Publications

February 2023
Case

Enstitute

By: Lindsay N. Hyde, Thomas R. Eisenmann, Kumba Sennaar and Sarah Mehta

Shaila Ittycheria (MBA ’10) founded the nonprofit organization Enstitute, in 2012 in New York City. Determined to challenge the status quo within higher education, Shaila and her cofounder sought to expand opportunities for talented young people by placing them in... View Details

Keywords: Social Entrepreneurship; Operations; Business Startups; Business Growth and Maturation; Education Industry; Employment Industry; United States

Web

Courses - Entrepreneurship

Avoiding Startup Failure Lindsay Hyde Spring 2024 Q3Q4 3.0 Building Web 3 Businesses Scott Duke Kominers Shai Bernstein Spring 2024 Q3 1.5 Business Marketing and Sales (also... View Details

January 2025
Case

Intuition Robotics: An AI Companion for Older Adults

By: Amit Goldenberg, Elie Ofek and Orna Dan

Intuition Robotics, a startup that makes an AI companion robot to alleviate older adults’ loneliness, debates whether to pursue a B2C model or B2G route. If it opts for the government vertical, it must determine how to negotiate a favorable deal. Two weeks after... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business Startups; AI and Machine Learning; Technology Adoption; Product Launch; Market Entry and Exit; Negotiation Offer; Business and Government Relations; Health Industry; Technology Industry; United States; New York (state, US)

April 2025 (Revised May 2025)
Background Note

Customer Acquisition and the Cash Flow Trap

By: E. Ofek, Barak Libai and Eitan Muller

Startups as well as existing firms recognize the need to invest in order to acquire customers for their new ventures. And as each customer is expected at some point to have generated sufficient gross margins to cover their CAC, management expects that, soon enough, the... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Customers; Forecasting and Prediction; Cash Flow; Business or Company Management

October 2024 (Revised November 2024)
Case

SWEN Blue Ocean: Impact Investing Goes to Sea

By: Vikram S Gandhi and David Allen

In August 2023, SWEN Blue Ocean, a €170 million impact fund that invested in startups contributing to ocean sustainability, faced a critical investment decision. Part of SWEN Capital Partners, an €8 billion, Paris-based private equity fund, Blue Ocean was co-founded in... View Details

Keywords: Communication Technology; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology; Venture Capital; Private Equity; Investment Funds; Science-Based Business; Technological Innovation; Financial Services Industry; France; Paris; Italy

28 May 2024
In Practice

Job Search Advice for a Tough Market: Think Broadly and Stay Flexible

of Labor Statistics. US employers added 175,000 jobs, seasonally adjusted, far fewer than the more than 300,000 in March and below the 240,000 analysts expected. For those seeking business careers, success might mean searching beyond... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne

January 2011 (Revised April 2023)
Course Overview Note

The Coming of Managerial Capitalism: Overview

By: Tom Nicholas

This is a course overview note for The Coming of Managerial Capitalism. CMC is chronologically organized. It starts in the late eighteenth century when America gained independence, spans the remarkable rise to industrial maturity during the nineteenth and twentieth... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Business or Company Management; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Welfare; War; Transformation; Information Technology; Finance; Situation or Environment; Decision Making; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; United States

2016
Working Paper

Pivoting Isn't Enough: Principled Pragmatism and Strategic Reorientation in New Ventures

By: Rory McDonald and Cheng Gao

New technology ventures often experience deviations from their original plans that oblige them to reorient in pursuit of better fit between their evolving products and target customers. Yet research is largely silent on how entrepreneurs explain and justify their... View Details

Keywords: Strategic Reorientation; Technology Entrepreneurship; Innovation; Product Development Processes; Organizational Adaptation; Qualitative Methods (General); Information Technology; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Communication; Entrepreneurship; Alignment; Innovation and Invention; Product Development

21 Sep 2023
Blog Post

Hands-on Learning About Global Markets

cohorts of some 70 students each, worked in 15 locations with 171 global business partners to get a firsthand look at how business is conducted around the world. A certificate of appreciation was presented... View Details

