Publications

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September 1989
Background Note

Performance Curves: Costs, Prices, and Value

By: Robert J. Dolan and Benson P. Shapiro

Explains the concept of a family of performance curves. The most well known is the price/performance curve relating the prices of items in a product line to their performance. Also discusses the cost/performance curve and its impact on product positioning, product line... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Price; Product Positioning; Performance; Competition; Value

January 2001 (Revised March 2002)
Case

Ford Motor Company's Value Enhancement Plan

By: Andre F. Perold

In April 2000, Ford Motor Co. announced a shareholder Value Enhancement Plan (VEP) to significantly recapitalize the firm's ownership structure. Ford had accumulated $23 billion in cash reserves and under the VEP would return as much as $10 billion of this cash to... View Details

Keywords: Restructuring; Forecasting and Prediction; Capital Structure; Cash; Financial Liquidity; Policy; Business and Shareholder Relations; Value; Auto Industry

08 Sep 2008
HBS Case

The Value of Environmental Activists

There are many methods, most financial, to measure the success of companies in meeting goals. But the question becomes a lot harder at Harvard Business School when MBAs are challenged to measure the efforts of environmental organizations like Greenpeace and the World... View Details

Keywords: by Sarah Jane Gilbert; Energy; Utilities

16 Apr 2020
Research & Ideas

Has COVID-19 Broken the Global Value Chain?

The coronavirus pandemic has not only disrupted lives and businesses, it has illuminated underlying fragilities in the global value chain (GVC) that drives economies around the world. The smartphone you use many times daily is a product... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

2023
Working Paper

The Value of Professional Ties in B2B Markets

By: Navid Mojir and Sriya Anbil

We study how a particular form of social ties (i.e., professional ties proxied by past employment) aﬀects price and proﬁtability in business-to-business (B2B) markets. While most of the work on social ties focuses on information diﬀusion in business-to-consumer... View Details

Keywords: Professional Ties; Social Ties; Business-to-business Marketing; B2B Marketing; Repo; Individual Connections; B2B Pricing; Pricing; Decision-making In Financial Markets; Marketing; Relationships; Price; Financial Markets; Decision Making

SSRN

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February 2022 (Revised March 2022)
Case

MicroStrategy's Investment in Bitcoin

By: C. Fritz Foley

At the end of the second quarter of 2020, MicroStrategy, a Virginia based provider of analytics software and services, announced plans to acquire and hold bitcoin as a part of the firm’s treasury reserve policy and corporate strategy. Within a year, the firm purchased... View Details

Keywords: Bitcoin; Corporate Strategy; Acquisition; Investment Portfolio; Capital Structure; Equity

August 1996
Exercise

Exercises in Negotiation Analysis

Two exercises designed to illustrate the relationship between BATNAs (best alternative to a negotiated agreement) and reservation prices and three exercises that illustrate the central ideas of Pareto efficiency are presented. The BATNA exercises involve multiple... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation

December 1983 (Revised March 1999)
Case

The United States Financial Crisis of 1931

The behavior of the Federal Reserve System during the early years of the Great Depression has been a topic of considerable controversy. The Fed, it has been argued, pursued a contracting policy, thereby helping to turn what might have been only a brief recession into... View Details

Keywords: Government and Politics; Financial Crisis; United States

August 2003 (Revised November 2003)
Background Note

Working Effectively with Counsel

Popular stereotypes of lawyers include "overhead," "Dr. No," "internal cop," "keep us out of trouble!" and "get us out of trouble!" Focus groups of business leaders queried in a survey by the Case Western Reserve University Law School associated the word "lawyer" with... View Details

Keywords: Law; Partners and Partnerships; Management Teams; Legal Services Industry

September 2003 (Revised September 2018)
Exercise

RetailMax: Role for Regan Kessel

By: Kathleen McGinn and Dina Witter

This exercise requires students to enact an internal salary negotiation, taking on the roles of Cam Archer, a star employee, and Regan Kessel, a VP trying to attract the MBA into his department. The exercise presents a one-issue, distributive negotiation that... View Details

