Publications

September 2008
Supplement

Adobe Systems: Working Towards a "Suite" Release (B)

By: David A. Thomas and Lauren Barley

The case examines the tools a manager can use to keep her project on track and manage conflict and tension as Adobe prepares to launch Creative Suite 3, the biggest software release in the company's 25-year history. The protagonist, Yvonne Murray, is a group program... View Details

Keywords: Change; Interpersonal Communication; Crisis Management; Product Launch; Projects; Conflict of Interests; Integration; Software

October 2010
Article

Unleashing the Power of Marketing

By: Beth Comstock, Ranjay Gulati and Stephen A Liguori

The article examines marketing management at General Electric Co. (GE). The transformation of the company's marketing department into an integral part of product development, product management, and strategic planning after years of relative neglect is considered.... View Details

Keywords: Product Development; Product Marketing; Strategic Planning; Human Resources; Marketing Strategy; Customer Relationship Management; Marketing; Advertising Industry; Technology Industry

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March 2022 (Revised January 2023)
Case

Innovation at Moog Inc.

By: Brian J. Hall, Ashley V. Whillans, Davis Heniford, Dominika Randle and Caroline Witten

This case focuses on the challenges of incentivizing innovation within Moog, an engineering company based in New York state that designs and builds guidance systems for space, air, and land-based travel. The case enables students to grapple with the challenges of using... View Details

2014
Working Paper

Pay Harmony: Peer Comparison and Executive Compensation

By: Claudine Gartenberg and Julie Wulf

This study suggests that peer comparison affects both wage setting and productivity within firms. We report three changes in division manager compensation following a 1991–1992 controversy over executive pay. We argue that this controversy increased wage comparisons... View Details

Keywords: Pay-for-Performance; Internal Labor Markets; Peer Comparison; Firm Geography; Behavior; Executive Compensation; Policy

SSRN

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January 1997 (Revised December 1999)
Case

OXO International

By: H. Kent Bowen, Marilyn Matis and Sylvie Ryckebusch

OXO, a kitchen tools and gadgets company, was started by a businessman who had 30 years of experience in the housewares industry. With his wife and son as founders, he creates a new niche in the gadgets industry for high-end gourmet stores. The company has headquarters... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Supply Chain Management; Production; Design; Ownership; Business Startups; Acquisition; Consumer Products Industry; Asia; New York (city, NY); Connecticut

Career Coach

Celia Chen

Having worked at McKinsey for 5 years in fintech and consumer/retail industries and Amazon as a senior product manager responsible for launching a new service, Celia is happy to speak to students interested... View Details

November 2006
Article

Find Your Sweet Spot

By: Rob Markey, Gerard Du Toit and James Allen

Charged with extending their unit’s product lines and boosting top-line growth over the next three years, product managers at one global consumer goods company wanted to identify the most attractive customer segments to target and how best to reach them. So they turned... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Customers; Segmentation

January 1987 (Revised January 2002)
Case

Baker Precision Instruments, Inc.

By: Ramchandran Jaikumar, Roy Shapiro, Donald Rosenfield and Kathryn E. Stecke

A rapidly growing machine parts manufacturer is trying to decide whether to acquire an advanced Flexible Manufacturing System or Systems. The selection decisions must address the impact of new technology, the effect of setup times on production planning and capacity,... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Cost vs Benefits; Machinery and Machining; Production; Decision Choices and Conditions; Management Systems; Industrial Products Industry; Industrial Products Industry

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August 2019 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Lemonade: Disrupting Insurance with Instant Everything, Killer Prices, and a Big Heart

By: Elie Ofek and Danielle Golan

Launching its first products in the fall of 2016 in New York, insurtech startup Lemonade was on a mission to disrupt the insurance market by using AI and behavioral economics principles. The company offered renters, homeowners, and condo insurance and mainly targeted... View Details

Keywords: AI; Business Startups; Insurance; Technological Innovation; Business Model; Disruption; Brands and Branding; Growth and Development Strategy; Global Strategy; Decision Making; Insurance Industry; Technology Industry

December 1999 (Revised October 2003)
Case

BRL Hardy: Globalizing an Australian Wine Company

By: Christopher A. Bartlett

Two new product launch decisions face Christopher Carson, managing director of BRL Hardy, Europe. Responsible for the European operations of a major Australian wine company, Carson has begun to globalize his strategy beyond selling the parent company's wines. After a... View Details

Keywords: Global Strategy; Joint Ventures; Product Launch; Brands and Branding; Competitive Strategy; Business Subsidiaries; Negotiation Style; Food and Beverage Industry

28 Nov 2005
Research & Ideas

Unilever: Transformation and Tradition

research company. These businesses were the product of past rational calculations, and some remained profitable and successful operations, but by the 1970s times had changed. Unilever found itself burdened, especially in Europe, with a... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones; Consumer Products

June 2013
Supplement

Studio Moderna - Sandi Cesko, CEO, Video Supplement

By: Jim Sharpe

This is the Video Supplement for Studio Moderna - A Venture in Eastern Europe (HBS Case #808110). View Details

May 2013
Supplement

Studio Moderna—A Venture in Eastern Europe

By: Jim Sharpe

This is the Spreadsheet Supplement for Studio Moderna—A Venture in Eastern Europe (HBS Case #808110). Includes Exhibit 3a, Exhibit 3b, Exhibit 5, and Exhibit 6. View Details

Karim R. Lakhani is the Dorothy & Michael Hintze Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He specializes in technology management, innovation, digital transformation and artificial... View Details

Keywords: biotechnology; communications; computer; health care; high technology; information technology industry; internet; pharmaceuticals; software; video games

October 2021 (Revised March 2022)
Supplement

PittaRosso: Artificial Intelligence-Driven Pricing and Promotion

By: Ayelet Israeli and Fabrizio Fantini

PittaRosso, a traditional Italian shoe retailer, is implementing an AI system to provide pricing and promotion recommendations. The system allows them to implement changes that would affect both the top of funnel and bottom of funnel activities for the company: once... View Details

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the complex interdependencies of globalized supply chains. While these global multistage production networks had spread during a relatively benign environment of falling trade barriers and increasing interdependencies among... View Details

September 2006 (Revised September 2007)
Case

Bang & Olufsen: Design Driven Innovation

By: Robert D. Austin and Daniela Beyersdorfer

A successful company, recognized worldwide for exquisite design of consumer electronics products, strives to better integrate software design into its traditional physical product design processes to meet the demands of a post-iPod world. Details the Bang & Olufsen... View Details

Keywords: Diversification; Production; Applications and Software; Product Design; Innovation and Invention; Product Development; Electronics Industry

2015
Discussion Paper

The Roles of Import Competition and Export Opportunities for Technical Change

By: Claudia Steinwender

A variety of empirical and theoretical trade papers have suggested and documented a positive impact of trade on the productivity of firms. However, there is less consensus about the underlying mechanism at work. While trade papers focus on access to export markets,... View Details

Keywords: Performance Productivity; Trade