Publications

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Faculty & Research

treating myeloma, but it is far from clinical trials and carries significant uncertainty. The other option is an established company with a promising drug already in Phase II trials, offering the potential for quicker patient impact and a... View Details

November 2020
Article

Disrupting the Disruptors or Enhancing Them? How Blockchain Re‐Shapes Two‐Sided Platforms

By: Daniel Trabucchi, Antonella Moretto, Tommaso Buganza and Alan MacCormack

The importance of platform‐based businesses in the modern economy is growing continuously and becoming increasingly relevant. Specifically, the deployment of digital technologies has enhanced the applicability of two‐sided business models, enabling companies to act not... View Details

Keywords: Blockchain; Two-Sided Platforms; Business Model; Innovation and Invention; Technological Innovation

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Gerald C. Chertavian

Gerald Chertavian is the Founder of Year Up, one of the nation’s largest and most effective youth workforce development programs. Chertavian was a successful technology entrepreneur and Wall Street banker, but it was through his many years as a Big Brother... View Details

November 2013 (Revised November 2014)
Case

Freemium Pricing at Dropbox

By: Thales Teixeira and Elizabeth Anne Watkins

Online storage company Dropbox provided remote-storage over the internet of any type of computer file, along with file sharing, synchronization and backup. Using a freemium pricing strategy whereby a basic service was free-of-charge and a premium service was paid,... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Strategy; Price; Internet; Information Technology Industry

01 Nov 2010
Research & Ideas

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

What determines whether decisions happen on the bottom, middle, or top rung of the corporate ladder? New research offers a surprising conclusion: The answer often lies in the technology that a company uses.... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

Research Summary

(formerly Leonard-Barton) Creating and Exploiting Knowledge-Based Assets

By: Dorothy A. Leonard

For the past decade, Dorothy Leonard's research has focused on how companies develop and exploit strategically advantageous knowledge assets. In her 1995 book Wellsprings of Knowledge (HBS Press), she identified and described in depth, activities that create and... View Details

May 2021 (Revised July 2021)
Case

Coats: Supply Chain Challenges

By: Willy C. Shih and Adina Wong

Coats, the largest thread maker in the world, transformed its business to digital colour measurement so that it could respond better to customer demand in the garment industry for rapid product cycles and more fragmented colour choices. Its embrace of digital colour... View Details

Keywords: Inventory Management; Supply Chains; Digital; Operations; Supply Chain Management; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Asia

2014
Teaching Note

Changhong: Journey to Shared Services (TN)

By: F. Warren McFarlan, Haiyan Zhang and Guo Jia

Founded in 1958 and headquartered in Mianyang - an emerging inland science and technology city in Sichuan Province, Changhong Electric Co., Ltd., started from the military industry. It then entered the color TV industry and subsequently expanded to a wide range of... View Details

Keywords: China; Appliances; Finance ＆ Insurance; China

06 Apr 2016
What Do You Think?

As Tim Cook, How Would You Tackle Apple's Next Challenge?

not be the FBI but the very advances in information technology on which Apple prides itself. The question was whether Apple was like the boy with his finger in the dike trying to hold back the water as it refused the US government’s... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett; Computer

April 2024 (Revised July 2024)
Case

Unleashing Human Magic at Best Buy

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger, Sunil Gupta and Amram Migdal

The case examines the transformation of Best Buy under CEO Hubert Joly's leadership from 2012. Facing significant business challenges, including competition from online and physical retailers, Joly implemented the "Renew Blue" turnaround strategy, which focused on... View Details

2008
Book

On Competition

By: M. E. Porter

Competition is one of society's most powerful forces for making things better in many ﬁelds of human endeavor. The study of competition and the creation of value, in their full richness, have preoccupied me for several decades. Competition is pervasive, whether it... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Practice; Competitive Strategy; Theory; Value Creation

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January 2020 (Revised March 2020)
Case

Huawei: A Global Tech Giant in the Crossfire of a Digital Cold War

By: William C. Kirby, Billy Chan and John P. McHugh

By 2020, Ren Zhengfei, CEO of Huawei, had transformed the small telephone switch manufacturer he founded in 1987 into a $120 billion telecommunications company poised to lead the lucrative rollout of fifth-generation (5G) cellular networks. However, an emerging... View Details

Keywords: International Strategy; Government And Business; Digital Infrastructure; Political Risk; Information Technology; Infrastructure; Business and Government Relations; Government and Politics; Information Infrastructure; Technology Industry; China; United States

24 Sep 2019
Research & Ideas

Do National Security Secrets Hold Back National Innovation?

Instead of seeking patents, many inventors and firms choose to keep the details of their innovations secret, out of the public view. But what are the implications of keeping important new ideas locked away in vaults as trade secrets? Does it slow down View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz

March 2009
Case

Incept LLC and Confluent Surgical (A)

By: Bhaskar Chakravorti, Toby E. Stuart and James Weber

A venture capitalist must decide whether to invest in a medical technology company that licenses intellectual property from a privately held IP holding company based on a platform technology. Entrepreneurs Amar Sawhney and Fred Khosravi founded Incept LLC to... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Entrepreneurship; Intellectual Property; Rights; Agreements and Arrangements; Partners and Partnerships; Trust; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry

06 Mar 2012
First Look

First Look: March 6

productive. The authors have studied when 161 countries adopted 104 technologies over the past 200 years, and they conclude that profound economic advantages-as measured by per capita income-accrue to early adopters of technology. Read... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

April 2017
Case

Planetary Resources Inc., Property Rights, and the Regulation of the Space Economy

By: Matthew Weinzierl and Angela Acocella

Planetary Resources, Inc. (PRI) had a bold, some said crazy, vision: to mine asteroids. One might have assumed that developing the right technology would be the greatest challenge facing PRI. But even if the fledgling company could develop and deploy the sophisticated... View Details

Keywords: Property; Rights; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Aerospace Industry; Mining Industry

February 2009
Case

HP: The Computer is Personal Again

By: Rajiv Lal and Cathy Ross

In September 2008, Todd Bradley, executive vice president of Hewlett-Packard Company's Personal Systems Group (PSG), gathered his thoughts before a meeting with his top executives and managers for product design and marketing. On the agenda was a discussion of... View Details

Keywords: Revenue; Product Positioning; Corporate Strategy; Computer Industry; Retail Industry

April 1999 (Revised February 2001)
Background Note

Offshore Drilling Industry, The

After booming in 1997 and early 1998, the offshore drilling industry slumps in late 1998 and early 1999. Lower oil prices lead oil companies to reduce drilling budgets, and rig utilization falls from essentially 100% to 70% in some markets. Day rates--the prices paid... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Demand and Consumers; Price; Supply and Industry; Mining Industry

February 1991 (Revised December 1992)
Case

Xerox and Fuji Xerox

Describes the growth and development of Fuji Xerox, Xerox's joint venture in Japan, and the evolving relationship between Fuji Xerox and Xerox. Focuses on the technological development of Fuji Xerox, and on the contributions that Fuji Xerox has made to Xerox's... View Details

Keywords: Joint Ventures; Electronics Industry; Japan; United States