Publications

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Fall 2024
Article

Redemption Mechanisms in Poison Pills: Evidence on Pill Design and Law Firm Effects

By: Olivier Baum and Guhan Subramanian

We present the first evidence on the incidence of “trip wire” versus “last look” poison pills. Using a hand-collected data set of 130 poison pills implemented and/or amended between January 1, 2020 and March 31, 2023, we find that pills are almost evenly divided... View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Negotiation Tactics; Contracts

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07 Aug 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Financial vs. Strategic Buyers

Keywords: by Marc Martos-Vila, Matthew Rhodes-Kropf & Jarrad Harford

2007
Book

Mergers: Leadership, Performance & Corporate Health

By: David G. Fubini, Colin Price and Maurizio Zollo

Drawing on their own extensive integration experience, the systematic analysis of 167 mergers, and cutting edge academic research, the authors of this book identify the common leadership challenges to be tackled for the achievement of what we call 'corporate health',... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Health; Mergers and Acquisitions; Leadership; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Success

Web

Poor’s Manual: The Rise of Business Analysts - Railroads and the Transformation of Capitalism | Harvard Business School

Railroads Finance Management Business Analysts Mass Distribution Mergers & Syndicates Research Links Poor’s Manual: The Rise of Business Analysts New systems of accounting facilitated the oversight of complex financial transactions View Details

February 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Barbarians at the Gate or Turnaround Gurus? Private Equity and the Rise of the LBO

By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko

During the 1980s, leveraged buyouts (LBOs) and the private equity (PE) firms responsible for carrying them out revolutionized both investment and management in the U.S. Between 1980 and 1989, buyout activity in the U.S. surged from $1 billion per year to $60 billion.... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Restructuring; Borrowing and Debt; Private Equity; Bonds; Investment Return; Institutional Investing; Profit Sharing; Business History; Management Style; Private Ownership; Performance Effectiveness; Value Creation; Financial Services Industry; United States

KRISHNA G. PALEPU is the Ross Graham Walker Professor of Business Administration, and has served previously as Senior Advisor to the President of Harvard University, and Senior Associate Dean at the... View Details

Keywords: accounting industry; banking; financial services; information technology industry; pharmaceuticals; retailing

Mitchell B. Weiss

Mitch Weiss is the Richard L. Menschel Professor of Management Practice at the Harvard Business School. He created and teaches the school's course on Public Entrepreneurship—on public leaders and private entrepreneurs who invent a difference in the... View Details

January 2011
Supplement

Vodafone in Japan (C)

By: Juan Alcacer, Mary Furey and Mayuka Yamazaki

An update to Vodafone cases A and B, describing Softbank's acquisition of Vodafone and its performance in Japan. View Details

Keywords: Acquisition; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Knowledge Acquisition; Performance; Motivation and Incentives; Adaptation; Diversification; Expansion; Telecommunications Industry; Japan

April 1989 (Revised October 2005)
Case

James Burke: A Career in American Business (A)

By: Richard S. Tedlow and Wendy Smith

Presents an historical overview of the professional career of James E. Burke, chairman and CEO of Johnson & Johnson. Examines the corporation's handling of three major occurrences--the Tylenol poisonings in 1982 and 1986 and the acquisition and subsequent sale of... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Marketing Strategy; Ethics; Personal Development and Career; Crisis Management; Consumer Products Industry; Health Industry; United States

May 2010 (Revised July 2010)
Case

Bank of America Acquires Merrill Lynch (A)

By: Robert C. Pozen and Charles E. Beresford

On December 22, 2008, Bank of America (BofA) chairman and CEO Ken Lewis convened a special board of directors meeting to review his company's pending acquisition of investment bank Merrill Lynch. Negotiations for the acquisition had begun a few months earlier, during... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Decision Choices and Conditions; Financial Crisis; Corporate Governance; Government Legislation; Crisis Management; Business and Government Relations; Banking Industry

September 2008
Case

Yucheng Technology

By: Li Jin, Li Liao, Chang Chen and Aldo Sesia

The founder and CEO of an IT company servicing the needs of the financial services industry in China needs to raise capital for the company to grow and survive. He has two options. He can try and obtain financing from private equity investors, or he can accept a... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Private Equity; Growth and Development Strategy; Information Technology; Financial Services Industry; China; United States

April 2017
Article

The New Look of Deal Protection

By: Guhan Subramanian and Fernán Restrepo

Deal protection in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) evolves in response to Delaware case law and the business goals of acquirers and targets. We construct a new sample of M&A deals from 2003 to 2015 to identify four such areas of evolution in current transactional... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Practice

Business transactions take widely varying forms―from multibillion-dollar corporate mergers to patent licenses to the signing of an all-star quarterback. Yet every deal shares the same goal, or at least should: to maximize the joint value created and to distribute... View Details

September 2021
Case

TAV Airports: Acquiring Almaty International

By: Juan Alcácer and Esel Çekin

The case opens in April 2020 with Sani Şener, CEO of TAV Airports, a vertically integrated regional airport operator headquartered in Istanbul, Turkey, and his team discussing the pending acquisition of the Almaty International Airport in Kazakhstan. The company had... View Details

Keywords: Airports; COVID-19 Pandemic; Strategy; Mergers and Acquisitions; Bids and Bidding; Air Transportation Industry; Central Asia; Turkey

May 2008 (Revised June 2009)
Case

House of Tata: Acquiring a Global Footprint

By: Tarun Khanna, Krishna G. Palepu and Richard Bullock

Chronicles the globalization of the Tata Group, one of India's largest business groups. Since 2000, many Tata Group operating companies have aggressively built international businesses, particularly through overseas acquisitions. After describing the globalization... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Developing Countries and Economies; Globalized Firms and Management; Growth and Development Strategy; India; United States

2001
Book

Creating Value through Corporate Restructuring: Case Studies in Bankruptcies, Buyouts, and Breakups

By: Stuart C. Gilson

Keywords: Value; Insolvency and Bankruptcy; Acquisition; Restructuring

December 1999
Case

E-Business at Honeywell International (A): AlliedSignal 1999

By: Rosabeth M. Kanter

AlliedSignal develops its e-business and merges with Honeywell, Inc. Throughout 1999 CEO Larry Bossidy leads activities to educate managers about e-business and the Internet, then requires strategic plans. This case looks at the planning process, barriers, and ideas in... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Executive Education; Leadership; Strategic Planning; Business Model; Change Management; Internet; Industrial Products Industry

April 2018 (Revised March 2019)
Case

Tesla-SolarCity

By: E. Scott Mayfield and Emil N. Siriwardane

On June 21, 2016, Tesla Motors, Inc. announced its offer to acquire SolarCity, bringing CEO Elon Musk one step closer to completing his goal of moving the world from a hydrocarbon-based economy to a solar-electric one. Markets and analysts were mixed in their reaction... View Details

Keywords: Tesla; SolarCity; Solar Power; Mergers and Acquisitions; Renewable Energy; Goals and Objectives; Finance