Publications

Article

Little Patents and Big Secrets: Managing Intellectual Property

By: James J. Anton and Dennis A. Yao

Exploitation of an innovation commonly requires some disclosure of enabling knowledge (e.g., to obtain a patent or induce complementary investment). When property rights offer only limited protection, the value of the disclosure is offset by the increased threat of... View Details

Keywords: Patents; Management; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge; Rights; Value; Information; Corporate Disclosure

Read Now

2023
Article

Association Between Regulatory Submission Characteristics and Recalls of Medical Devices Receiving 510(k) Clearance

By: Alexander O. Everhart, Soumya Sen, Ariel D. Stern, Yi Zhu and Pinar Karaca-Mandic

Importance: Most regulated medical devices enter the U.S. market via the 510(k) regulatory submission pathway, wherein manufacturers demonstrate that applicant devices are “substantially equivalent” to 1 or more “predicate” devices (legally marketed medical devices... View Details

Keywords: Recalls; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry

10 Nov 2020
Sharpening Your Skills

Research News and Tips: Innovating Across Time Zones

informal deadlines are associated with significantly more adverse effects, including more hospitalizations, life-threatening incidents, and deaths—particularly, drugs most rushed through the approval process." What's going on here? The... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

January 2017 (Revised August 2017)
Case

Mexico's Energy Reform

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Haviland Sheldahl-Thomason

Energy—both petroleum and electricity—had been terribly managed for decades in Mexico. The two national monopolies—PEMEX and CFE—were inefficient, overstaffed, corrupt, rife with subsidies, and losing money. Finally, in 2012, President Enrique Peña Nieto announced his... View Details

Keywords: Energy; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Performance Improvement; Energy Industry; Mexico

Educators

01 Sep 2016
News

Alumni and Faculty Books for September 2016

Alumni Books The Saudi Kingdom by Ali Al Shihabi (MBA 1985) (Markus Wiener Publishers) Al Shihabi presents an analysis of Saudi Arabia’s political stability in light of mounting domestic and international challenges facing the country... View Details

Terrence Tianshuo Shi

Terrence Tianshuo Shi is a doctoral student at Harvard Business School. He was awarded the John M. Olin Research Fellowship in Law and Economics at Harvard Law School and named a Deloitte Foundation Doctoral Fellow for 2024. Prior to joining the doctoral program,... View Details

01 Nov 2010
Research & Ideas

How IT Shapes Top-Down and Bottom-Up Decision Making

instance, and the fact that telecom industry regulations vary from country to country, which means networking prices vary, too.) The findings were consistently parallel with the hypotheses: An increase in... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

11 Dec 2013
News

Philanthropy's Edge: Innovation and a Long Time Horizon

Keywords: Bridgespan; Government

summer 2003
Article

Patents, Invalidity, and the Strategic Transmission of Enabling Information

By: James J. Anton and Dennis A. Yao

The patent system encourages innovation and knowledge disclosure by providing exclusivity to inventors. Exclusivity is limited, however, because a substantial fraction of patents have some probability of being ruled invalid when challenged in court. The possibility of... View Details

Keywords: System; Innovation and Invention; Knowledge Dissemination; Courts and Trials; Competition; Patents; Corporate Disclosure

24 Apr 2014
News

Connecting people and policymakers in a conversation online

After taking an active role in Barack Obama’s reelection campaign, in which she discovered how much she enjoyed canvassing voters and talking to people, Elsa Sze (MBA/MPP 2014) wanted to extend the intensity of political engagement beyond... View Details

21 Apr 2023
Research & Ideas

The $15 Billion Question: Have Loot Boxes Turned Video Gaming into Gambling?

Players have long been able to buy virtual items with real money in video games, such as special weapons and features. But Nintendo raised the ire of parents and regulators in... View Details

Keywords: by Scott Van Voorhis; Video Game; Media & Broadcasting

31 Jul 2018
Working Paper Summaries

How Does Product Liability Risk Affect Innovation? Evidence from Medical Implants

Keywords: by Alberto Galasso and Hong Luo

18 Apr 2014
News

Strengthening the bond between the U.S. and China

Former US Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. (MBA 1970) talks about his current work in US-China relations as CEO of the Paulson Institute. (Published April 2014) View Details

08 Feb 2016
Research & Ideas

The Civic Benefits of Google Street View and Yelp

if city regulators wanted to see the impact of licensing three new businesses on a particular block, they could monitor changes in Google Street Views, cross-referencing that data with online reviews in the neighborhood View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Consumer Products

16 Mar 2009
Working Paper Summaries

Running Out of Numbers: Scarcity of IP Addresses and What To Do About It

Keywords: by Benjamin Edelman; Computer; Communications; Telecommunications

September 2009
Article

Virtue out of Necessity? Compliance, Commitment and the Improvement of Labor Conditions in Global Supply Chains

By: Akshay Mangla, Richard Locke and Matthew Amengual

Private, voluntary compliance programs, promoted by global corporations and nongovernmental organizations alike, have produced only modest and uneven improvements in working conditions and labor rights in most global supply chains. Through a detailed study of a major... View Details

Keywords: Working Conditions; Ethics; Supply Chain; Governance Compliance; Globalization

Read Now

01 Feb 1997
News

Made, Not Born: HBS Courses and Entrepreneurial Management

need to cut the cost of a building by 10 percent in order to make the numbers work, they need to understand what has been given up. I'd like them to be better at visualizing the impact of what is being created and its effect on the user... View Details

2018
Working Paper

Ratcheting, Competition, and the Diffusion of Technological Change: The Case of Televisions Under an Energy Efficiency Program

By: Tomomichi Amano and Hiroshi Ohashi

In differentiated goods markets with societal implications, quality standards are commonly implemented to avoid the under-provision of innovation. Firms have clear incentives to engage in strategic behavior because policymakers use market outcomes as a benchmark in... View Details

Keywords: Product Differentiation; Energy Efficiency Standards; Ratcheting; Diffusion Of Innovation; Technological Innovation; Competition; Quality; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy