Publications

August 2024 (Revised February 2025)
Case

Novo Nordisk Foundation

By: Debora L. Spar and Julia M. Comeau

In 2024, Novo Nordisk A/S was one of the most profitable firms in the world, thanks largely to just two GLP-1-based drugs, Ozempic and Wegovy. Unusually, this incredibly profitable firm was controlled not by individual private shareholders, but by a non-profit... View Details

Keywords: Pharmaceutical Companies; Diabetes; Obesity; Foundation; Non-profit Management; Profit; Corporate Governance; Business or Company Management; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Expansion; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Nonprofit Organizations; Pharmaceutical Industry; Denmark; Europe

July 2024 (Revised December 2024)
Background Note

District Heating: An Overview

By: Willy Shih and Michael W. Toffel

This note provides an overview of district heating: systems in which central plants generate heat that is conveyed by steam or water through a set of insulated pipes to send heat to residential and/or commercial buildings. It describes key elements of the system (heat... View Details

Keywords: Decarbonization; Energy Efficiency; Energy Storage; Energy Transmission; Construction; Energy; Buildings and Facilities; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Climate Change; Operations; Energy Industry; Denmark; Europe; United States

April 2024
Supplement

Recycle & Re-Match: The Future of Soccer Turfs

By: George Serafeim

April 2024 (Revised July 2024)
Case

Market Dynamics and Moral Dilemmas: Novo Nordisk’s Weight-Loss Drugs

By: Joseph L. Badaracco, Tom Quinn and John Schultz

Danish pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk was owned by a charitable foundation, and since its founding in the 1920s had focused on producing insulin to treat diabetes. In 2017, however, it released Ozempic, a diabetes treatment with the revolutionary side effect of... View Details

October 2023 (Revised November 2023)
Case

Recycle & Re-Match: The Future of Soccer Turfs

By: George Serafeim, Lena Duchene and Carlota Moniz

By August 2023, Re-Match, an artificial turf waste-to-value company, had operations in Denmark and the Netherlands and had recycled over 160,000 tons of waste and plastic fiber. With recent capital injection from the VC firm Verdane and a dual revenue business model,... View Details

September 2023
Background Note

Amager Bakke: Municipal Waste to Energy

By: Willy Shih, Michael W. Toffel and Kelsey Carter

This background note describes the Amager Bakke waste-to-energy (WtE) plant in Copenhagen, which merges traditional waste incineration with a combined heat and power (CHP) plant and air pollution control (scrubbing) technology, and had plans to add carbon dioxide (CO2)... View Details

August 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Supplement

Arla Foods: Data-Driven Decarbonization (A)

By: Michael Parzen, Michael W. Toffel, Amram Migdal and Susan Pinckney

Arla implemented a data-based price incentive system to measure, track, and influence climate friendly changes to reduce CO2 emissions across the world’s fourth largest dairy cooperative. View Details

Keywords: Dairy Industry; Business Earnings; Earnings Management; Environmental Accounting; Agribusiness; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Decision Making; Decisions; Voting; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Environmental Regulation; Environmental Sustainability; Green Technology; Pollution; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Financial Strategy; Price; Profit; Revenue; Food; Geopolitical Units; Global Strategy; Ownership Type; Cooperative Ownership; Performance Efficiency; Performance Evaluation; Problems and Challenges; Natural Environment; Science-Based Business; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Cooperation; Corporate Strategy; Food and Beverage Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Europe; United Kingdom; European Union; Germany; Denmark; Sweden; Luxembourg; Belgium

August 2023 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Arla Foods: Data-Driven Decarbonization (A)

By: Michael Parzen, Michael W. Toffel, Susan Pinckney and Amram Migdal

The case describes Arla’s history, in particular its climate change mitigation efforts, and how it implemented a price incentive system to motivate individual farms to implement scope 1 greenhouse gas emissions mitigation measures and receive a higher milk price. The... View Details

August 2023 (Revised January 2024)
Supplement

Arla Foods: Data-Driven Decarbonization (B)

By: Michael Parzen, Michael W. Toffel, Susan Pinckney and Amram Migdal

The case describes Arla’s history, in particular its climate change mitigation efforts, and how it implemented a price incentive system to motivate individual farms to implement scope 1 greenhouse gas emissions mitigation measures and receive a higher milk price. The... View Details

February 2023 (Revised April 2023)
Case

Kvadrat: Focus, Execute, and Grow

By: Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott

Kvadrat was a family-owned global textiles company. The company had enjoyed impressive top-line growth and was shifting gears to emphasize profitability via a shorter strategic agenda. Agenda items included: U.S. expansion, generating improved margins in its consumer... View Details

