Publications

February 2024
Case

Continuity & Change at Boston Consulting Group

By: David G. Fubini, Suraj Srinivasan and David Lane

As the new CEO of Boston Consulting Group (BCG) since autumn 2021, Christoph Schweizer had big shoes to fill—his predecessor, Rich Lesser, had tripled the partnership’s total revenues and created digital initiatives that contributed 40+% of 2021 revenues, more than... View Details

Keywords: Business Organization; Change Management; Talent and Talent Management; Governance; AI and Machine Learning; Environmental Sustainability; Leading Change; Risk Management; Organizational Culture; Partners and Partnerships; Revenue; Growth and Development Strategy; Management Succession; Consulting Industry

February 2024 (Revised June 2024)
Case

Can Families Conquer Private Equity? Pritzker Private Capital

By: Lauren Cohen and Sophia Pan

Anthony (Tony) Pritkzer, Paul Carbone, and the Pritzker Private Capital (PPC) team wondered how to approach the firm’s next phase of growth. PPC was a private equity firm that offered a differentiated approach to the family capital market. Back in 2016, the partners... View Details

February 2024
Case

Tabby: Winning Consumers' Digital Wallets

By: Eva Ascarza and Fares Khrais

Hosam Arab (MBA 2009), cofounder and CEO of Tabby, a Saudi-based fintech startup, raised its Series D funding round in October 2023, four years after its inception, valuing it as a regional unicorn. Tabby's core product, a buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) service, allowed... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business Startups; Risk Management; Competitive Strategy; Expansion; Financial Services Industry; Financial Services Industry; Saudi Arabia

February 9, 2024
Article

The Rise of Consumer Crypto

By: Steve Kaczynski and Scott Duke Kominers

Although non-fungible tokens are often misunderstood and even derided, they remain a general and flexible solution for establishing and tracking ownership in the digital domain. As a superior solution to existing technology in many areas of the consumer economy, their... View Details

Keywords: Cryptocurrency; Crypto Economy; NFTs; Non-fungible Tokens; Internet Of Everything; Market Design; Technological Innovation; Demand and Consumers; Web Services Industry

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February 2024 (Revised December 2024)
Case

Best Buy Health: Enabling Care at Home

By: Robert S. Huckman, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Antonio Moreno, Bradley Staats and Sarah Mehta

This case explores retailer Best Buy’s decision to enter health care. Best Buy Health aims to enable care at home across three prongs: consumer health, active aging, and virtual care. A key pillar of Best Buy Health's strategy is leveraging the Geek Squad—the company's... View Details

Keywords: Business Ventures; Health Care and Treatment; Innovation and Invention; Business Strategy; Market Entry and Exit; Service Delivery; Service Operations; Electronics Industry; Health Industry; Retail Industry; United States; Minnesota

February 2024 (Revised April 2024)
Case

Uniswap: Fighting a Vampire Attack (A)

By: Shikhar Ghosh, Shweta Bagai and Liang Wu

This is the first of a three-case series that explores the challenges faced by Uniswap, a key player in the decentralized finance (DeFi) sector. Founded by Hayden Adams, the case traces Uniswap's rapid growth from a simple idea inspired by a Reddit post to becoming one... View Details

February 2024
Case

Adventures Inc: 21st Century Brand Building

By: Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott

Founded in 2020, Adventures worked with celebrities in Brazil to create and launch digitally native brands. The idea was to match the celebrity’s skill in creating content and entertaining fans with Adventures’ skill in consumer packaged goods marketing and operations.... View Details

Keywords: Digital Brand; Influencer Marketing; Growth And Scaling; Capital Constraints; Brand Portfolio Strategy; CPG; Start-up; Celebrity Endorsement; Digital Marketing; Growth and Development Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Advertising; Social Media; Business Startups; Joint Ventures; Brands and Branding; Brazil

February 2024 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Shore Capital Partners: The Next Ten Years

By: Boris Groysberg and Kerry Herman

Private equity firm Shore Capital Partners is at an inflection point, after 12 years of phenomenal growth and success. Now, as the partners consider options, should Shore remain micro-cap focused, or move into more mid-cap investments? Should Shore hold investments... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategy; Financial Services Industry

February 2024
Case

FIGS: Scrubbing the Status Quo

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Nicole Tempest Keller

In October 2023, FIGS had revolutionized the medical scrubs industry with its fashionable and functional designs, but the venture was at a critical juncture. The digitally native vertical brand (DNVB) had gone public in a successful IPO in 2021 and reached $500 million... View Details

Keywords: Marketing Channels; Corporate Strategy; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Model; Decision Choices and Conditions; Competitive Strategy; Expansion; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; United States; California; Los Angeles; Europe; Canada

