Publications

24 Nov 2003
Research & Ideas

Boards and Corporate Governance: A Balanced Scorecard Approach

capital to the best ideas, weeding out the bad ones. Investors have the challenge of sorting through the overwhelming number of ideas to discern the good ones, a process compared to finding a needle in a haystack. They often lack the information necessary to make good... View Details

Keywords: Re: Robert S. Kaplan & Krishna G. Palepu

March 2004
Case

L.L. Bean: A Search for Growth

By: Rajiv Lal, Walter J. Salmon and James Weber

In mid-2003, CEO Chris McCormick felt L.L. Bean was in a good position to begin to grow again. For nearly 90 years, the company sold clothing and gear for outdoor enthusiasts through its catalogs and a single retail store in Freeport, Maine. In the three decades prior... View Details

Keywords: Business History; Restructuring; Growth and Development Strategy; Cost Management; Sales; Performance Improvement; Diversification; Distribution Channels; Resignation and Termination; Retail Industry; Web Services Industry

June 2021
Technical Note

SPAC Space

By: John R. Wells and Benjamin Weinstock

In 2020, over half of all initial public offerings (IPOs) in the United States were special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), blank-check companies that typically had two years to find a business to take public, usually through a reverse merger. Together, 248... View Details

Keywords: Special Purpose Acquisition Companies; SPACs; Mergers and Acquisitions; Going Public; Initial Public Offering; Investment; Strategy

23 Jan 2013
Research & Ideas

Three-Dimensional Strategy: Winning the Multisided Platform

you have to interact with both the thredUP website and its sellers." Clearing The Air A general misunderstanding of how MSPs work has hampered entrepreneurial attempts to create them and venture investments... View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna

24 Jul 2017
Blog Post

Transitioning to Product Management at HBS

Before coming to HBS, I worked as an investment associate at a growth equity firm in Boston. My role there gave me exposure to founders and various executives of growing businesses, and I was very much invigorated by the prospect of... View Details

Web

2024 Reunion Presentations - Alumni

world. Why Startups Fail Professor Tom Eisenmann + More Info - Slides – Less Info - Slides Most startups fail. About two-thirds of venture capital investments do not earn a positive return. Professor... View Details

Web

Attract additional Black talent to all parts of the HBS community. - Advancing Racial Equity

mentoring young scholars, hiring and promoting junior faculty, influencing HBS’s academic and strategic choices, and shaping and fostering our culture. To diversify our tenured ranks, we commit to investing deeply in the success of our... View Details

07 May 2007
Research & Ideas

Rediscovering Schumpeter: The Power of Capitalism

different countries. He also served briefly as Austria's finance minister and worked for 3 years as an investment banker, where he made a fortune that he promptly lost in a stock market crash. So he wasn't a typical academic, even though... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne; Education

06 Aug 2012
Research & Ideas

Strategic Intelligence: Adapt or Die

opposed to blindly continuing on a path when all the signals in your competitive environment suggest you need to change course. When I've looked more carefully at why companies fail, oftentimes they see a problem but their structure gets in the way. They've View Details

Keywords: by Michael Blanding

March 2024 (Revised May 2024)
Case

Masterpiece for the Masses: The First Art Exchange ARTEX

By: Lauren Cohen, Anastasiya Siroochenko (Siro) and Sophia Pan

Yassir Benjelloun-Touimi, CEO of ARTEX, aspired to marry the world of art and finance. Hoping to promote transparent, fractionalized ownership of renowned artwork, the founder had spent years contemplating the birth of an art stock market. This exchange would allow... View Details

March 2004 (Revised May 2005)
Case

Shurgard Self-Storage: Expansion to Europe

By: Richard G. Hamermesh and Indra Reinbergs

Shurgard, a U.S.-based firm that rents storage facilities to consumers and small businesses, is considering financing options for rapid expansion of its European operations. Five years after entering Europe, Shurgard Europe has opened 17 facilities in Belgium, France,... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Valuation; Business Model; Governing and Advisory Boards; Entrepreneurship; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Service Industry; Belgium; France; Sweden; United States; Europe

March 2006
Course Overview Note

International Finance: A Course Overview Note

By: Mihir A. Desai

Describes the International Finance course at Harvard Business School, which argues that the forces of globalization have fundamentally changed the scope and activities of firms, thereby altering the practice of finance within these firms. As a consequence of an... View Details

Keywords: Multinational Firms and Management; Business Ventures; Integration; Change Management; Decision Choices and Conditions; Investment; Risk Management; Competitive Advantage; Motivation and Incentives; International Finance; Capital Markets

September 2018 (Revised November 2018)
Case

From Beirut With Love (A)

By: Christina R. Wing, Esel Y. Cekin and Samer Al-Rachedy

This case describes how Robert Fadel, CEO and chairman of ABC, one of Lebanon’s leading retail and real estate groups, professionalized the family business. Robert was the second son of the company’s founder, Maurice Fadel, who had run it single-handedly. Concerned... View Details

March 2024 (Revised August 2024)
Case

Darktrace: Scaling Cybersecurity and AI (A)

By: Jeffrey F. Rayport and Alexis Lefort

In 2023, Darktrace CEO Poppy Gustafsson was contemplating her growth strategy at a leading U.K.-based cybersecurity venture, launched in 2013 by a group of anti-terror cyber specialists, University of Cambridge mathematicians, and artificial intelligence (AI) experts.... View Details

Keywords: Technology; Talent; Scaling; Entrepreneurship; Cybersecurity; Leadership; Business Growth and Maturation; Recruitment; Resignation and Termination; AI and Machine Learning; Growth and Development Strategy; Organizational Culture; Going Public; Technology Industry; United Kingdom; Europe; United States