss their approach to the climate change challenge Professors Mike Toffel and Marco Iansiti presented the more than 900 RC... View Details

Keywords: Dan Morrell

Career Coach

Matt Spielman

Matt (Columbia ’94, HBS ’99) is the Founder and Managing Partner of Inflection Point Partners, an executive coaching and leadership development firm dedicated to igniting... View Details

Keywords: Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management; Investment Management

23 Feb 2010
First Look

First Look: Feb. 23

likely to involve collaboration across locations, particularly with inventors from the firm's primary R&D site. Our results suggest that R&D dynamics in clusters are heavily influenced by multi-location firms with innovative links... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

October 1993 (Revised September 1994)
Case

Becton Dickinson: Worldwide Blood Collection Team

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Kathleen Scharf

Describes Becton Dickinson's evolving attempt to develop products and strategies to meet worldwide competitive and market needs. Traces the evolution of a classic parent company-led product-market strategy to truly transnational product and strategy development.... View Details

Keywords: Global Strategy; Product Development; Innovation and Management; Competitive Advantage; Multinational Firms and Management