Publications

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February 2013 (Revised February 2013)
Case

Wayne Ferrari: iAutomation at a Crossroads

By: Jim Sharpe and Michael Norris

Wayne Ferrari has bridged the gap between being an independent entrepreneur and a "professional manager." After selling his business to a Private Equity (PE) firm, Ferrari takes on the role of CEO and with their support implements a roll-up strategy to attain growth... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurial Management; Entrepreneurial Organizations; Leveraged Buyouts; Roll-up; Career Planning; Acquisitions; Pricing; Pricing Policies; Pricing Strategy; Pricing Structure; Acquisition; Entrepreneurship; Private Equity; Distribution; Integration; System; Electronics Industry; Distribution Industry; United States

September 1991 (Revised February 1993)
Case

Burroughs Wellcome and AZT (A)

By: Willis M. Emmons III

Burroughs Wellcome Co., developer of AZT, the first drug approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), finds itself under siege in September 1989 by AIDS activists and various segments of the U.S.... View Details

Keywords: Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Ethics; Business and Government Relations; Communication Strategy; Health Care and Treatment; Monopoly; Intellectual Property; Research and Development; Price; Pharmaceutical Industry; London

March 2020 (Revised May 2020)
Case

Generation Investment Management

By: Vikram S. Gandhi and Sarah Mehta

By January 2020, sustainable investment firm Generation Investment Management (Generation), founded in London in 2004, had grown from a shared vision among seven founders to a 90-person firm managing $27 billion in public and private equity. Throughout its history,... View Details

November 2012 (Revised December 2017)
Case

TerraPower

By: William A. Sahlman, Ramana Nanda, Joseph B. Lassiter III and James McQuade

John Gilleland, CEO of TerraPower, returned to his office after a lengthy meeting with potential investors. It was October 2012, and TerraPower was in the process of raising a $200M Series C round to finance the ongoing development of its next-generation nuclear... View Details

Keywords: Nuclear Power; Entrepreneurial Finance; Financing and Loans; Venture Capital; Energy Industry; United States; China; India

January 2014 (Revised May 2015)
Case

Yahoo: Both Sides of the Stamped Deal

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Lisa C. Mazzanti

In 2012, Marissa Mayer became the CEO of Yahoo!, a tech giant with a tumultuous past. When Mayer tries to reinvigorate the company, she hires Jacqueline Reses, who has a private equity background, to head both human resources and mergers and acquisitions (M&A). As part... View Details

Keywords: Mobile App; Acquisition-hire; Exit Strategy; Start-up; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Mergers and Acquisitions; Human Resources; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Product Development; Technology Industry; Sunnyvale; New York (city, NY)

2023
Working Paper

Contagious Anomalies

By: Angela Ma and Miles Zheng

This paper shows that anomaly strategy contagion contributes a key component of risks induced by arbitrageur trading. We present three main findings: (1) Contagion deteriorates the market liquidity of the contaminated strategy. (2) Increased contagion risk predicts... View Details

Keywords: Contagion; Anomalies; Non-bank Intermediaries; Arbitrage; Intermediary Asset Pricing

SSRN

10 Oct 2016
News

Why Lincoln Hid His Strongest Feelings from the Public

January 2008
Article

Venture Capital Investment Cycles: The Impact of Public Markets

By: Paul Gompers, Anna Kovner, Josh Lerner and David Scharfstein

It is well documented that the venture capital industry is highly volatile and that much of this volatility is associated with shifting valuations and activity in public equity markets. This paper examines how changes in public market signals affected venture capital... View Details

Keywords: Market Cycles; Venture Capital; Investment; Experience and Expertise; Public Equity; Volatility; Financial Services Industry

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Jeffrey F Rayport is a faculty member in the Entrepreneurial Management Unit at Harvard Business School, where he teaches in the School’s MBA and Executive Education Programs and on HBS Online. His primary focus in teaching and research is growth-stage technology... View Details

June 30, 2020
Article

Bipartisan Tax-Free Solution to Health Care Financing: Coupling HRAs With a Public Option

By: Regina E. Herzlinger, Richard Boxer and James Wallace

A combination of health insurance initiatives by the presumptive 2020 Democratic and Republican presidential nominees could expand health care coverage and significantly reduce costs, without raising taxes. Along the way, the combination could revitalize private... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Financing; Public Option; Health Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA); Health Care and Treatment; Insurance; Cost Management

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David Scharfstein is the Edmund Cogswell Converse Professor of Finance and Banking at Harvard Business School, where he has taught since 2003. He currently teaches a course on financial intermediation in the MBA program. Scharfstein has written on a wide range of... View Details

Keywords: banking

19 Oct 2022
Op-Ed

Cofounder Courtship: How to Find the Right Mate—for Your Startup

is highly dependent on the chemistry, the experience each brings into the relationship, leadership styles and many other internal and external factors. While having cofounders can reduce business risk and/or bring complementary skills,... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Austin

2025
Working Paper

Why Companies Thrive Or Die: Ownership and the Path to Perpetuation

By: Josh Baron

Why do some companies continue to thrive for decades and others die after an initial run of success? Much like an airplane accident, company failure is generally the consequence of cascading effects that combine together to overwhelm a previously effective strategy.... View Details

Keywords: Ownership Type; Outcome or Result

08 May 2013
News

Hospital Prices No Longer Secret As New Data Reveals Bewildering System, Staggering Cost Differences

12 Oct 1999
Research & Ideas

It Came in the First Ships: Capitalism in America

one long entrepreneurial adventure. Even down to the present day, more Americans have probably made fortunes from the appreciation of real estate values than from any other source. But land is only the starting place for the epochal drama... View Details

Keywords: by Thomas K. McCraw

September 2006
Supplement

Medco Energi Internasional (CW)

In late 2004, Hilmi Panigoro, CEO of the publicly traded Indonesian oil company Medco Energi Internasional, is striving to regain majority control of the company his brother Arifin founded in 1980. The Asian financial crisis of 1999 led to a major restructuring that... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Restructuring; Family Business; Financing and Loans; Ownership Stake; Business and Shareholder Relations; Energy Industry; Indonesia; Singapore

September 2011
Supplement

Expansion at Narayana Hrudayalaya

By: Tarun Khanna and Tanya Bijlani

Narayana Hrudayalaya has expanded into a multi-specialty health city in Bangalore, with a 25-acre campus that offers complex tertiary care procedures ranging from orthopedics to cancer care. In 2008, NH raised private equity from JP Morgan and Pinebridge Investments to... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Price; Health Care and Treatment; Emerging Markets; Social Enterprise; Expansion; Health Industry; Bangalore; Cayman Islands; Miami