Publications

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June 2003 (Revised March 2008)
Case

Schering-Plough and Genome Therapeutics: Discovering an Asthma Gene

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Marc Aquino

Personalized medicine requires the identification of mutated genes. Schering-Plough's search for the one related to asthma requires finding families with the disease. Examines the industry that helps conduct such research, including contract research organizations. View Details

Keywords: Health Disorders; Research and Development; Genetics; Biotechnology Industry; Pharmaceutical Industry

14 Jul 2009
First Look

First Look: July 14

Course MaterialsThe DiagnoFirst Opportunity Harvard Business School Case 309-112 John Mason, a principle at Oldwell Partners, was facing a decision of whether or not to invest in DiagnoFirst, a molecular diagnostics firm. DiagnoFirst's key product was a View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

03 Mar 2015
First Look

First Look: March 3

a lower price but charge more for the cartridges necessary to run a sample and earn its primary revenue from these cartridges. The third model would see GenapSys sell its device at or around cost, but use the data customers generated to create a proprietary database of... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

24 Sep 2012
Research & Ideas

Why Do We Tax?

age, gender, height, and race. The most provocative, however, is for genetics. Once we know and understand genetic information better, we could, in principle, do a very good job of inferring individuals' innate abilities from the View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Legal Services

October 2001 (Revised March 2008)
Case

Anagene, Inc.

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Christina L. Darwall

An entrepreneurial, publicly traded biotech company has begun production and sales of its core product--cartridges that permit DNA samples to be analyzed on a microchip. In the early quarters, sales are difficult to forecast and the company has experienced fluctuating... View Details

Keywords: Cost Accounting; Financial Reporting; Production; Performance Capacity; Risk and Uncertainty; Genetics; Governing and Advisory Boards; Biotechnology Industry; California

August 2007
Teaching Note

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, Ltd (TN)

By: Tarun Khanna and Krishna G. Palepu

Teaching note to 707441. View Details

Keywords: Growth and Development Strategy; Cost; Competitive Strategy; Adoption; Emerging Markets; Change; Multinational Firms and Management; Genetics; Pharmaceutical Industry; India

November 2009 (Revised March 2010)
Case

Managing Drugs on the Forefront of Personalized Medicine: The Erbitux and Vectibix Story

By: Richard G. Hamermesh, Raju Kucherlapati and Rachel Gordon

In May 2007, Amgen Inc. (Amgen) received disappointing news from the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) that its drug Vectibix, developed to fight metastatic colorectal cancer, had been rejected. This was especially surprising news given that a similar rival drug had... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Health Testing and Trials; Marketing Strategy; Product Positioning; Genetics; Biotechnology Industry; Europe; United States

June 2011 (Revised October 2013)
Case

Gene Patents (A)

By: Richard Hamermesh, David Kiron and Phillip Andrews

In March 2010, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Sweet overturned 30 years of legal precedent and ruled that unaltered human genes could not be patented. This case reviews patent law and how it relates to our increasing knowledge of the Human Genome. The case issues... View Details

Keywords: Courts and Trials; Patents; Genetics; Judgments; Science-Based Business; Biotechnology Industry; United States

February 2024
Article

Are Many Sex/Gender Differences Really Power Differences?

By: Adam D. Galinsky, Aurora Turek, Grusha Agarwal, Eric M. Anicich, Derek D. Rucker, Hannah Riley Bowles, Nira Liberman, Chloe Levin and Joe C Magee

This research addresses the long-standing debate about the determinants of sex/gender differences. Evolutionary theorists trace many sex/gender differences back to natural selection and sex-specific adaptations. Sociocultural and biosocial theorists, in contrast,... View Details

Keywords: Gender; Genetics; Power and Influence; Social Issues

Read Now

20 Dec 2004
Research & Ideas

How an Order Views Your Company

about customers and products or services. But, because of increasingly intense competition, one now had to look at individual orders. My research assistant (at the time) and I wrote a case with such detail that it proved to be very popular and useful. It is like having... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Johnston

03 Sep 2024
Research & Ideas

Is It Even Possible to Dam the Flow of Misleading Content Online?

think the social media company is biased, but its action still reduces the potential for a bad outcome. General: For example, “don’t eat GMOs.” With a more general expression, such as a post that genetically modified foods are... View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald; Information Technology; Technology

13 Apr 2015
Research & Ideas

3 Ways Firms Can Profit From Environmental Investments

2014. BCG recommended that conventional brands would do well to enter the environmentally friendly product market, as Clorox did by launching its Green Works line of cleaning products, or as Unilever did by acquiring Ben & Jerry's-which recently announced plans to... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Energy; Utilities

08 Jun 2021
Research & Ideas

Tell Me What to Do: When Bad News Is a Big Relief

surgery for a genetic condition. “I was lying in the MRI thinking, ‘I hope they find just the shadow of something suspicious and bad because then the decision won’t be up to me,’” she says. “Afterward, I was like, ‘That’s the craziest,... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

24 Jan 2005
Research & Ideas

Entrepreneurial Hospital Pioneers New Model

But what's more interesting—and this is a function of operating in an environment such as India where heart disease is endemic—it's a genetic trait among Indians, and also there are so many people, so there are more heart ailments—is that... View Details

Keywords: by Martha Lagace; Health

April 2008
Teaching Note

Viagen: Revolutioning the Livestock Industry (TN)

By: David E. Bell, Mary L. Shelman and Eliot Sherman

Teaching Note for [507021]. View Details

Keywords: Investment; Genetics; Production; Training; Customers; Supply Chain; Business Plan; Commercialization; Information Technology; Performance Efficiency; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Industry Structures; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Biotechnology Industry