January 2024 (Revised August 2024)
Case

Essex County Community Foundation: Pivot to Systems Philanthropy

By: V. Kasturi Rangan, Brian Trelstad and Courtney Han

2023 marked five years of the Essex County Community Foundation (ECCF)’s “systems philanthropy” approach to grantmaking. Located in northeastern Massachusetts, the community foundation served 800,000 residents across 34 cities and towns that varied widely by... View Details

Keywords: Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Reputation; Civil Society or Community; Social Issues; Alignment; Nonprofit Organizations; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Leading Change; Massachusetts

January 2024 (Revised October 2024)
Case

DO & CO: Crafting Luxury in the Fast Lane (A)

By: Juan Alcácer, Esel Cekin, Michael Lee and Noah Roberson

In July 2023, Attila Dogudan, the chairman of DO & CO, a renowned international catering firm, found himself in a deep conversation with his two sons about a potential new venture: catering for the Las Vegas Grand Prix, a significant step beyond their 31-year history... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Health Pandemics; Opportunities; Corporate Strategy; Luxury; Food and Beverage Industry; Las Vegas

January 2024
Supplement

Winning Business at Russell Reynolds

By: Ethan Bernstein and Cara Mazzucco

In an effort to make compensation drive collaboration, Russell Reynolds Associates’ (RRA) CEO Clarke Murphy sought to re-engineer the bonus system for his executive search consultants in 2016. As his HR analytics guru, Kelly Smith, points out, that risks upsetting—and... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Talent and Talent Management; Compensation and Benefits; Growth and Development Strategy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Performance Evaluation; Motivation and Incentives; Consulting Industry

January 19, 2024
Article

Value-Based Health Care Can Transform the Treatment of Patients with Substance Use Disorder

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Sarah E. Wakeman

U.S. overdose deaths currently exceed 100,000 per year. New facilities, known as bridge clinics, are broadening access to high-quality care by offering outpatient substance use disorder (SUD) treatment with few access barriers. But many of the critical services offered... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Cost; Adoption

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January 2024 (Revised January 2025)
Case

Huawei: Resilience amid Autarky and Adversity

By: William C. Kirby and Daniel Fu

In September 2023, Huawei made a dramatic return to the global smartphone space with the launch of its Mate 60 Pro smartphone, equipped with an indigenously designed, 7nm chip. This came despite a myriad of export controls and restrictions imposed against the company... View Details

January 2024
Background Note

Evaluating Innovations in the Organization of Primary Care: What Type of Innovation Is It and How Well Does It Align with the Six Factors?

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and James Wallace

How can we evaluate if innovative health care ventures can do good—benefit society—and do well—become financially viable? This question is the topic of the first module in the Innovating in Health Care course book.

This note and "Health Stop (A): What Type... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Health Care and Treatment; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Mission and Purpose; Alignment; Health Industry

2024
Book

The Everything Token: How NFTs and Web3 Will Transform the Way We Buy, Sell, and Create

By: Steve Kaczynski and Scott Duke Kominers

We demystify the coming digital revolution, showing how NFTs will transform our online and offline interactions.

NFTs aren’t just pictures on the internet, or a fad that has come and gone. Rather, they’re a new technology for creating digital assets and... View Details

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December 2023 (Revised February 2024)
Case

Transforming Healthcare Delivery at Karolinska University Hospital

By: Susanna Gallani, Mary Witkowski, Elena Corsi and Nikolina Jonsson

The case study examines the journey toward value-based healthcare at Karolinska University Hospital. The hospital's ambitious shift to a patient-centered care delivery model, accompanied by the construction of a new facility, encountered challenges such as high costs,... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Transformation; Transition; Business Organization; Communication Strategy; Information Infrastructure; Service Delivery; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Health Industry; Sweden; Europe

December 2023
Case

Davivienda Bank's Upskilling and Reskilling Strategy in Colombia

By: Jorge Tamayo, Raffaella Sadun and Jenyfeer Martinez Buitrago

Set in 2022, this case describes the digital transformation strategy of Davivienda— a leading player in Colombia’s commercial banking and one of the companies belonging to Grupo Bolívar, a major Colombian financial conglomerate—and the bank’s upskilling and reskilling... View Details

December 2023 (Revised August 2024)
Supplement

Microsoft Azure and the Cloud Wars (B)

By: Andy Wu and Matt Higgins

By 2023, the global market for cloud infrastructure had consolidated into a three-horse race. As of Q4 2022, Amazon, Microsoft, and Google collectively accounted for 66% of the global market. AWS had a market share of 33%, Microsoft Azure had 23%, and Google Cloud had... View Details

Keywords: Microsoft; Artificial Intelligence; AI; Competition; Information Infrastructure; Market Participation