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strategic investment decisions that generate financial success. 8 weeks, 5–6 hrs/week Pay by August 14 $1,850 Certificate Alternative Investments Professors Victoria Ivashina, Randolph Cohen, & Arthur Segel Take your View Details

March 2006 (Revised November 2006)
Case

The Market and the Mountain Kingdom: Change in Lesotho's Textile Industry

By: Rawi E. Abdelal, Regina M. Abrami, Noel Maurer and Aldo Musacchio

In Maseru, the capital of the Kingdom of Lesotho, the stirrings of industrialization and modernization were promising, and more than 50,000 workers, mostly women, were employed in the textile sector; the figure reflected more than a threefold increase in just a few... View Details

Keywords: History; Labor Unions; Trade; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Financial Crisis; Globalized Markets and Industries; Business and Government Relations; Decision Choices and Conditions; Foreign Direct Investment; Developing Countries and Economies; Fashion Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Lesotho

March 2006 (Revised August 2006)
Case

Putnam Investments: Rebuilding the Culture

By: Nitin Nohria and Charles Nichols

Charles "Ed" Haldeman Jr. is promoted CEO of Putnam Investments after the firm was badly damaged by a series of improper trading practices. He is charged with the task of managing the crisis, repairing the company culture, and putting the firm back into a pattern of... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Organizational Culture; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Ethics; Investment Funds; Investment; Leading Change; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Services Industry; United States

June 2010 (Revised September 2011)
Case

The Southeast Bank of Texas in the Financial Crisis

By: Robert C. Pozen and Benjamin Greff Schneider

The Southeast Bank of Texas, like most other financial institutions in the U.S., has fallen on hard times during the financial crisis of the past year. Now, in March 2009, the bank is faced with several choices as a result of the new reforms spawned from the financial... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Crisis; Capital; Financial Liquidity; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Banking Industry; Texas

September 2024
Case

Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners: Leading the Energy Transition

By: John Macomber and Maxwell Nii Laryea

A leading global infrastructure fund debates whether and when to become engaged in the electrolysis and distribution of hydrogen, as part of the hydrogen economy and the global transtion to a net zero energy world. The proposed billion dollar project consists of wind... View Details

Keywords: Infrastructure; Energy Generation; Renewable Energy; Project Finance; Decision Making; Risk and Uncertainty; Energy Industry; Spain

2024
Working Paper

Public Debt and Investment Under Political Competition: Evidence from Toxic Loans

By: Julien Sauvagnat and Boris Vallée

We examine how political considerations shape local government responses to a substantial rise in indebtedness. We use the delayed yet sharp deterioration of “toxic” loans held by French municipalities as a quasi-natural experiment to empirically investigate such... View Details

Keywords: Public Debt; Public Investments; Political Contestation; Toxic Loans; Borrowing and Debt; Investment; Public Sector; Government and Politics; Local Range; Financing and Loans

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24 Jul 2000
Research & Ideas

Value Maximization and Stakeholder Theory

Contending with that value maximization approach is "stakeholder theory" which says that managers should make decisions so as to take into account all of the interests of all stakeholders in a firm. (Stakeholders, he notes,... View Details

Keywords: by Michael C. Jensen

May 2022 (Revised April 2024)
Case

Third Point in 2020: Growth Is Where the Value Is?

By: Robin Greenwood, James Williams and Denise Han

In early May 2020, Daniel Loeb’s team at Third Point was evaluating a potential growth opportunity in the Walt Disney Company and whether investor activism might play a role. Battered by the effects of COVID-19, the company’s stock had initially tumbled to $86 and then... View Details

Keywords: Growth; Equity; Disney; Value; COVID-19 Pandemic; Economics; Strategy; Growth and Development; Investment Return; Opportunities; Business and Stakeholder Relations; North America

David E. Bell is a Baker Foundation Professor at HBS. He has taught marketing many times in the MBA program including as course head.

During his career at HBS, David has taught a variety of other courses to both MBAs and executives, including risk... View Details

Keywords: agribusiness; agriculture; apparel; e-commerce industry; fashion; food; food processing; grocery; insurance industry; marketing industry; retailing

January 2023
Case

The END Fund: To Eliminate Neglected Tropical Diseases

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Courtney Han

Founded in 2012, the END fund focused on eliminating five Neglected Tropical Diseases that accounted for 80% of the tropical diseases affecting nearly 1.5 billion people worldwide. Its roughly $25 million/year annual budget was fully committed when it got news that the... View Details

Keywords: Nonprofit Organizations; Health Disorders; Health Care and Treatment; Resource Allocation; Global Range; Decisions; Investment Funds

August 2014 (Revised November 2015)
Case

Rick's Dilemma

By: Arthur I. Segel, Charles F. Wu, Siddharth Yog and Ben Eppler

In 2014, Rick is serving as a trustee for a large family trust whose principle asset is a plot of prime real estate in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. The land is currently subject to a ground lease which pays $4.6 million annually, with resets every 20 years at 4.5%... View Details

Keywords: Real Estate; New York Property; Appraisal Methods; Valuation Methodologies; Property; Finance; Real Estate Industry; New York (city, NY); United States

2011
Other Unpublished Work

Do Public and Private Firms Behave Differently? An Examination of Investment in the Chemical Industry

By: Albert W. Sheen

I compare the capacity expansion decisions of U.S. public and private producers of seven commodity chemicals from 1989-2006. I find that private firms invest differently, and more efficiently, than public firms. Specifically, private firms are more likely than public... View Details

Keywords: Private Ownership; Chemicals; Investment; Public Ownership; Chemical Industry; United States

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February 2000
Case

E2M Health Services

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer and Naomi Atkins

Outlines the growth of an innovative diabetes disease management organization from 1994-99. Having demonstrated the success of their model in managing diabetes populations in Texas and New York State, the CEO and president must decide the future strategy of the company... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Markets; Revenue; Innovation and Invention; Business or Company Management; Marketing Strategy; Internet; Health Industry

03 Nov 2008
HBS Case

Economics of the Ethanol Business

Reinhardt, with Senior Researcher James Weber and Agribusiness Program Director Mary Shelman (HBS MBA '87), examines the complex political and economic underpinnings of the ethanol industry and the dilemma facing the farmers of Mid-Missouri Energy (MME). The farmers... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Agriculture & Agribusiness; Energy

14 Nov 2007
First Look

First Look: November 14, 2007

PlaNet Finance was a French NGO providing technical support and training services to microfinance institutions (i.e., institutions providing financial services to the poor) and other microfinance actors, rating of microfinance... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

January 2012 (Revised March 2012)
Case

Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA)'s Entry into the Retirement Market

By: Lauren Cohen and Christopher Malloy

This case examines Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA)'s decision to enter the retirement market with their new "Dimensional Managed DC" product, a complete retirement solution that aimed to provide investors with what they really wanted: the same standard of living in... View Details

Keywords: Retirement; Asset Management