Publications

25 Feb 2020
News

Case Study: The Credit Bureau

Mobley cart them away. The concept resonates with Mobley’s target customers, who for now are in the NYC area (where the company is based), although its service areas will change to keep pace with shifting demands, Ramírez says. “The View Details

Keywords: Jen McFarland Flint; Real Estate

01 Dec 2014
News

Case Study: Growing the Family Business

centers profitable more quickly. — Bob Poulin (MBA 1985) The premium in the hourly rates is well deserved, but you are giving too much value away by not covering fixed/setup costs. I believe the source of funds to finance the expansion is in your pricing model. Using... View Details

Keywords: childcare; Finance

07 Aug 2012
First Look

First Look: August 7

experiment to measure the value of shareholder proxy access. We find that firms that would have been most vulnerable to proxy access, as measured by institutional ownership and activist institutional View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

13 Jan 2009
First Look

First Look: January 13, 2009

Profit Chain to Work for Unbeatable Competitive Advantage Authors:James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser Jr., and Joe Wheeler Publication:Harvard Business Press, 2008 Abstract Ownership behaviors have a profound impact on profit and growth.... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

16 Apr 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, April 16, 2019

Europe, a private equity investment company, had worked in the family business for a few years but had developed a career mainly outside of the family business. The transfer of the shares’ ownership had tightened the three brothers’ bonds... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

November 2005 (Revised July 2009)
Case

Cutter & Buck (A)

By: William A. Sahlman and Victoria Winston

Only three short months into her new position as CEO of publicly traded golf apparel manufacturer Cutter & Buck, Fran Conley discovers accounting irregularities that call into question the reliability of this company's financial statements. Working closely with her... View Details

Keywords: Financial Statements; Crime and Corruption; Corporate Disclosure; Governing and Advisory Boards; Lawsuits and Litigation; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Going Public

February 1997 (Revised July 2004)
Case

Walden Woods

By: William J. Poorvu and Arthur I Segel

In 1984, Mortimer Zuckerman and Ed Linde, through their firm, Boston Properties (BP), acquired land in Concord, MA to build a 147,000-square-foot, first-class suburban office building. BP proceeded to go through the permitting and approval process with the town and was... View Details

Keywords: Risk and Uncertainty; Decision Choices and Conditions; Entrepreneurship; Property; Environmental Sustainability; Conflict and Resolution; Real Estate Industry; Massachusetts

February 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Barbarians at the Gate or Turnaround Gurus? Private Equity and the Rise of the LBO

By: Tom Nicholas and John Masko

During the 1980s, leveraged buyouts (LBOs) and the private equity (PE) firms responsible for carrying them out revolutionized both investment and management in the U.S. Between 1980 and 1989, buyout activity in the U.S. surged from $1 billion per year to $60 billion.... View Details

Keywords: Leveraged Buyouts; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Restructuring; Borrowing and Debt; Private Equity; Bonds; Investment Return; Institutional Investing; Profit Sharing; Business History; Management Style; Private Ownership; Performance Effectiveness; Value Creation; Financial Services Industry; United States

04 Oct 2007
What Do You Think?

Has Managerial Capitalism Peaked?

of direct oversight of management by owners—an important element of owners' capitalism—through the vehicle of private equity ownership is the answer. Adrian Grigoriu maintains that "A private ownership... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Heskett

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

March 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Scale and Scope at Drake Real Estate Partners

By: Christina R. Wing and David Lane

Realizing in early 2021 that their pending real estate investment fund would likely be oversubscribed, Drake Real Estate Partners co-founders Nicolás Ibáñez and David Cotterman were considering how best to continue to diversify their investor base and how to optimize... View Details

Keywords: Business Growth and Maturation; Family Business; Investment; Ownership; Value Creation; Financial Services Industry; Real Estate Industry; United States; Latin America; Chile

December 2017
Case

Piracy in Somalia (A)

By: Sophus A. Reinert and Alissa Davies

A Somali fisherman stands on a beach in early 2011, considering his options: should he embark in his tiny fishing vessel or join a nearby pirate crew? His war-ravaged country, entering its 20th year of civil war, was in the midst of a famine that had claimed hundreds... View Details

Keywords: Pirates; Foreign Aid; Civil War; Private Property; Human Rights; Economic Development; Globalization; War; Property; Crime and Corruption; Rights; Development Economics; Moral Sensibility; Shipping Industry; Somalia

Article

Two-Sided Platforms: Product Variety and Pricing Structures

By: Andrei Hagiu

This paper provides a new modeling framework to analyze two-sided platforms connecting producers and consumers. In contrast to the existing literature, indirect network effects are determined endogenously, through consumers' taste for variety and producer competition.... View Details

Keywords: Pricing Structure; Indirect Network Effects; Product Variety; Price; Network Effects; Two-Sided Platforms; Product; Renting or Rental; Competition

Find at Harvard

April 2004 (Revised December 2004)
Case

Jazztel

By: Marc L. Bertoneche, Laurent Jacque, Kenneth Hynes and Jennifer Woolman

Jazztel--an upstart Spanish telecom--is considering an IPO on the NASDAQ (rather than the Madrid Bolsa) for funding its ambitious capital expenditure program estimated at $750 million over the next 10 years. The alternative would be another round of high-yield debt.... View Details

Keywords: History; Initial Public Offering; Valuation; Privatization; Financing and Loans; Financial Strategy; Telecommunications Industry; Spain