Publications

2010
Article

The Effect of Financial Development on the Investment Cash Flow Relationship: Cross-Country Evidence from Europe

We investigate financing constraints in a large cross-country data set covering most of the European economy. Firm-level investment sensitivity to cash flow is used to identify financing constraints. We find that the sensitivities are significantly positive, on... View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development; Development Economics; Investment; Cash Flow; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Relationships; Economy; Financial Markets; Business Subsidiaries; Capital Markets; Assets; Financing and Loans; Europe

December 1993 (Revised December 2003)
Case

Manville Corp. Fiber Glass Group (B)

By: Lynn S. Paine and Sarah Gant

Describes how Manville's managers responded when their main product, fiberglass, was classified by an international research agency as a possible human carcinogen. View Details

Keywords: Product Marketing; Business or Company Management; Ethics; Product

Ramana Nanda is Professor of Entrepreneurial Finance and Academic Lead of the Institute for Deep Tech Entrepreneurship at Imperial College London. His research examines financing frictions facing new ventures, with an aim to help entrepreneurs with fundraising and... View Details

Keywords: banking; biotechnology; energy; financial services; green technology; microfinance; nonprofit industry; venture capital industry

Fiscal Risk and the Portfolio of Government Programs

This paper proposes a new approach to social cost-benefit analysis using a model in which a benevolent government chooses risky projects in the presence of market failures and tax distortions. The government internalizes market failures and therefore perceives project... View Details

2014
Book

Empire of Cotton: A Global History

By: Sven Beckert

The epic story of the rise and fall of the empire of cotton, its centrality to the world economy, and its making and remaking of global capitalism. Cotton is so ubiquitous as to be almost invisible, yet understanding its history is key to understanding the origins... View Details

Keywords: Economic Systems; Plant-Based Agribusiness; Globalized Markets and Industries; Society; Manufacturing Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

October 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Fantuan

By: Feng Zhu and David Lane

In 2023, CEO Randy Wu was considering the optimal growth strategy for Fantuan, a restaurant food delivery platform that had expanded from its 2014 founding in Vancouver, Canada to serve the Chinese demand for Asian cuisine in urban markets across Australia, Canada, the... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Focus and Relationships; Diasporas; Entrepreneurship; Digital Platforms; Growth Management; Business Strategy; Diversification; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; United States; Canada; United Kingdom; Australia

May 2011 (Revised June 2011)
Case

The Crisis at Tyco - A Director's Perspective

By: Suraj Srinivasan and Aldo Sesia

In 2002, Wendy Lane had been a member of the board of directors at Tyco International a little more than a year when the company's CEO Dennis Kozlowski and other top executives were accused of fraud, which ultimately led to resignations, imprisonments, lawsuits, and... View Details

Keywords: Management Teams; Reputation; Governing and Advisory Boards; Crisis Management; Accounting Audits; Problems and Challenges; Risk Management; Finance; Managerial Roles; Lawsuits and Litigation; Service Industry; United States

2020
Book

Capitalism at Risk: How Business Can Lead

By: Joseph L. Bower, Dutch Leonard and Lynn S. Paine

Who should take the lead in fixing market capitalism? Business—not government alone. The spread of capitalism worldwide has made people wealthier than ever before. But capitalism's future is far from assured. Pandemics, income inequality, resource depletion, mass... View Details

Keywords: Capitalism; Business And Society; Economic Systems; Economic Growth; Policy; Leading Change; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Community Relations; Corporate Strategy

10 Apr 2007
First Look

First Look: April 10, 2007

some of the best work around" in serving the needs of orphans around the world. Purchase this case: http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=807069 PublicationsThe Internal View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

Web

Faculty & Research

leaders within such organizations more effective political brokers. To test this argument, I propose a shift-share instrument that measures the exposure of Brazilian local labor markets to exogenous changes... View Details

June 2003 (Revised December 2003)
Case

Social Partnership

By: Huw Pill and Julian Coulter

Discusses the tripartite social partnership among employers, unions, and government that was geared toward maintaining international competitiveness through wage moderation within the European monetary system from the late 1980s. View Details

Keywords: Wages; Competition; Partners and Partnerships; Labor and Management Relations; Business and Government Relations; Europe

2012
Case

Beyondsoft Co., Ltd. (B)

By: F. Warren McFarlan, Donghong Li and Hong Zhang

The case "Beyondsoft Co., Ltd. (A)" completed in early 2010 described the strategic path of Beyondsoft over its history of more than 10 years since its foundation in 1995, containing its major business lines and the relations with the major customers at that time, the... View Details

Keywords: Computer Software; Entrepreneurship; Outsourcing; Strategy; China; Information Technology; China

12 May 2015
Working Paper Summaries

Financing Payouts

Keywords: by Joan Farre-Mensa, Roni Michaely & Martin C. Schmalz

October 2015
Article

Agglomerative Forces and Cluster Shapes

By: William R. Kerr and Scott Duke Kominers

We model spatial clusters of similar firms. Our model highlights how agglomerative forces lead to localized, individual connections among firms, while interaction costs generate a defined distance over which attraction forces operate. Overlapping firm interactions... View Details

Keywords: Agglomeration; Clusters; Industrial Organization; Silicon Valley; Technology Flows; Patents; Networks; Information Technology; Industry Clusters; Entrepreneurship; California

Article

Organizational Beliefs and Managerial Vision

By: Eric J. Van den Steen

Can managers have an impact on their firm that goes beyond their direct actions and decisions? This article shows that a manager with strong beliefs about the right course of action will attract, through sorting in the labor market, employees with similar beliefs. This... View Details

Keywords: Organizations; Goals and Objectives; Decisions; Labor; Markets; Employees; Motivation and Incentives; Recruitment; Risk and Uncertainty; Values and Beliefs

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January 2016
Case

Savannah Informatics

By: Kevin Schulman

John Muthee and Justus Paul are recent graduates of medical school and a unique program in clinical informatics. They return to Nairobi, Kenya with a passion to make a difference in their community. They have a team they know well, but need to find a project concept... View Details

Keywords: Information Systems; Entrepreneurship; Strategy; Kenya; Africa

May 1993 (Revised May 1996)
Case

BellSouth Enterprises: The Cellular Billing Project

When BellSouth Enterprises decided to aggressively pursue the international cellular market, it needed new software in order to cope with the complexities of cellular billing and the country-specific variations in the international cellular market. BellSouth made the... View Details

Keywords: Alliances; Market Entry and Exit; Software; Global Strategy; Telecommunications Industry; United States