October 2021
Case

(180) Days of Quibi

By: David J. Collis and Terrence Shu

Mobile streaming app Quibi was ready to take the entertainment world by storm at its April 2020 launch. Backed by $1.75 billion, influential investors from Hollywood to Wall Street eagerly anticipated early success for this brainchild of Meg Whitman, former CEO of... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Strategy; Strategy; Business Model; Business Startups; Mobile Technology

06 Feb 2019
Blog Post

7 Tips for a Successful Technology Venture Immersion

discovered HBS’s MS/MBA: Engineering Sciences Program, a perfect way to get the business and leadership development experience I was looking for AND continue my technical learning. In particular, I was drawn to the program’s focus on... View Details

January 2024 (Revised May 2024)
Case

Runa

By: Paul Gompers and Carla Larangeira

In early 2022, Courtney McColgan, founder and CEO of Runa, a human resources and payroll Software-as-a-Service platform, faced an unexpected tech market downturn. Founded in 2018, Runa catered to small and medium-sized businesses in Mexico, offering an affordable and... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Volatility; Entrepreneurship; Decision Making; Leadership; Management; Venture Capital; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Business Growth and Maturation; Latin America

TeachingInterests

Managing the Future of Work (MBA Education—Elective Curriculum)

By: Christopher T. Stanton

The nature and scope of work is changing rapidly, creating massive business challenges in the shadow of broader political and social shifts. HBS launched a major initiative in 2017 on Managing the Future of Work to define these workplace issues and... View Details

September 2024
Case

Myeloma Investment Fund

By: Kyle Myers and Scott Sawaya

This case explores a critical decision facing the Myeloma Investment Fund (MIF) as it evaluates two investment opportunities aimed at accelerating a cure for multiple myeloma.

The MIF, a venture philanthropy fund, must choose between two distinct paths. One... View Details

Keywords: Venture Philanthropy; Biomedical Research; Investing For Impact; Innovation ＆ Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Science-Based Business; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Decision Making; Health Care and Treatment; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

September 2022
Background Note

On CUE: The Quest for Optimal Customer Unit Economics

By: Elie Ofek, Barak Libai and Eitan Muller

Startups are often evaluated by how well they perform on unit economics, defined as the ratio of a customer’s lifetime value (LTV) to acquisition costs (CAC). A common target for unit economics, advocated by many VCs and analysts, is 3:1 (i.e., LTV/CAC=3). While there... View Details

Keywords: Unit Economics; Business Startups; Performance Evaluation; Customer Value and Value Chain; Customer Relationship Management; Analysis

30 Jan 2024
Research & Ideas

‘Intrinsic Joy’ Sparks Ideas Better than Cash

contributed far more “repos” (software packages placed and held in a repository) during the run-up to their payout than those who didn’t participate. Yet, once paid, a sponsored user’s community-driven contributions and long-term engagement tanked, finds recent... View Details

Keywords: by Rachel Layne; Technology

June 2010 (Revised February 2011)
Case

The Fox Islands Wind Project (A)

By: Joseph B. Lassiter III, James Thomas Corcoran, Max Gazor, Dylan Hogarty and Alexander H. Somers, Jr.

The market for electricity on the Fox Islands of North Haven and Vinalhaven, Maine is unique and costly for residents. Historically, electricity prices on the islands had been three times the national average because of the high cost of importing electricity via an... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Renewable Energy; Social Entrepreneurship; Cost; Financing and Loans; Projects; Business and Community Relations; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology Industry; Maine

April 2019 (Revised June 2019)
Case

Voatz

By: Mitchell Weiss and Maddy Halyard

Nimit Sawhney scrolled through the tweet stream on his phone, unsure of what to make of it on August 6, 2018 or how to respond. Voatz, the Boston-based startup he co-founded and led, provided a mobile-voting platform. In March of 2018, had successfully piloted the new... View Details

Keywords: Mobile App; Business Startups; Voting; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Safety; Cybersecurity