Keywords: Growth; Culture; International Expansion; Organization; Family Business; Leadership; Growth and Development; Strategy; Organizations; Supply Chain; Family Ownership; Profit; Organizational Culture; Denmark

Article

Financing Constraints, Home Equity and Selection into Entrepreneurship

By: Thais Laerkholm Jensen, Søren Leth-Petersen and Ramana Nanda

We exploit a mortgage reform that differentially unlocked home equity across the Danish population and study how this impacted selection into entrepreneurship. We find that increased entry was concentrated among entrepreneurs whose firms were founded in industries... View Details

Keywords: Mortgage Reform; Home Equity; Financing Constraints; Entrepreneurs; Entrepreneurship; Mortgages; Denmark

Find at Harvard

July 2022 (Revised March 2023)
Case

The LEGO Group: Builders of a More Diverse and Inclusive Tomorrow

By: Elie Ofek and Sarah Mehta

This case explores how the LEGO Group’s diversity and inclusion efforts from 2008 to 2022. View Details

Keywords: Race; Inclusion; Equity; Demographics; Age; Diversity; Ethnicity; Gender; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Europe; Denmark; United States

June 2022
Case

PFA Pensions: The Climate Plus Product

By: Daniel Green, Victoria Ivashina and Alys Ferragamo

The case explores whether alternative investments play a unique role in achieving low carbon dioxide emissions at the portfolio level. This case is set in April of 2020 and follows Kasper Ahrndt Lorenzen, Chief Investment Officer, and Peter Tind Larsen, Head of... View Details

Keywords: Carbon Emissions; Carbon Footprint; Alternative Assets; Alternative Investment Vehicles; Pension Fund Investing; Private Equity; Renewable Energy; Investment Portfolio; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Environmental Sustainability; Denmark

March 2022 (Revised April 2022)
Teaching Note

Group Functions at the Maersk Group

By: David J. Collis

In 2014, seven years after he was appointed CEO of the Danish shipping and oil conglomerate A.P. Møller Maersk (the Maersk Group), Nils Andersen was reexamining the size and role of corporate headquarters in the company he had reshaped as a "premium conglomerate."... View Details

Keywords: Maersk; Business Units; Conglomerates; Decentralization; Core Business; Value Added; Synergy; Headquarters; Shipping; Petroleum; Oil And Gas; Drilling; Corporate Strategy; Business Conglomerates; Business Divisions; Transportation Industry; Shipping Industry; Denmark

December 2021
Case

Danish Crown: Feeding the Future

By: David E. Bell, Damien P. McLoughlin, Daniela Beyersdorfer and Mette Fuglsang Hjortshoej

Danish Crown, one of the world’s largest exporters of pork meat and one of Europe’s top five producers of beef, faced increasing headwinds in 2021, making CEO Jais Valeur feel like the core of the meat business was under attack. As a cooperative and prominent player in... View Details

Keywords: Agribusiness; Animal-Based Agribusiness; Food; Environmental Management; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Nutrition; Cooperative Ownership; Change Management; Transition; Leadership; Leading Change; Marketing; Product Marketing; Corporate Strategy; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry; Food and Beverage Industry; Europe; Denmark

July 2021
Teaching Note

Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and the Cost of Capital

By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher

Teaching Note for HBS Case Nos. 221-006 and 221-070. View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Business Divisions; Cost of Capital; Corporate Finance; Value; Valuation; Industrial Products Industry; United States; Denmark; Republic of Ireland

March 2021
Case

Astralis Group: Determining a Brand Strategy

By: Benjamin C. Esty, Mette Fuglsang Hjortshoej and Emilie Billaud

After launching a Danish esports company in July 2019, and going public in December 2019 with multiple brands associated with different games, the Astralis leadership team was contemplating a shift to a single, corporate brand. While the original arguments for... View Details

January 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Supplement

Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and The Cost of Capital (Abridged)

By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher

In 2000, Eaton Corporation was a broadly diversified industrial conglomerate. But its strategy was evolving and its focus was narrowing around “power management” and more recently on “intelligent power,” the use of digitally enabled products and services designed to... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Business Divisions; Cost of Capital; Corporate Finance; Value; Valuation; Industrial Products Industry; United States; Denmark; Republic of Ireland

January 2021 (Revised June 2021)
Case

Eaton Corporation: Portfolio Transformation and the Cost of Capital (Abridged)

By: Benjamin C. Esty, E. Scott Mayfield and Daniel Fisher

In 2000, Eaton Corporation was a broadly diversified industrial conglomerate. But its strategy was evolving and its focus was narrowing around “power management” and more recently on “intelligent power,” the use of digitally enabled products and services designed to... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Conglomerates; Business Divisions; Cost of Capital; Corporate Finance; Value; Valuation; Industrial Products Industry; United States; Denmark; Republic of Ireland