Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(1,872)
- Faculty Publications (510)
- Article
"Troll" Check? A Proposal for Administrative Review of Patent Litigation
By: Lauren Cohen, John Golden, Umit Gurun and Scott Duke Kominers
The patent system is commonly justified as a way to promote social welfare and, more specifically, technological progress. For years, however, there has been concern that patent litigation is undermining, rather than furthering, these goals. Particularly in the United... View Details
- October 2017
- Article
Toward a Prescriptive Theory of Dynamic Capabilities: Connecting Strategic Choice, Learning, and Competition
By: Gary P. Pisano
The field of strategy has mounted an enormous effort to understand, define, predict, and measure how organizational capabilities shape competitive advantage. While the notion that capabilities influence strategy dates back to the work of Andrews (1971, The Concept... View Details
- July 2017
- Article
Intellectual Property Rights Protection, Ownership, and Innovation: Evidence from China
By: Lily Fang, Josh Lerner and Chaopeng Wu
Using a difference-in-difference approach, we study how intellectual property right (IPR) protection affects innovation in China in the years around the privatizations of state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Innovation increases after SOE privatizations, and this increase... View Details
Keywords: Patents; Privatization; State Ownership; Trademarks; Copyright; Innovation and Invention; China
- June 2017
- Case
AKB48: Going Global? (A)
By: Juan Alcácer, Kotaro Sasamoto, Tee Chayakul and Mayuka Yamazaki
After a remarkable success in Japan, the producer of the Japanese female singing group AKB48 evaluates market opportunities overseas for his artistic creation. This case introduces the business model behind the AKB48 concept and allows students to identify what... View Details
Keywords: Brand Building; Brand Extension; Culture-based Products; Global Products; Differentiation; Intellectual Property; International Business; Local Products; Strategy; Value Capture; Market Entry and Exit; Music Entertainment; Business Model; Global Strategy; Global Range; Brands and Branding; Value Creation; Expansion; Music Industry; Japan; China; Indonesia; Taiwan; Philippines; Thailand; South Korea
- June 2017
- Teaching Note
Project Sun Devil and Project Paris
By: Nori Gerardo Lietz and Alexander W. Schultz
Tony Lee is preparing to present a project to the investment committee of Howard Street Capital. He will be recommending an investment in Project Sun Devil, a high-quality 225-unit student housing rental property near Tempe, Arizona. Tony Lee will compete for capital... View Details
Keywords: General Management; Financial Analysis; Return On Assets; Accounting; Performance Measurement; Financial Ratios; Return On Equity; Financial Statements; Profitability Analysis; Portfolio Investment; Portfolio Management; Real Estate; Property; Investment Portfolio; Investment Return; Analysis; Real Estate Industry; United States
- June 2017
- Article
The Social Trajectory of a Finance Professor and the Common Sense of Capital
By: Marion Fourcade and Rakesh Khurana
This paper traces the career of Michael Jensen, a Chicago finance PhD turned Harvard Business School professor to reveal the intellectual and social conditions that enabled the emergence and institutionalization of what we call the “neoliberal common sense of capital,”... View Details
- May 2017
- Case
Cambridge Franchise Partners
By: Richard Ruback and Royce Yudkoff
Two partners commence a rollup in the quick-service restaurant segment. They focus on operating improvements and spinning-off real estate. View Details
- May 2017 (Revised October 2017)
- Case
Hyperloop Transportation Technologies: Building Breakthrough Innovations in Crowd-Powered Ecosystems
By: Lynda M. Applegate, Terri L. Griffith and Ann Majchrzak
Dirk Ahlborn, co-founder and CEO of Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, Inc. (HTT) looks back at the evolving organizational design and community that allows HTT to be crowd-powered. Since the founding in 2013, HTT has dealt with building an organization with less... View Details
- April 2017
- Case
The Future of Patent Examination at the USPTO
By: Prithwiraj Choudhury, Tarun Khanna and Sarah Mehta
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is the federal government agency responsible for evaluating and granting patents and trademarks. In 2015, the USPTO employed approximately 8,000 patent examiners who granted nearly 300,000 patents to inventors. As of April... View Details
Keywords: Machine Learning; Telework; Collaborating With Unions; Human Resources; Recruitment; Retention; Intellectual Property; Copyright; Patents; Trademarks; Knowledge Sharing; Technology Adoption; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Performance Productivity; Performance Improvement; District of Columbia
- April 2017
- Article
Prizes, Patents and the Search for Longitude
By: M. Diane Burton and Tom Nicholas
The 1714 Longitude Act created the Board of Longitude to administer a large monetary prize and progress payments for the precise determination of a ship’s longitude. However, the prize did not prohibit patenting. We use a new dataset of marine chronometer inventors to... View Details