Keywords: Negotiation; Compensation and Benefits; Management Practices and Processes; Retail Industry

September 2003 (Revised October 2020)
Exercise

RetailMax: Role for Cam Archer

By: Kathleen McGinn and Dina Witter

This exercise requires students to enact an internal salary negotiation, taking on the roles of Cam Archer, a star employee, and Regan Kessel, a VP trying to attract the MBA into his department. The exercise presents a one-issue, distributive negotiation that... View Details

Keywords: BATNA; Decision Trees; Negotiation; Compensation and Benefits; Personal Development and Career; Retail Industry

2009
Simulation

Finance Simulation: M&A in Wine Country: No. 3289.

By: Timothy A. Luehrman and W. Carl Kester

In this simulation, students play the role of CEO at one of three publicly-traded wine producers: Starshine, Bel Vino, or International Beverage. Each player evaluates merger and/or acquisition opportunities among the three companies and then determines reservation... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Negotiation; Valuation; Value Creation; Food and Beverage Industry; Agriculture and Agribusiness Industry

February 2017 (Revised June 2017)
Case

ExxonMobil: Business as Usual? (A)

By: George Serafeim, Shiva Rajgopal and David Freiberg

Climate change was becoming an important societal and business issue as more governments were introducing climate change related regulations and investors became increasibly worried about stranded assets within oil and gas firms. In September 2016, the U.S. Securities... View Details

Keywords: Oil ＆ Gas; Oil Prices; Oil Companies; Asset Impairment; Predictive Analytics; Sustainability; Environmental Impact; Innovation; Disclosure; Accounting; Valuation; Climate Change; Renewable Energy; Environmental Sustainability; Financial Reporting; Energy Industry

November 2022
Case

Hiring with the Community in Saint Paul

By: Mitchell B. Weiss and Sarah Mehta

This case reviews Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter’s decision to involve the community in the process of hiring his cabinet members. Rather than relying on an executive recruiting firm or choosing cabinet heads from his own network, Carter recruited 100 community members... View Details

Keywords: Community Engagement; Competency and Skills; Government and Politics; Human Resources; Government Administration; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Decision Making; Public Administration Industry; United States; Minnesota; Saint Paul

January 2009 (Revised November 2011)
Case

The Tip of the Iceberg: JP Morgan Chase and Bear Stearns (A)

By: Clayton S. Rose, Daniel Baird Bergstresser and David Lane

"Bear Stearns & Co. burned through nearly all of its $18 billion in cash reserves during the week of March 10, 2008, and an unprecedented provision of liquidity support from the Federal Reserve on Friday, March 13 was insufficient to reverse the decline in Bear's... View Details

Keywords: Mergers and Acquisitions; Financial Crisis; Capital; Financial Liquidity; Financial Strategy; Corporate Governance; Crisis Management; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Competition; Valuation; Financial Services Industry

January 2021 (Revised May 2021)
Case

'GEnron'? Markopolos versus General Electric (A)

By: Jonas Heese and David Lane

In August 2019, Harry Markopolos—the forensic accountant known for uncovering Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme—alleged that General Electric had committed accounting fraud totaling $38 billion, coining the term “GEnron” for perceived similarities with the 2001 accounting... View Details

Keywords: Financial Statements; Communication; Energy; Financial Condition; Insurance; Performance; Planning; Business and Shareholder Relations; Risk and Uncertainty; Value; Insurance Industry; Financial Services Industry; Energy Industry

November 2010
Case

Lessons Learned? Brooksley Born & the OTC Derivatives Market (A)

By: Clayton S. Rose and David Lane

On May 7, 1998, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, chaired by Brooksley Born, issued a "Concept Release" inviting public comment on the relevance and appropriateness of existing regulation of the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives market, a market with a... View Details

Keywords: Financial Crisis; Credit Derivatives and Swaps; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry; Public Administration Industry; District of Columbia