Publications

March 2004
Case

L.L. Bean: A Search for Growth

By: Rajiv Lal, Walter J. Salmon and James Weber

In mid-2003, CEO Chris McCormick felt L.L. Bean was in a good position to begin to grow again. For nearly 90 years, the company sold clothing and gear for outdoor enthusiasts through its catalogs and a single retail store in Freeport, Maine. In the three decades prior... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Restructuring; Growth and Development Strategy; Cost Management; Sales; Performance Improvement; Diversification; Distribution Channels; Resignation and Termination; Retail Industry; Web Services Industry

12 Mar 2013
First Look

First Look: March 12

capture of accounting regulation by segments of the financial-services industry. Paper: http://hbr.org/2013/03/why-fair-value-is-the-rule/ar/1 Working PapersCarry Trade and Exchange-Rate Regimes Authors:Alfaro, Laura, and Fabio Kanczuk... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

16 Apr 2013
First Look

First Look: April 16

profitable investment decisions. During the last ten years, Wall Street research has been battered by a series of shocks. As concerns over conflicts of interest mounted, the integrity of research output was questioned, leading to... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

04 Oct 2011
First Look

First Look: October 4

relationship using data from 93 change projects conducted by clinical managers at the National Health Service in the United Kingdom. The results show social position, both within the field and within the organization, influences actors'... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

August 2021
Case

Andreessen Horowitz’s Cultural Leadership Fund (A)

By: Anita Elberse, Briana Richardson and Cydni Williams

In May 2020, Chris Lyons, a partner at leading venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz receives the news that his company has reached a verbal agreement with one of Silicon Valley’s hottest social-media startups to lead its ‘Series A’ funding round, in a deal that... View Details

Keywords: Entertainment; Talent Management; General Management; Inclusion; Talent and Talent Management; Diversity; Venture Capital; Entrepreneurship; Networks; Nonprofit Organizations

Research Summary

Reverse Innovation

VG and Chris Trimble reveal a bold discovery with far-reaching implications in REVERSE INNOVATION: Create Far From Home, Win Everywhere (Harvard Business Review Press; April 10, 2012;... View Details

2012
Working Paper

Information Technology and Boundary of the Firm: Evidence from Plant-Level Data

By: Chris Forman and Kristina McElheran

We study the relationship between different margins of information technology (IT) use and vertical integration using plant-level data from the U.S. Census of Manufactures. Focusing on the short-run decision of whether to allocate production output to downstream plants... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Technology Adoption; Production; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Vertical Integration; Supply Chain; Manufacturing Industry; United States

Read Now

2015
Chapter

Information Technology and the Distribution of Inventive Activity

By: Chris Forman, Avi Goldfarb and Shane Greenstein

We examine the relationship between the diffusion of advanced Internet technology and the geographic concentration of invention, as measured by patents. First, we show that patenting became more concentrated from the early 1990s to the early 2000s and, similarly, that... View Details

Keywords: Patents; Geographic Location; Internet and the Web; Innovation and Invention

Find at Harvard

2019
Chapter

Technology Adoption

By: Chris Forman, Avi Goldfarb and Shane Greenstein

Using examples from information technology adoption, we emphasize the role of costs, benefits, communications channels and dynamic considerations in the decision to adopt new technology. We discuss differences between adoption by consumers and adoption by firms. We... View Details

Keywords: Technology Adoption

Find at Harvard

2024
Working Paper

Primary Capital Market Transactions and Index Funds

By: Marco Sammon and Chris Murray

We document the effects of mechanical buying by CRSP-index-tracking funds on post-IPO returns and IPO deal structure. Leveraging a difference-in-differences-style design built on a 2017 CRSP rule change, we find that expected index fund demand leads fast track IPOs to... View Details

Keywords: Investment Funds; Initial Public Offering; Investment Return; Price; Market Transactions; Financial Markets

SSRN

01 May 2012
First Look

First Look: May 1

findings that have implications for theory and practice, and that suggest new directions for future research. Download the paper: http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/12-093.pdf Information Technology and Boundary of the Firm: Evidence from Plant-Level Data Authors: View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

10 Apr 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research, April 10, 2018

Shaped by—the Internet By: Greenstein, Shane, Avi Goldfarb, and Chris Forman Abstract—The first 15 years of the 21st century have thrown into sharp relief the challenges of growth, equity, stability, and... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

05 Mar 2013
First Look

First Look: March 5

issuers deteriorates during credit booms, and that this deterioration forecasts low excess returns to corporate bondholders. The key insight is that changes in the pricing of credit risk disproportionately affect the financing costs faced View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

23 Apr 2013
First Look

First Look: April 23

suggests that this model-which tolerates moral complexity-is perhaps one of the few that can adapt and endure over time. Manufacturing Morals is a perceptive must-read for anyone looking for insight into the moral decision making of today's business leaders and those... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

2013
Book

Beyond the Idea: How to Execute Innovation in Any Organization

By: Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble

By offering specific action steps, Beyond the Idea extends the elegant conceptual insights from How Stella Saved the Farm, Govindarajan and Trimble's parable. Beyond the Idea shows exactly how to: - Build a team with a very particular structure, one... View Details

March 2006
Case

EMC Corporation: Proposed Acquisition of VMware

By: Constance E. Bagley, Carin-Isabel Knoop and Chris Lombardi

Involves the decision by the CEO of EMC Corp. whether to acquire VMware, a small software firm in California that makes virtualization software. Among the factors to be considered are a pending patent case involving WMare and Microsoft and integration challenges... View Details

Keywords: Patents; Decision Choices and Conditions; Lawsuits and Litigation; Applications and Software; Acquisition; Information Technology Industry; California

March 2013 (Revised April 2014)
Case

Barnes & Noble: Managing the E-Book Revolution

By: Alan MacCormack, Brian Kimball Dunn and Chris F. Kemerer

The case describes competition in the market for E-Books, and Barnes & Noble's Strategy in this industry. As a traditional retailer, B&N was challenged by the introduction of digital technologies that allow books to be published, distributed and sold to consumers... View Details

Keywords: Innovation; Technology Strategy; Platform Competition; Innovation Strategy; Information Technology; Product Development; Digital Platforms; Standards; Disruptive Innovation; Retail Industry; Publishing Industry; North America

2003
Case

Capston-White's Document Management and Production Services

By: Vijay Govindarajan, Chris Trimble and Julie Lang

The development of multi-function devices that could copy, print, fax, and scan created a convergence in the markets for these devices. Copiers and printers had previously been purchased and managed in very different manners by large organizations. Facing an uncertain... View Details

Keywords: Technological Innovation; Innovation Strategy; Service Delivery; Service Industry