- March 2017 (Revised February 2025)
- Case
Edwin Land: The Art and Science of Innovation
By: Tom Nicholas, Christopher T. Stanton and Matthew G. Preble
Throughout the second half of the 20th century, Polaroid first invented—and then continuously reinvented—the field of instant photography. Under the leadership of its mercurial founder Edwin Land, the company regularly released new instant cameras and films, often... View Details
Keywords: Instant Photography; Company History; Change Management; Disruption; Forecasting and Prediction; Entrepreneurship; Business History; Innovation Strategy; Disruptive Innovation; Innovation and Management; Intellectual Property; Patents; Product Marketing; Brands and Branding; Product Launch; Product Development; Chemical Industry; Consumer Products Industry; United States
- March 2017
- Case
Intellectual Ambition at Harvard Business School: Elton Mayo and Fritz Roethlisberger
By: Jan W. Rivkin and Amram Migdal
This case, set in the 1920s and 1930s, discusses the contributions of Harvard Business School (HBS) Professors Elton Mayo and Fritz Roethlisberger to management research and to the Human Relations Movement in management scholarship. The case focuses on their research... View Details
Keywords: Education; Business Education; Curriculum and Courses; Executive Education; Higher Education; Interdisciplinary Studies; Learning; History; Business History; Human Resources; Employees; Employee Relationship Management; Management; Management Analysis, Tools, and Techniques; Organizations; Practice; Relationships; Groups and Teams; Labor and Management Relations; Rank and Position; Research; Social Psychology; Attitudes; Behavior; Emotions; Motivation and Incentives; Power and Influence; Social and Collaborative Networks; Status and Position; Trust; Society; Social Issues; Theory; Education Industry; United States; Massachusetts; Illinois
- January 2017
- Teaching Note
The Park Hotels: Revitalizing an Iconic Indian Brand
By: Jill Avery and Chekitan S. Dev
Priya Paul, chairwoman of The Park Hotels, an award-winning portfolio of thirteen boutique hotels scattered across India, was in the midst of a brand revitalization program. Landor Associates, a leading brand consultancy, had identified three areas of concern: the... View Details
- 2017
- Working Paper
The Rise of American Ingenuity: Innovation and Inventors of the Golden Age
By: Ufuk Akcigit, John Grigsby and Tom Nicholas
We examine the golden age of U.S. innovation by undertaking a major data collection exercise linking inventors from historical U.S. patents to Federal Censuses between 1880 and 1940 and to regional economic aggregates. We provide a theoretical framework to motivate the... View Details
- January 2017
- Case
Nashua River Capital Management
By: Samuel Hanson and Aldo Sesia
Investment manager Eliza Baena confronts an apparent convertible bond arbitrage opportunity when she notices a narrowing spread between two Boston Properties (BXP) bonds, one a convertible bond and the other a straight bond, in the wake of the 2008 Lehman bankruptcy.... View Details
- 2017
- Chapter
Empirical Evidence on the Behavior and Impact of Patent Trolls: A Survey
By: Lauren Cohen, Umit Gurun and Scott Duke Kominers
We survey the empirical literature on non-practicing entity (NPE) litigation behavior and its consequences. We document both aggregate trends and cross-sectional differences amongst various types of NPEs. Survey evidence illustrates a number of ways in which NPEs can... View Details
Keywords: Patent Trolls; NPEs; PAEs; Innovation; Patents; Lawsuits and Litigation; Innovation and Invention
- Article
Lessons From Hollywood: A New Approach To Funding R&D
By: Gary P. Pisano and Andrew W. Lo
Companies find it increasingly difficult to justify long-term, risky R&D investments—particularly in science-based fields such as biotechnology, advanced materials, and energy. We argue in this article that the traditional venture model has limits for such investments... View Details
- December 2016
- Case
Muñoz Group Faces Brexit
By: Forest Reinhardt and Annelena Lobb
In 2016, Muñoz Group, a multifaceted agribusiness company that developed, produced, packed, imported, and exported citrus, flowers, grapes, juice, and ice cream, faced an unexpected new challenge in the British public’s vote for the United Kingdom to exit the European... View Details
- 2016
- Working Paper
Foreign Competition and Domestic Innovation: Evidence from U.S. Patents
By: David Autor, David Dorn, Gordon H. Hanson, Pian Shu and Gary Pisano
Manufacturing is the locus of U.S. innovation, accounting for more than three quarters of U.S. corporate patents. The rise of import competition from China has represented a major competitive shock to the sector, which in theory could benefit or stifle innovation. In... View Details
- December 2016
- Article
The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales, Revisited
By: Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Koleman Strumpf
Even as we approach the twentieth anniversary of widespread file sharing, its impact on the sale of copyrighted material remains in dispute. We contributed to this debate with an early study, “The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales: An Empirical Analysis,” that was... View Details