Publications

February 2005 (Revised April 2006)
Case

Rx Depot: Importing Drugs from Canada

By: Debora L. Spar

In 2002, a handful of entrepreneurs began to ship drugs from Canada into the United States, taking advantage of regulatory and price differentials across the neighboring countries. Using the Internet and a low-cost network of Canadian pharmacies, firms like Rx Depot... View Details

Keywords: Courts and Trials; Entrepreneurship; Intellectual Property; Laws and Statutes; Pharmaceutical Industry; Canada; United States

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November 2007
Article

The Accidental Entrepreneur: The Emergent and Collective Process of User Entrepreneurship

By: Sonali K. Shah and Mary Tripsas

We develop a process model of how users, an understudied source of entrepreneurship, create, evaluate, share, and commercialize their ideas. We compare and contrast our model to the classic model of the entrepreneurial process, highlighting the emergent and... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Valuation; Business Model; Commercialization; Adoption; Adaptation; Product; Civil Society or Community

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Read Now

September 2015
Supplement

Kaweyan: Female Entrepreneurship and the Past and Future of Afghanistan (B)

By: Geoffrey Jones and Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

This (B) case takes up the story of the Afghan female entrepreneur Kamila Sidiqi between 2009 and 2015. The case opens with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry praising her achievements at a State Department dinner in March 2015 for the newly elected President of... View Details

Keywords: Business or Company Management; Entrepreneurship; Personal Development and Career; Gender; Afghanistan

13 Jul 2016
HBS Case

How Uber, Airbnb, and Etsy Attracted Their First 1,000 Customers

they could go around San Francisco knocking on doors. Instead, founders Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia thought like customers themselves, trying to figure out where they would go if Airbnb didn’t exist. It didn’t take them long to figure out the answer: Craigslist. The... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding; Retail; Service; Transportation

Web

Blavatnik Fellowship in Life Science Entrepreneurship - Health Care

closely with leading biotech industry and biomedical authorities, receive programmatic guidance and mentorship, and join a community of entrepreneurs shaping the future of science. “ Bringing life science innovations to the global... View Details

Program

Senior Executive Leadership Program—China

sharpen their management and leadership skills and are preparing to assume new responsibilities or drive growth initiatives Entrepreneurs with established start-ups and executives planning to establish or expand their presence in China... View Details

11 Dec 2007
First Look

First Look: December 11, 2007

Working PapersThe Seer of Wellesley Hills: Roger Babson and the Babson Statistical Organization Author:Walter A. Friedman Abstract Roger Babson was a pioneer of the business-forecasting industry in the United States in the early twentieth century. He built the... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

February 2001 (Revised October 2002)
Background Note

Entrepreneurial History: A Conceptual Overview

By: Nancy F. Koehn

Analyzes HBS cases on five entrepreneurs and the companies they built: Josiah Wedgwood, Henry Heinz, Marshall Field, Howard Schultz of Starbucks, and Michael Dell. These five cases and their accompanying teaching notes comprise a course module on entrepreneurial... View Details

Keywords: Transition; Demand and Consumers; Competition; Business History; Entrepreneurship; Customer Focus and Relationships; Business Strategy; Society

26 Mar 2008
First Look

First Look: March 26, 2008

time. Purchase this case: http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=608113 Kazuo Inamori, A Japanese Entrepreneur Harvard Business School Case 408-039 The case provides insight into a business leader whose cognizance... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

11 Apr 2023
Op-Ed

The First 90 Hours: What New CEOs Should—and Shouldn't—Do to Set the Right Tone

for Entrepreneurs Preparing for the Next Stage Want to Build Better Leaders? Focus on Mindset, Skills, Knowledge Feedback or ideas to share? Email the Working Knowledge team at hbswk@hbs.edu. Image: iStockphoto/FatCamera View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch

August 2022 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Fresh Food Generation

By: Brian Trelstad, Amy Klopfenstein and Mel Martin

This case highlights one of five BIPOC entrepreneurs in the Boston area as part of the HBS Impact Investment Fund. In fall 2021, a team of HBS students reviewed the financial statements of Fresh Food Generation (FFG), a Dorchester, Massachusetts-based food service... View Details

Keywords: Impact Investing; Investment; Entrepreneurial Finance; Entrepreneurship; Race; Food and Beverage Industry; Boston

2014
Contribution

Entrepreneurship in Emerging Markets: Contextual Intelligence for the Study of Two Thirds of the World's Population

By: Tarun Khanna

In this paper, I review the concept of "institutional voids" that provides a way to understand the structure of emerging markets. These voids impede would-be buyers from getting together with would-be sellers, and hence compromise the functioning of markets.... View Details

Keywords: Emerging Markets; Entrepreneurship

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June 2013 (Revised November 2016)
Case

Goldfinger: Charles W. Engelhard Jr. and Apartheid-era South Africa

By: Geoffrey Jones and Elliot R. Benton

This case considers the strategies of Charles W. Engelhard, an American mining magnate who made large investments in apartheid-era South Africa. Engelhard was widely believed to have been the model for the James Bond villan Auric Goldfinger. During the 1950s and 1960s... View Details

Keywords: Political Economy; Business History; FDI; Corporate Social Responsibility And Impact; South Africa; Mining; Ethics; Globalization; Government and Politics; History; Mining Industry; Africa; South Africa

August 2002 (Revised July 2003)
Case

LAE Enterprises Corp.

Jay Entrepreneur had to decide whether it was worth his time to plow through a 12-page term sheet for a Series A round of preferred stock prepared by HBS Investors, a well-established venture capital firm that did seed, early-round, and mezzanine financings. He could... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Contracts; Decision Choices and Conditions; Business Startups; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry

07 Jul 2022
HBS Case

How a Multimillion-Dollar Ice Cream Startup Melted Down (and Bounced Back)

pay enough attention to financial discipline and keeping track of cash in and cash out, [which] can get an entrepreneur into trouble.” Even with an average store profitability of 15 percent, and the fact that it was shipping its product... View Details

Keywords: by Pamela Reynolds

23 Jul 2001
Research & Ideas

Sam Walton: Great From the Start

"done everything right," yet his reward was exile. Many another great entrepreneur suffered similar setbacks. Many made mistakes for which they had only themselves to blame. Many encountered situations in which their failure to... View Details

Keywords: by Richard S. Tedlow; Retail

Web

Research Areas - Doctoral

international ventures; the environments in which entrepreneurs make decisions; and social entrepreneurship. 4. Performance Measurement and Outcomes scholars study drivers and effectiveness of performance measurement and management... View Details

Web

Programs & Resources - Entrepreneurship

Programs & Resources For MBA Students Successful entrepreneurs understand the essential value of experience, both inside and outside the classroom. Discover programs, courses, and resources to help guide you through your HBS... View Details

August 2022
Supplement

Sweet Teez Bakery: Projecting the Dough’s Rise Financial Supplement

By: Emily R. McComb, Mel Martin and Amy Klopfenstein

Abstract: In 2021, the HBS Impact Investment Fund student team met with entrepreneur Teresa Maynard, who had applied for a $25,000 impact investment loan. The students thought the former Harvard Data Scientist’s bakery business, Sweet Teez Bakery, showed promise.... View Details

Keywords: Impact Investment; Entrepreneurship; Social Entrepreneurship; Finance; Investment; Goods and Commodities; Financial Reporting; Small Business; Food and Beverage Industry; Massachusetts; United States