Publications

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January 2018 (Revised November 2018)
Case

Index

By: Jose Alvarez and Julia Kelley

In December 2017, Marc Freed-Finnegan and Jonathan Wall, the co-founders of retail technology company Index, had to discuss the company’s direction as they entered 2018. Five years earlier, Freed-Finnegan and Wall had founded Index after observing the technological... View Details

Keywords: Product Launch; Product Positioning; Sales; Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Retail Industry; Technology Industry

22 Nov 2016
First Look

November 22, 2016

Publisher's link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=50794 September 2016 Administrative Science Quarterly Whitened Résumés: Race and Self-Presentation in the Labor Market By: Kang, Sonia K.,... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

10 Aug 2010
First Look

First Look: August 10

PublicationsAdverse Selection in Online 'Trust' Certifications and Search Results Author:Benjamin G. Edelman Publication:Electronic Commerce Research and Applications (June 2010) Abstract Widely used View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

04 Apr 2008
What Do You Think?

Who Owns Intellectual Property?

Summing Up Is intellectual property becoming community property? Is a new generation of users and consumers of intellectual property produced by new technologies bringing totally different assumptions and attitudes to bear on its ownership? Has new technology induced... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

17 Jan 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research: January 17

style, and thus set prices that limit market penetration. The winning strategy diverges from this approach in almost every respect. When innovators develop products that people want to pull into their lives, they create View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

01 Nov 2012
HBS Seminar

Joel Waldfogel, University of Minnesota

27 Jul 2023
Blog Post

Buy Big, Sell Small

cofounder of ApnaKlub, a wholesale digital platform that helps kirana owners aggregate their buying power and access credit tools and other services. “These are micro businesses that run on tight margins. If shopkeepers run out of something, they have to travel to a... View Details

22 Mar 2017
HBS Seminar

Gerald C. Kane, Boston College

2025
Working Paper

Productivity Beliefs and Efficiency in Science

By: Fabio Bertolotti, Kyle R. Myers and Wei Yang Tham

We develop a method to estimate producers’ productivity beliefs in settings where output quantities and input prices are unobservable, and we use it to evaluate allocative efficiency in the market for science. Our model of researchers’ labor supply shows that their... View Details

Keywords: Performance Productivity; Perception; Research

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April 2006 (Revised March 2007)
Case

PayPal Merchant Services

By: Thomas R. Eisenmann and Lauren Barley

In early 2006, PayPal management is deciding how to respond to Google's entry into online payments. PayPal, owned by eBay, has targeted online merchants outside eBay's auction community for its next wave of expansion. Google represents a potential threat to PayPal's... View Details

Keywords: Internet and the Web; Competition; Expansion; Service Operations; Auctions; Web Services Industry; Service Industry

March 2018 (Revised July 2020)
Case

Nectar (A)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Thomas O. Jones

In late 2017, Nectar was a rapidly emerging player in the “bed-in-a-box” online market for direct-to-consumer foam memory mattresses. Barely a year old, it had achieved a revenue run rate of $85M and looked ahead to another year of blistering growth. The founding team... View Details

Keywords: Direct-to-consumer; Growth and Development Strategy; Product; Diversification; Decision Making; Growth Management; Entrepreneurship

February 2011 (Revised December 2012)
Case

Coca-Cola on Facebook

By: John Deighton and Leora Kornfeld

In late 2008, executives at Coca-Cola had to decide what to do with a fan-created page on Facebook that had amassed over one million followers in three months. From a legal point of view the fan-created page was in violation of Facebook's terms of service as a... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Governance Controls; Policy; Brands and Branding; Marketing Channels; Social and Collaborative Networks; Food and Beverage Industry

28 Apr 2022
Research & Ideas

Can You Buy Creativity in the Gig Economy?

Writers may lament the uncertainties of the digital age, as many turn to online markets to distribute their work with no promises of fame or fortune. But when authors are guaranteed a cut of their own book... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

2022
Article

Dynamic Pricing Algorithms, Consumer Harm, and Regulatory Response

By: Alexander MacKay and Samuel N. Weinstein

Pricing algorithms are rapidly transforming markets, from ride-sharing apps, to air travel, to online retail. Regulators and scholars have watched this development with a wary eye. Their focus so far has been on the potential for pricing algorithms to facilitate... View Details

Keywords: Competition Policy; Regulation; Algorithmic Pricing; Dynamic Pricing; Economics; Law And Economics; Law And Regulation; Consumer Protection; Antitrust Law; Industrial Organization; Antitrust Issues And Policies; Technological Change: Choices And Consequences; Competition; Policy; Price; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Microeconomics; Duopoly and Oligopoly; Law

SSRN

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August 2011 (Revised April 2013)
Case

Language and Globalization: 'Englishnization' at Rakuten (A)

By: Tsedal Neeley

Hiroshi Mikitani, the CEO of Rakuten, (Japan's largest online retailer), is at the helm of an organization that is rapidly expanding into global markets. In a critical stride toward becoming the world's No. 1 Internet services company, Mikitani announces... View Details

Keywords: Teaching; Human Capital; Change Management; Transformation; Social Enterprise; Communication Strategy; Internet and the Web; Disruptive Innovation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategic Planning; Leadership; Global Strategy; Technology Industry; Retail Industry; Japan

03 Jun 2019
News

How to summon motivation when you feel like you don’t have any

May 2007 (Revised July 2011)
Background Note

Retail Shopping in 2007: The Net Versus the Mall

By: Stephen P. Bradley, Nancy Bartlett and James Weber

Provides an overview of the retail sector within the United States as online shopping captures an increased percentage of consumer spending. The role of enabling technologies and applications, including comparison shopping sites and recommendation systems, are covered.... View Details

Keywords: Spending; Marketing Channels; Demand and Consumers; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Retail Industry; United States

April 2020 (Revised October 2021)
Case

SpaceX, Economies of Scale, and a Revolution in Space Access

By: Matthew C. Weinzierl, Kylie Lucas and Mehak Sarang

From the time he transformed the world of online banking, Elon Musk established himself as a bold innovator. After selling X.com to PayPal in 2002, he founded a series of revolutionary start-ups, starting with Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX). Hoping to "make... View Details

Keywords: Space Tech; Space Access; Vision; Economies Of Scale; Technological Innovation; Emerging Markets; Commercialization; Finance; Aerospace Industry