Publications

01 Apr 2024
In Practice

Navigating the Mood of Customers Weary of Price Hikes

volume) would fall in response to a price increase. Understanding broad trends in elasticities and underlying demand is critical for making companywide decisions about whether to change prices, or where on the premium-to-value spectrum to... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Retail; Consumer Products

February 2023 (Revised March 2025)
Case

Graphic Packaging: Project Cowboy (A)

By: Benjamin C. Esty and E. Scott Mayfield

In July 2019, Graphic Packaging CEO Michael Doss was proposing a $600 million investment in a new machine to produce coated recycled board (CRB), a type of paper packaging used for consumer products (cups, cereal boxes, beverage boxes, etc.) that utilized recycled... View Details

Keywords: Capital Budgeting; Growth Management; Demand and Consumers; Duopoly and Oligopoly; Competitive Strategy; Competitive Advantage; Expansion; Value Creation; Supply and Industry; Pulp and Paper Industry; Manufacturing Industry; United States; North America

Article

The Role of Finance and Private Investment in Developing Sustainable Cities

By: John D. Macomber

Three trends will drive urban investment, development, and entrepreneurship in the next two decades. This article provides tools to identify the situations and circumstances that will be most favorable for private sector involvement in consideration of these trends.... View Details

Keywords: Trends; Demographics; Private Sector; Investment; City; Infrastructure; Opportunities; Urban Development

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Research Summary

Overview

Hisano’s research addresses the social and cultural implications of technological development and economic changes mainly in the twentieth-century United States. By analyzing the regulation, manipulation, and presentation of food color, her current book project links... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Consumer Behavior; Agribusiness; Food And Environment; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Business And Government; Advertising; Goods and Commodities; Food; History; Government and Politics; Marketing; Business and Government Relations; Advertising Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Chemical Industry; United States

03 May 2004
Research & Ideas

Business History around the World

driving the wealth of nations. It also demonstrates that there has never been a single model for successful or unsuccessful capitalism. To give only one example, business and economic historians have often taken a skeptical view of the... View Details

Keywords: by Cynthia Churchwell

2013
Working Paper

Adjusting National Accounting for Health: Is the Business Cycle Countercyclical?

By: Mark Egan, Casey B. Mulligan and Tomas J. Philipson

Many national accounts of economic output and prosperity, such as gross domestic product (GDP) or net domestic product (NDP), offer an incomplete picture by ignoring, for example, the value of leisure, home production, and the value of health. Previous discussed... View Details

Keywords: Health; Valuation; Accounting; United States

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May 2009 (Revised January 2011)
Case

Enel: Power, Russia, and Global Markets

By: Rawi E. Abdelal, Richard H.K. Vietor and Sogomon Tarontsi

Although the global trend toward liberalization of electric utilities forced Enel, the largest power company in Italy, to give up some of its assets in its home base, it also opened up many opportunities abroad, including in Russia, one of the largest electricity... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Energy Generation; Foreign Direct Investment; Global Strategy; Globalized Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Business and Government Relations; Utilities Industry; Russia; Italy

2022
Article

Reversible Power-to-Gas Systems for Energy Conversion and Storage

By: Gunther Glenk and Stefan Reichelstein

In the transition to decarbonized energy systems, Power-to-Gas (PtG) processes have the potential to connect the existing markets for electricity and hydrogen. Specifically, reversible PtG systems can convert electricity to hydrogen at times of ample power supply, yet... View Details

May 1994
Background Note

Reorienting Channels of Distribution

By: V. Kasturi Rangan

Traditionally, distribution channels have been viewed as vertical marketing systems where responsibility was transferred from one layer to the next, like passing a baton in a relay race. Distribution channels in the future are likely to look more like horizontal... View Details

Keywords: Distribution Channels; Customers; Supply and Industry; Alliances; Performance Efficiency; Performance Effectiveness; Change; Distribution Industry

07 Sep 2007
Working Paper Summaries

Diversification of Chinese Companies: An International Comparison

Keywords: by Joseph P.H. Fan, Jun Huang, Felix Oberholzer-Gee, Troy D. Smith & Mengxin Zhao

2014
Working Paper

The Rising Cost of Consumer Attention: Why You Should Care, and What You Can Do about It

By: Thales S. Teixeira

Attention is a necessary ingredient for effective advertising. The market for consumer attention (or "eyeballs") has become so competitive that attention can be regarded as a currency. The rising cost of this ingredient in the marketplace is causing marketers to waste... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Advertising

21 May 2014
Working Paper Summaries

The Role of the Corporation in Society: An Alternative View and Opportunities for Future Research

Keywords: by George Serafeim

19 Aug 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Optimal Taxation in Theory and Practice

Keywords: by N. Gregory Mankiw, Matthew Weinzierl & Danny Yagan

2012
Discussion Paper

Labor Productivity and Quality Change in Singapore: Achievements in 1974-2011 and Prospects for the Next Two Decades

By: Koji Nomura and Tomomichi Amano

Labor productivity growth in Singapore that has grown at a rate of over 3.0 percent per year since 1970s considerably slowed down to 0.5 percent on average per annum in the latter half of the 2000s. The purpose of this paper is to ask, first, to what extent Singapore’s... View Details

Keywords: Labor; Performance Productivity; Quality; Economic Growth; Singapore

September 1991 (Revised August 1994)
Background Note

Note on Pharmaceutical Industry Regulation

By: Willis M. Emmons III

Traces the evolution of U.S. regulatory policy towards the pharmaceutical industry over the course of the twentieth century. A major theme is the steady shift away from a policy of 'let the buyer beware' to the creation of a complex and time-consuming review process,... View Details

Keywords: Safety; Industry Growth; Marketing; Research and Development; Health Testing and Trials; Economics; Pharmaceutical Industry; United States

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08 Sep 2009
Research & Ideas

The Height Tax, and Other New Ways to Think about Taxation

less burdensome for all citizens. "While the idea of a height tax follows directly from the standard economic framework for tax analysis, most people find the idea crazy," allows HBS professor Matthew C. Weinzierl, an economist... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace

18 Jun 2024
Research & Ideas

Industrial Decarbonization: Confronting the Hard Challenges of Cement

Cities like Cairo; Chongqing, China; Delhi; and Kinshasa, Congo are experiencing population explosions accompanied by unprecedented demand for homes, offices, factories, and infrastructure. In the United States, the Biden Administration’s policy-driven infrastructure... View Details

Keywords: by by Janelle Conaway; Green Technology; Energy; Industrial Products; Manufacturing

September 2012 (Revised August 2015)
Case

Shanghai Pharmaceuticals

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Natalie Kindred

Shanghai Pharmaceuticals (SPH), a vertically integrated Chinese pharmaceutical conglomerate, was considering its strategic options in the context of a rapidly evolving industry, policy, and economic environment. The company—essentially a collection of subsidiaries... View Details

Keywords: Business Subsidiaries; Business Conglomerates; Vertical Integration; Decision Choices and Conditions; Mergers and Acquisitions; Consolidation; Health Care and Treatment; Global Strategy; State Ownership; Pharmaceutical Industry; Health Industry; Shanghai; United States; Europe