Publications

March 2025 (Revised April 2025)
Case

Perplexity: Redefining Search

By: Suraj Srinivasan, Michelle Hu, Sriraghav Srinivasan and Radhika Kak

By early 2025, Perplexity had rapidly evolved from a modest startup into a popular "answer engine" valued at $9 billion. The company had boldly positioned itself as the disruptor to Google aiming to redefine search for the AI age. Through novel AI... View Details

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Venture Capital; Innovation Leadership; Technological Innovation; Internet and the Web; Business Startups; Competitive Strategy; Business Model; Technology Industry; United States

11 Oct 2023
Blog Post

A Journey of Discovery, Teamwork, and Impact with FIELD Global Immersion

In early May, I embarked on a journey to Seoul, South Korea, accompanied by 70 fellow Harvard Business School classmates. Our purpose? To culminate our first-year studies through the FIELD Global Immersion program. Throughout this... View Details

August 2019 (Revised April 2021)
Case

Unifying Divisions: Joro's Mission to Preserve the Planet

By: Shikhar Ghosh and Marilyn Morgan Westner

The case focuses on the initial startup team and Founders’ agreements. In March 2018, Sanchali Pal proposed renegotiating the informal founders’ agreement and equity split she and her co-founders had drafted the previous spring. They had been working together for over... View Details

Keywords: Founders' Agreements; Business Startups; Climate Change; Agreements and Arrangements; Conflict Management

01 Jun 2011
Working Paper Summaries

The First Deal: The Division of Founder Equity in New Ventures

Keywords: by Thomas F. Hellmann & Noam Wasserman

February 2022 (Revised July 2022)
Supplement

InstaDeep: AI Innovation Born in Africa (B)

By: Shikhar Ghosh and Esel Çekin

Karim Beguir and Zohra Slim were the co-founders of InstaDeep, a deep tech startup focusing on artificial intelligence (AI) solutions. Instadeep was one of the few companies globally that were partnering with DeepMind, an AI subsidiary of Google [Alphabet Inc.].... View Details

Keywords: AI; Artificial Intelligence; Entrepreneurship; Operations; Business Subsidiaries; Brands and Branding; Innovation and Invention; Growth and Development Strategy; AI and Machine Learning; Technology Industry; Africa

20 Mar 2000
Research & Ideas

Incubators: The New Venture Capitalists?

Move over, venture cap. There's a new kid on the block. It's the business incubator, and it has the potential to remake the way businesses are launched in the Internet economy. Incubators are not really new,... View Details

Keywords: by Kenneth Liss

March 2023
Case

Mirakl: Growing The Marketplace Economy

By: Antonio Moreno, Santiago Gallino and Emilie Billaud

Mirakl provided the technology and seller network required for companies like Macy's, Best Buy, Walmart, Siemens, or Carrefour to simply design, launch, and administer a marketplace that included products from third-party sellers. What began as a basic business idea in... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Transformation; Technological Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Internet and the Web; Technology Adoption; Sales; Information Technology Industry; Retail Industry; Web Services Industry; Europe; France; Paris; United States

07 Mar 2016
HBS Seminar

Scott Stern, MIT Sloan School of Management

20 Dec 2011
First Look

First Look: December 20

& Course MaterialsKroll Bond Rating Agency Bo BeckerHarvard Business School Case 212-034 The established credit raters were criticized for inflating the mortgage credit bubble that imploded in 2008. A new rating agency, KBRA, is... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

07 Mar 2011
Research & Ideas

Why Companies Fail—and How Their Founders Can Bounce Back

Ghosh, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School who has held top executive positions at some eight technology-based start-ups. If failure refers to failing to see the projected return on investment, then the failure rate is 70 to 80... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

01 Dec 2023
News

Thinking Ahead

news you can use to bring yourself and your business up to speed in the year ahead. Fundraising Forecast: Continued Clouds, Some Sun It isn’t news that the fundraising climate has cooled considerably in the past year. But as a View Details

Keywords: Julia Hanna; Illustrations by Chris Gash; News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information

17 Feb 2020
Sharpening Your Skills

How Entrepreneurs Can Find the Right Problem to Solve

Entrepreneurial Management Unit at the Harvard Business School. [Image by: iStock Photo ] Other stories by Julia Austin Making the Right Technical Hire How Scale Changes a Manager's Responsibilities Startup... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Austin

August 2018
Technical Note

Evaluating Start Ups

By: William A. Sahlman, Ramana Nanda and Robert F. White

A framework for assessing new business opportunities and the business plans used to describe them is developed. Useful for aspiring entrepreneurs in MBA programs. View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Business Plan; Opportunities

15 Feb 2022
Book

When Working Harder Doesn’t Work, Time to Reinvent Your Career

a distance-learning program. But this detour didn’t derail the career of Arthur Brooks, now a Harvard Business School professor. Brooks explores his unlikely shift from budding musician to hard-charging head of a Washington, DC, thinktank... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman

March 2025
Case

Harvey: AI for Lawyers

By: Suraj Srinivasan, Charles Krumholz and Radhika Kak

In early 2025, Winston Weinberg and Gabe Pereyra, co-founders of Harvey AI, reflected on the company’s meteoric rise as a pioneer in AI-powered legal technology. Since its founding in 2022, Harvey had transformed how lawyers approached research, drafting, and document... View Details

Keywords: Innovation Strategy; Business Startups; AI and Machine Learning; Technological Innovation; Growth and Development Strategy; Product Positioning; Legal Services Industry; Technology Industry; New York (city, NY); San Francisco; London

April 2025
Teaching Note

Allbirds: Decarbonizing Fashion (A) and (B)

By: Michael W. Toffel, Ken Pucker and Stacy Straaberg

Teaching Note for HBS Case Nos. 622-024, 625-004, 625-005, and 625-702. The Allbirds: Decarbonizing Fashion (A) case introduces Allbirds as a footwear startup not only focused on simple design, comfort, and sustainable natural materials but on decarbonizing the wider... View Details