Publications

February 2007 (Revised November 2007)
Case

Latvia: Economic Strategy after EU Accession

By: Michael E. Porter and Christian H.M. Ketels

Describes the economic development of Latvia, a small eastern European country on the shores of the Baltic Sea, from regaining independence in 1991 to European Union (EU) accession in 2004 and is set on May 1st, 2004, the day Latvia became an EU member. Latvia had... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Economic Growth; Policy; Business and Government Relations; European Union; Latvia

Richard Hamermesh was the MBA Class of 1961 Professor of Management Practice at the Harvard Business School. While at HBS Richard served as co-chair of the HBS Healthcare... View Details

Keywords: health care

22 May 2020
Blog Post

Reflections on Service - Armed Forces Alumni Association Student Profiles

Each of these portraits tells a unique story of military service. The HBS students featured represent a small portion of the many veterans who live and learn in our community. They are sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, spouses and... View Details

January 2015 (Revised May 2018)
Case

$19B 4 txt app WhatsApp...omg!

By: David Collis, Ashley Hartman and Aakash Mehta

In February 2014, Facebook announced the acquisition of WhatsApp for $19 billion. WhatsApp, founded in 2009, was a relatively young company that employed only 50 people and earned merely $10 million in revenue in 2013. It was one of many mobile messaging services that... View Details

2023
Working Paper

Applications or Approvals: What Drives Racial Disparities in the Paycheck Protection Program?

By: Sergey Chernenko, Nathan Kaplan, Asani Sarkar and David S. Scharfstein

We use the 2020 Small Business Credit Survey to study the sources of racial disparities in use of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Black-owned firms are 8.9 percentage points less likely than observably similar white-owned firms to receive PPP loans. About 55% of... View Details

Keywords: Borrowing and Debt; Small Business; Race; Financing and Loans

SSRN

November 2024
Supplement

Epic Games: Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite (B)

By: Andy Wu and Ronald Wang

In a significant ruling on April 24, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld portions of the district court’s decision against Epic Games back in September 2021. However, Apple’s anti-steering provisions, which restricted app developers from... View Details

Keywords: Lawsuits and Litigation; Market Transactions; Applications and Software; Technology Industry; Video Game Industry

July 2020
Case

Michael Solomonov: Jerusalem in a Bowl

By: Boris Groysberg, Evan M.S. Hecht and Katherine Connolly Baden

Before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Michael Solomonov and Steven Cook had begun to wonder whether it might be time to rethink their opportunistic approach to the expansion of their small restaurant empire in Philadelphia, CooknSolo. The pandemic, however, caused an... View Details

Keywords: Restaurant Industry; Entrepreneur; COVID-19; Crisis; Crisis Response Plans; Entrepreneurship; Food; Health Pandemics; Crisis Management; Innovation and Invention; Leadership; Creativity; Strategy; Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Risk and Uncertainty; Situation or Environment; Food and Beverage Industry; United States

Article

Liability Structure in Small-Scale Finance

By: Fenella Carpena, Shawn Cole, Jeremy Shapiro and Bilal Zia

Microfinance, the provision of small individual and business loans, has experienced dramatic growth, reaching over 150 million borrowers worldwide. Much of the success of microfinance has been attributed to attempts to overcome the challenges of information asymmetries... View Details

Keywords: Microfinance; Emerging Markets; Financial Markets; Legal Liability; Banks and Banking; Banking Industry; India

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May 2017
Case

Promontory, Inc.

By: Frank V. Cespedes and Amy Handlin

Promontory, Inc. is a small, privately owned firm in the promotional products (specialty advertising) industry. After starting the firm two years ago with the intention of pursuing a high-quality/high-price strategy, the CEO is seeking methods of increasing sales... View Details

Keywords: Salesforce Management; Marketing Strategy; Customization and Personalization; Business Model; Sales; Advertising Industry

April 1995
Case

Montague Corporation (A)

By: Norman A. Berg and James Weber

The Montague Corp. is a small company started in 1987 and owned by David Montague, age 31, and his father. The company designs, manufactures in Taiwan, and sells through distributors worldwide a high-quality "bicycle that folds." The company offices are located in... View Details

Keywords: Business Strategy; Financial Strategy; Financial Management; Job Cuts and Outsourcing; Globalized Firms and Management; Family Business; Bicycle Industry; Taiwan; Cambridge

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2014
Case

Meizhou Dongpo Restaurant: Entrepreneurship, Leadership and Culture

By: F. Warren McFarlan, Weiku Wu and Jia Guo

Meizhou Dongpo is a large catering group in China. On June 6, 1996, the first Meizhou Dongpo Restaurant was opened in Beijing. The enterprise entered the stage of rapid development in 2000, and set up Beijing Meizhou Restaurant Management Co., Ltd. In June 2003 the... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Leadership; National Culture; China; Restaurants; China

2009
Book

Experiments in Financial Democracy: Corporate Governance and Financial Development in Brazil, 1882-1950

By: Aldo Musacchio

In Experiments in Financial Democracy, I challenge the idea that it was colonial institutions that sent Brazil, a civil law country, down a particular path of corporate governance and finance. Detailed archival research reveals significantly different patterns of... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Investment; Corporate Governance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Business History; Business and Shareholder Relations; Brazil