Publications

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May 2005 (Revised February 2007)
Case

HNA Group: "A Miracle in Civil Aviation"

By: Cynthia A. Montgomery and Carole Winkler

Chen Feng and three others started Hainan Airlines in China during a historic transformation and privatization of the civil aviation industry. From a small loan from the local province in 1992, Chairman Chen built the company into a conglomerate that, by 2003, owned... View Details

Keywords: Growth Management; Air Transportation; Business Growth and Maturation; Competitive Advantage; Emerging Markets; Business Startups; Air Transportation Industry; China

January 2004
Article

Corporate Venturing: The Origins of Unilever's Pregnancy Test

By: Geoffrey Jones and Alison Kraft

The relative ability of different sizes of firm and organisational designs to develop and sustain dynamic capabilities in innovation and create new businesses remains a matter of contention. While Chandler among many others has emphasised the pre-eminent role of large... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Organizational Design; Technological Innovation; Business Startups; Venture Capital; Brands and Branding; Multinational Firms and Management; Product Development; Product Launch; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Great Britain

Find at Harvard

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22 May 2020
In Practice

Post-COVID Health Care: More Screens, Less Red Tape?

apps for frontline employees to contain the pandemic. The experience will like reshape the entire health care industry for years to come. We asked faculty members affiliated with the Health Care Initiative at Harvard Business School how... View Details

Keywords: by Danielle Kost

January 2007 (Revised December 2008)
Case

The Challenges of Launching a Start-Up in China: Dorm99.com

By: William C. Kirby, F. Warren McFarlan and Tracy Manty

After graduating from Harvard Business School in June 2006, Ken Pao and Bill Li were ready to fully commit to the Internet start-up they had been working on since they first stepped foot on the business school campus. They moved to Beijing, rounded out their management... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Joint Ventures; Entrepreneurship; Product Launch; Business and Government Relations; Internet; China

09 Apr 2018
Sharpening Your Skills

The Dark Side of Performance Bonuses

decisions, to get flu shots, to lose weight, to be wiser about personal financial planning. Behavioral scientists are becoming the new HR superstars in some organizations. Research through the years at Harvard Business School has explored... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

Web

Executive Education - Entrepreneurship

learn how to exploit disruptive opportunities to build successful businesses and product lines. Who should attend: Entrepreneurs or executives who are launching their own startup or preparing to jump-start... View Details

September 2009 (Revised August 2011)
Case

Urban Decay: A Great Idea

By: Lena G. Goldberg

Casual discussions of ideas for a new business can have unintended legal consequences and expectations about founder status and ownership shares may diverge widely. Using facts from a litigated case, the concept of inadvertent formation of a partnership is explored. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Spoken Communication; Lawsuits and Litigation; Ownership Stake; Partners and Partnerships

March 2024
Case

Nomad: A License to Bank

By: Paul A. Gompers and Pedro Levindo

In late 2023, Lucas Vargas, CEO and co-founder of Nomad, a fintech that offered financial services in the United States for Brazilian residents, had to decide what to do to ensure the company’s continued expansion. Nomad launched its first product, a U.S. digital bank... View Details

01 Aug 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, August 1

startup contests. In mid-2016, questions remained about the pace and magnitude of change, the scale-up and profitability of Watson, and Rometty’s leadership of change. What was left to do? Purchase this... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

01 Sep 2023
News

Global Outposts Expand HBS’s Intellectual Footprint

Since taking over as CEO of Tata Steel in 2013, T. V. Narendran had sought to transform India’s oldest steel manufacturing firm to ready it for a rapidly evolving business world. He instilled financial discipline, acquired new businesses,... View Details

Keywords: Jennifer Gillespie

01 Jun 2023
News

Buy Big, Sell Small

least 75 percent of India’s consumer goods sales despite the significant inefficiencies of an outdated business model. “Kiranas are limited-inventory, 2,000- to 5,000-square-foot shops that don’t always get on-time deliveries or access to... View Details

Keywords: Deborah Blagg; retail; supply chain management; entrepreneurship; leadership; innovation; Miscellaneous Store Retailers; Retail Trade

July 2010 (Revised October 2012)
Case

Employment Vignettes

By: Lena G. Goldberg and Chad M. Carr

Six vignettes drawn from decided cases explore legal and business issues in hiring, firing, promoting, and demoting employees, with an emphasis on protected classes, pretext, and anti-discrimination laws in the setting of start-ups and privately held companies. View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; For-Profit Firms; Employees; Resignation and Termination; Selection and Staffing; Laws and Statutes; Lawsuits and Litigation

24 May 2021
Op-Ed

Can Fabric Waste Become Fashion’s Resource?

COVID-19 has broken fashion’s supply chain. As a result, an already wasteful industry has become more wasteful. Even before the pandemic, the global apparel industry was producing about 92 million tons of textile waste a year. That’s about one garbage truck’s worth of... View Details

Keywords: by Geoffrey Jones and Shelly Xu; Fashion

28 Apr 2014
Research & Ideas

Football Stars Debate ‘The Social Capital of the Savvy Athlete’

in front of a standing-room-only audience at the Harvard Innovation Lab at Harvard Business School. Other participants included Arizona Cardinals receiver Larry Fitzgerald, Houston Texans running back Arian Foster, and Domonique Foxworth,... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Sports

21 Jun 2023
Blog Post

Building a Better World: The Harvard Builders Club

2022) and Tomer Avni (MS/MBA 2022) We – Yarden and Tomer – are graduates of Harvard’s MS/MBA Engineering Sciences program. The program was founded in 2018 by Harvard Business School and Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and... View Details

Career Coach

Adelina Pak

Informed by her prior experiences in the Technology industry, Adelina enjoys helping students understand the various roles within tech and navigate recruiting specific to the industry. She has experience working at both software and hardware, B2C and B2B, as well as... View Details

January 2000 (Revised October 2001)
Case

@Hoc: Leveraging Israeli Technology in the United States

Describes @Hoc, an idea for an Internet software company, developed by two HBS MBA 1999 graduates, Guy Miasnik and Ly Tran. @Hoc's software, loaded into a browser, enables instant, context-sensitive information retrieval and shopping. @Hoc's R&D team is located in... View Details

Keywords: Geographic Location; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Financing and Loans; Business Startups; Information Technology Industry; Israel; Boston

April 2024 (Revised February 2025)
Teaching Note

eBee: Affordable Mobility for Africa

By: Ramon Casadesus-Masanell, Gamze Yucaoglu and Jordan Mitchell

Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 724-360.The case opens in March 2023, as Sten van der Ham and Jaap Maljers, CEO and co-founder of eBee, an electric bike (e-bike) company in Africa, are contemplating the different avenues for growth and path to profitability for the... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Value Creation; Competition; Expansion; Logistics; Profit; Resource Allocation; Corporate Strategy; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Business Strategy; Product Marketing; Entrepreneurial Finance; Bicycle Industry; Africa; Kenya