Publications

17 Sep 2001
Research & Ideas

Why E-commerce Didn’t Die With the Fall of Webvan

Times were hard for Webvan this year. Like other online grocers and delivery services that hit the screen in 2001—among them, Homegrocer, Kozmo, and Streamline—Webvan finally called it quits in July after two years in business. Webvan may... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Consumer Products; Retail

07 Dec 2015
HBS Seminar

Antonio Moreno-Garcia, Assistant Professor of Managerial Economics & Decision Sciences, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University

18 Feb 2021
Video

Accept Your Broken Pieces to Make a Difference

April 2006 (Revised April 2007)
Case

Endeca Technologies: New Growth Opportunities

By: Paul A. Gompers and Kristin Perry

Steve Papa, CEO of Endeca Technologies, must decide whether to expand into a new market with a new application of his company's technology. Endeca has experienced significant success with its information access software in the online retail industry, and in September... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Market Entry and Exit; Production; Organizational Structure; Partners and Partnerships; Opportunities; Expansion; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Information Technology Industry

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February 2011
Case

oDesk: Changing How the World Works

By: Boris Groysberg, David A. Thomas and Jennifer M. Tydlaska

It is 2010, and Gary Swart, CEO of oDesk, is contemplating the next steps for his organization. Founded in 2004 in California, oDesk operates an online marketplace which matches Employers with Contractors. oDesk provides fact-based information on Contractors, including... View Details

Keywords: Recruitment; Leadership; Growth and Development Strategy; Digital Platforms; Marketplace Matching; Corporate Strategy; Internet and the Web; Consulting Industry

Fall, 2024
Article

Sixty Years of the Voting Rights Act: Progress and Pitfalls

By: Andrea Bernini, Giovanni Facchini, Marco Tabellini and Cecilia Testa

We review the literature on the effects of the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA), which removed formal restrictions to Black political participation. After a brief description of racial discrimination suffered by Black Americans since Reconstruction, we introduce the goals... View Details

Keywords: Prejudice and Bias; Equality and Inequality; Race; Political Elections; Voting; Policy; Outcome or Result; Government Legislation

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2012
Other Unpublished Work

Selection, Reallocation, and Knowledge Spillover: Identifying the Sources of Productivity Gains from Multinational Activity

By: Laura Alfaro and Maggie X. Chen

The impact of multinational activity on host-country productivity has been a major topic of economic research. A positive impact can be attributed to knowledge spillovers from foreign multinational to domestic firms or a less stressed, alternative explanation—firm... View Details

Keywords: Multinational Firms and Management; Performance Productivity; Supply and Industry; Knowledge; Manufacturing Industry

March 2009 (Revised September 2011)
Case

Zopa: The Power of Peer-to-Peer Lending

By: Mikolaj Jan Piskorski, Isabel Fernandez-Mateo and David Chen

Zopa, a U.K.-based peer-to-peer lending company, connected individual lenders and borrowers via an online interface. The company charged a small fee for completed loan transactions but has not turned a profit. Zopa offered two platforms, Markets and Listings. Markets... View Details

Keywords: Financing and Loans; Personal Finance; Market Participation; Digital Platforms; Social and Collaborative Networks; Financial Services Industry; United Kingdom

24 Feb 2014
Research & Ideas

Uncovering Racial Discrimination in the ‘Sharing Economy’

pictures in online marketplaces were the inspiration for the research. "In the early days of the Internet, online marketplaces like eBay were relatively anonymous," says Luca, an assistant professor in the... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Construction; Real Estate; Advertising

09 Nov 2015
Research & Ideas

These Employers Pay Higher Salaries than Necessary

buyer. Now translate the same situation from a brick-and-mortar bazaar to an online peer-to-peer marketplace such as Upwork, which allows businesses to outsource work to freelancers, frequently overseas. “Workers on the View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Employment; Technology; Computer

17 Mar 2015
Research & Ideas

Where Did My Shopping Mall Go?

are that retailers will reduce store count and also reduce the size of those locations as online commerce begins to satisfy more and more demand. What is to become of all this retail space? How do consumers go and "kick the tires" of... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Retail

14 Jul 2014
Research & Ideas

Pay Attention To Your ‘Extreme Consumers’

What do Porsche fanatics, a video game hater, and a person who cooked two weeks' worth of meals in a rice cooker have in common? They are all "extreme consumers"—those whose tastes are so out there that mainstream market researchers tend... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

10 Oct 2018
Research & Ideas

The Legacy of Boaty McBoatface: Beware of Customers Who Vote

stevanovicigor In 2016, the National Environmental Research Council (NERC), a quasi-governmental agency in the United Kingdom, decided it would be fun to let the public vote online to name the country’s newest research vessel. The agency... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Advertising

January 2022
Case

Walmart USA—Searching for Growth

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Maria P. Roche

In 2022, Doug McMillon, president and CEO of Walmart, and his team looked back at a difficult but ultimately successful past year. The global pandemic had posed enormous challenges, but the company had weathered the storm successfully, raising same-store sales growth,... View Details

Keywords: Health Pandemics; Growth and Development Strategy; Sales; Business Strategy; Business and Shareholder Relations; Retail Industry

Tony Mayo is the Thomas S. Murphy Senior Lecturer of Business Administration and C. Roland Christensen Distinguished Management Educator in the Organizational Behavior Unit of Harvard Business School (HBS). He currently teaches and serves as the course head for... View Details

Keywords: advertising; airline; education industry; nonprofit industry; publishing industry; service industry

October 2018
Case

SeatGeek

By: Robert F. Higgins and Sarah Mehta

In late 2016, Russ D'Souza and Jack Groetzinger, co-founders of the online event ticketing platform SeatGeek, faced some difficult decisions. In the company's seven-year history, SeatGeek had positioned itself primarily as an aggregator, facilitating ticket... View Details

Keywords: Event Ticketing; Sports Ticketing; Acquisition; Business Model; Decision Making; Cost vs Benefits; Digital Platforms; Sports; Strategy; Information Technology; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Digital Platforms

April 2008
Case

Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd. (A)

By: Paul W. Marshall, Michael Shih-ta Chen and Keith Chi-ho Wong

In late November 2000, Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd., the once-monopolized telecom operator owned by the Taiwanese government, was on its way to privatization. Mr. C.K. Mao, Chairman of the company, who headed the job only three months earlier, after its prior chairman... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Employee Relationship Management; Leading Change; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Privatization; Competition; Telecommunications Industry; Taiwan

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May 2008 (Revised August 2010)
Case

ScriptLogic®: Point, Click, Done!™

ScriptLogic is a software company that has built a product portfolio that fits under a 'Point, Click, Done!' umbrella; its products are easy to download, easy to install, and easy to use. The company's online marketing program and inside sales force have been very... View Details

Keywords: Investment Return; Growth and Development Strategy; Product Marketing; Product Development; Salesforce Management; Software; Information Technology Industry

February 2000 (Revised May 2001)
Case

eBricks.com

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann

eBricks.com is developing an online marketplace for construction materials. The start-up company faces two decisions: 1) whether to merge with BluelineOnline.com, a firm providing project management solutions for the construction industry; and 2) whether to develop an... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Planning; Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Marketplace Matching; Decision Choices and Conditions; Business Startups; Construction Industry