Publications

March 2010
Article

Calculating, Creating, and Claiming Value in Business Markets: Status and Research Agenda

By: Gary L. Lilien, Rajdeep Grewal, Douglas Bowman, Min Ding, Abbie Griffin, V. Kumar, Das Narayandas, Renana Peres, Raji Srinivasan and Qiong Wang

A key challenge facing business marketers surrounds developing a deeper understanding of customer needs. We conceptualize that challenge as having three dimensions: calculating, creating, and claiming value. We discuss key problems, new developments and research... View Details

Keywords: Value Creation; Problems and Challenges; Research; Customer Relationship Management

Research Summary

Design Driven Innovation

By: Roberto Verganti

Firms, managers and scholars have often balanced between two approaches to innovation: user centered (where incremental innovation is pulled by the market) and technology push (where innovation comes from breakthrough development in technologies). However there is a... View Details

02 Jun 2020
Working Paper Summaries

HBS COVID-19 Global Policy Tracker

Keywords: by Alberto Cavallo and Tannya Cai; Health

15 Aug 2016
Video

FIELD Global Immersions

October 2019 (Revised October 2019)
Case

Epic Games

By: Andy Wu and Christopher Zhang

Epic Games entered a stagnant market with its PC-games digital storefront in 2018, in the context of incumbent competitors such as Steam, its meteoric rise via Fortnite, and imminent industry shifts in gaming distribution. On the surface, Epic Games Store’s competitive... View Details

Keywords: Industry Analysis; Video Games; Platforms; Comparative Advantage; Growth Strategy; Innovation Focused Strategy; Pricing Strategy; Strategy; Competition; Growth and Development Strategy; Innovation Strategy; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Digital Platforms; Technology Industry

July 2008 (Revised March 2009)
Case

elBulli: The Taste of Innovation

By: Michael I. Norton, Julian Villanueva and Luc Wathieu

Ferran Adrià, chef at elBulli, the highest-ranked restaurant in the world for two consecutive years, faces two related decisions. First, Adrià and his team must continue to develop new and different dishes for the ground-breaking cuisine at elBulli to guarantee a... View Details

Keywords: Innovation and Invention; Growth and Development Strategy; Marketing Strategy; Creativity; Food and Beverage Industry; Spain

December 2010
Article

Building Sustainable Hybrid Organizations: The Case of Commercial Microfinance Organizations

By: Julie Battilana and Silvia Dorado

We explore how new types of hybrid organizations (organizations that combine institutional logics in unprecedented ways) can develop and maintain their hybrid nature in the absence of a "ready-to-wear" model for handling the tensions between the logics they combine.... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Structure; Microfinance; Growth and Development Strategy; Identity; Commercialization; Balance and Stability; Policy; Recruitment; Business Model

July–August 2014
Article

Where to Launch in Africa?

By: Eugene F. Soltes

A case study in the management of new business enterprises in developing countries is examined. A dilemma facing a Malawian entrepreneur in whether to locate a packaging industry new business in his native Malawi or in the larger market of Nigeria is examined.... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Entrepreneurship; Developing Countries and Economies; Geographic Location; Decision Making; Africa

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Research Summary

Exploring the Tail of Creativity: An Evolutionary Model of Breakthrough Invention

This research, under the direction of Lee Fleming, argued for a distributional approach to new product development and has formed the basis for my subsequent research. View Details

May 1986 (Revised July 1995)
Case

General Mills, Inc.: Yoplait Custard-Style Yogurt (A)

By: John A. Quelch

Yoplait's director of new product development is evaluating alternative line extensions including custard-style Yoplait. He must determine what additional research to recommend. Options include a mini-market test, a simulated test market and a fully-fledged test... View Details

Keywords: Food; Product Development; Product Marketing; Food and Beverage Industry; United States

January 1995
Case

3M: Profile of an Innovating Company

By: Christopher A. Bartlett and Afroze A Mohammed

Traces the birth and development of 3M Corp., focusing in particular on the origins of its entrepreneurially-based ability to innovate. In particular, it highlights the role of CEO William L. McKnight in creating a unique set of values, policies, and structures to... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Competitive Advantage; Organizational Culture

June – July 2008
Article

A Better Approach to Foreign Aid

By: Justin Muzinich and Eric D. Werker

Frustration with U.S. foreign aid is widespread. At the same time, flows of private development finance—including foreign direct investment and remittances—have begun to dwarf official aid. We suggest a new approach that harnesses the power of private development... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Foreign Direct Investment; International Relations; Taxation; Welfare or Wellbeing; United States

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January 2007 (Revised January 2007)
Background Note

Note on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration

By: Robert F. Higgins, Richard G. Hamermesh and Virginia Fuller

Describes the U.S. FDA with particular emphasis on its role in the development of new drugs, biologic products, and medical devices today. Provides context for the drug approval process by describing the FDA's history and organizational structure. View Details

Keywords: Health; Governance Compliance; Policy; Product Development; Government and Politics; Pharmaceutical Industry; Medical Devices and Supplies Industry; Biotechnology Industry; Public Administration Industry; United States

25 Apr 2012
Research & Ideas

The Importance of Teaming

gel, as individual members are delegated to new projects—and therefore new teams—on a hectic as-needed basis. Professor Amy Edmondson maintains that managers should think in terms of... View Details

Keywords: Re: Amy C. Edmondson

October 2017 (Revised April 2019)
Case

Eastern Bank: Innovating Through Eastern Labs

By: Karen Mills, Dennis Campbell and Aaron Mukerjee

Eastern Bank is a 200-year-old New England mutual bank with a community focus. Eastern specializes in small business lending, having made strategic investments to become the top SBA lender in New England in the midst of the Great Recession, when other banks were... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Technological Innovation; Entrepreneurship; Management

June 2003 (Revised May 2004)
Exercise

The Pacific Sentinel: Role for Alex Martinez

By: Kathleen L. McGinn and Dina R. Pradel

A new publishing company has just purchased the Pacific Sentinel, a fictional West Coast newspaper. The new publisher is willing to invest $1 million in the future success of the paper and has asked the executive editor and advertising manager to develop a joint plan... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation; Acquisition; Business Strategy; Publishing Industry; Western United States

January 2016 (Revised October 2016)
Case

Saudi Aramco and Corporate Venture Capital

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Matthew Rhodes-Kropf and Nathaniel Burbank

Saudi Aramco launched an internal venture capital arm in 2011, which promptly became the world's largest investor in energy related startups. In choosing to proceed, the company's New Business Development unit (NPD) wrestled with a number of challenges. How should the... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Energy Industry; Saudi Arabia

November 1999
Case

Lucent Technologies: Optical Networking Group

By: Marco Iansiti and Barbara Feinberg

Set in June 1999, this case describes the development of a new platform product, the Wavestar OLS 400G, that responded both to a demand for greater "bandwidth" and aggressive competitors seeking to supply it. The 400G's development process took only 14 months and... View Details

Keywords: Customers; Operations; Product Development; Performance Improvement; Information Technology; Information Infrastructure