Publications

23 Mar 2021
News

Managing Future Growth at an Innovative Workforce Education Start-up

April 2008
Module Note

Improvement with Customer-Operators

By: Frances X. Frei and Dennis Campbell

Taught as the third module in a Harvard Business School course on Managing Service Operations: Understanding the Customer Operating Role (606-092). Explores how firms can systematically leverage their customer-operators in the organizational improvement process is... View Details

Keywords: Service Operations; Performance Improvement; Customer Focus and Relationships; Framework; Employees; Business Model; Management Practices and Processes; Organizational Design

May 2017
Teaching Note

Partners Group: Ain't No Mountain High Enough

By: Nori Gerardo Lietz

Partners Group (PG), a Swiss-based PE manager, initiated a series of strategic shifts and evolved from a predominately fund-of-funds manager into a large, multi-asset class PE firm focused on direct investments. PG was the first PE firm to go public in 2006. A number... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Entrepreneurship; Management Practices and Processes; Private Equity

06 Dec 2013
News

Prescription: Measure Health Care's Real Costs

26 Apr 2010
News

Pharma's Future Depends on These Three Trends

March 2022 (Revised April 2022)
Teaching Note

Spotify's Audio-First Strategy: Leading the Podcasting Market

By: Hong Luo and Carol Lin

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 721-439. Within 15 years, CEO Daniel Ek had led Spotify from an ambitious startup to a multi-billion dollar company that had transformed the music industry. As part of Spotify’s next phase of growth, the platform would invest heavily in... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Business Divisions; Customer Relationship Management; Revenue; Music Industry

April 2008
Supplement

ProfitLogic (CW)

By: Lynda M. Applegate, Richard G. Hamermesh and Michael J. Roberts

This interactive spreadsheet accompanies the ProfitLogic case (#802-110) to enable analysis of the cash flow implications of three business models that the company is considering. Students are able to change key assumptions and see the impact on cash flow. View Details

Keywords: Cash Flow; Business Model

21 May 2019
News

Making Change Payments, Perspectives, and Politics

January 2021
Case

mPharma (A)

By: Rembrand Koning, John D. Macomber, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Wale Lawal

mPharma pioneered electronic prescriptions in Ghana, and aimed to increase drug affordability and accessibility in Africa, but the company remained unprofitable. Following investor concerns about mPharma's business, CEO Gregory Rockson considered alternative business... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Acquisition; Health; Business Model; Health Industry; Technology Industry; Ghana

14 Apr 2018
News

Would you pay $18.75 for ad-free Facebook?

06 Jul 2020
News

Fit for Context Leadership

2010
Article

Competing against Online Sharing

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Andres Hervas-Drane

This paper aims to explore online sharing of copyrighted content over peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing networks and its impact on the music industry and to assess the viable business models for the industry in the future. View Details

Keywords: Consumers; Computer Networks; Resource Sharing; Online Operations; Internet and the Web; Copyright; Networks; Business Model; Music Industry

Find at Harvard

March 2002 (Revised May 2002)
Case

Genzyme: Engineering the Market for Orphan Drugs

Genzyme has made money with external technology in orphan drug markets generally considered to be too small to be attractive to other drug companies. Now competition is entering these same markets, placing Genzyme's business model under new pressures. View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Information Technology; Market Entry and Exit; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

Blog

Emerging from the Pandemic: Insights from South Asia and ASEAN

in-person program was like. For them, virtual programs were a good option. A second group had been to our Boston campus and wanted to come back, but had immediate business challenges for which they needed specific skills. They were also... View Details

July 2008 (Revised September 2009)
Case

Betfair vs. UK Bookmakers

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell and Neil Campbell

Betting exchanges provide an electronic platform that allows ordinary consumers to not only back teams to win, but also to lay odds for other punters to back. This business model allows punters to cut out the middleman of the bookmaker and leads to a much more... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Decision Choices and Conditions; Two-Sided Platforms; Market Transactions; Competition; Entertainment and Recreation Industry

Research Summary

Technology and Operations Strategy

By: Marco Iansiti

Marco Iansiti studies the evolving nature of strategy, innovation and operations in the modern enterprise. Over the past 20 years, he has researched the processes for technology adoption, development, and integration in hundreds of firms across a wide... View Details

May 2011
Background Note

Scale Effects, Network Effects, and Investment Strategy

By: Willy Shih

This technical note discusses scale economies, and direct and indirect network effects in the context of building better business models. Some of the great business disasters of the dot.com bubble were companies that scaled their infrastructure without working through... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Investment; Price; Crisis Management; Network Effects; Multi-Sided Platforms; Strategy

January 2024 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Tesla Motors in 2024--Turbulence Ahead?

By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Kate Stoppiello

Over its 20 years in existence, Tesla had become nearly synonymous with electric vehicles, and the company assumed an enviable market position. By 2023, however, Tesla faced intense competition. Traditional carmakers and EV upstarts were expected to introduce close to... View Details

Keywords: Competitive Strategy; Product Positioning; Competition; Industry Growth; Auto Industry; North America; Europe; China; Australia

August 2014
Case

Netflix in 2011

By: Willy Shih and Stephen Kaufman

Reed Hastings founded Netflix to provide a home movie service that would do a better job satisfying customers than the traditional retail rental model. But as it encountered challenges it underwent several major strategy shifts, ultimately developing a business model... View Details