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- March 2025
- Case
Xfund and Sam Altman: Finding Harvard’s Best Generative AI Founders
By: Suraj Srinivasan
On May 1, 2024, Xfund Managing Partners Patrick Chung and Brandon Farwell, hosted a high-stakes venture pitch session designed to select one startup for a minimum $100,000 investment. This “Xperiment Stake” competition, dedicated to startups in the Generative AI... View Details
- March 2025
- Case
Harvey: AI for Lawyers
By: Suraj Srinivasan, Charles Krumholz and Radhika Kak
In early 2025, Winston Weinberg and Gabe Pereyra, co-founders of Harvey AI, reflected on the company’s meteoric rise as a pioneer in AI-powered legal technology. Since its founding in 2022, Harvey had transformed how lawyers approached research, drafting, and document... View Details
- 2025
- Working Paper
Code-Washing: Evidence from Open-Source Blockchain Startups
By: Ofir Gefen, Daniel Rabetti, Yannan Sun and Che Zhang
This study examines startups' management of source code repositories, distinguishing authentic developers ("code-producers''), from those inflating activity to mislead investors ("code-washers''). Using global blockchain startup and GitHub data, we find that... View Details
Keywords: Entrepreneurial Finance
- February 2025
- Case
Fly, Fix, Fly at True Anomaly
By: Joshua Lev Krieger, Jim Matheson, Fiona Murray and David Allen
How should companies learn from failure? Founded by four U.S. Space Force warfighters, the tough tech startup True Anomaly wanted to compete with major defense contractors to supply the U.S. Department of Defense with satellites and software that could help protect... View Details
- February 2025
- Case
Hyperscaling Dreams: Ualá’s Path from Startup to Fintech Champion
By: Juan Alcacer and Manuel Franck
Ualá, a fintech startup founded in Argentina in 2017 by Pierpaolo Barbieri, aimed to increase financial inclusion in Latin America through a digital platform linked to a prepaid card. After rapid success in Argentina, it expanded into Mexico and Colombia, acquiring... View Details
- February 2025
- Case
Managing Complexity at mymuesli
By: Thomas Graeber and Stacy Straaberg
In April 2009, direct-to-consumer e-commerce muesli brand mymuesli faced a flood of customer questions. The breakfast cereal startup enabled users to order personalized muesli on its website by choosing from 75 organic ingredients for a total of 566 quadrillion... View Details
- January 2025
- Teaching Note
AGENTS.inc: Pathways to Growth at an AI Startup
By: Frank Nagle and Susan Pinckney
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 724-444. In 2024, AI agent startup company AGENTS.inc faced multiple strategic decisions that could shape the company’s ability to grow into the future AI agent market leader. View Details
- January 2025
- Case
Summer Health: Raising an AI-First Company?
By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang, Sarah Mehta and Maxim Pike Harrell
In October 2023, Summer Health CEO Ellen DaSilva arrived at a defining juncture for her pediatric telehealth startup. Founded in 2021, Summer Health offered parents rapid access to licensed pediatricians via text message. DaSilva, an experienced telehealth executive,... View Details
- January 2025
- Case
Intuition Robotics: An AI Companion for Older Adults
By: Amit Goldenberg, Elie Ofek and Orna Dan
Intuition Robotics, a startup that makes an AI companion robot to alleviate older adults’ loneliness, debates whether to pursue a B2C model or B2G route. If it opts for the government vertical, it must determine how to negotiate a favorable deal. Two weeks after... View Details
- January 2025
- Case
Untapped Global: Financing Africa's Missing Middle
By: Raymond Kluender and Emanuele Colonnelli
In November 2024, Jim Chu, founder and CEO of Untapped Global, faced mounting internal tensions over the company’s strategic direction. Untapped had developed a data-driven revenue-based financing (RBF) model to address the “missing middle” problem—the $5.2 trillion... View Details
Keywords: Social Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Working Capital; Private Equity; Financial Strategy; Microfinance; International Finance; Currency Exchange Rate; Profit Sharing; Revenue; Developing Countries and Economies; Economic Growth; Emerging Markets; Mission and Purpose; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; Information Technology Industry; Technology Industry; Africa; Nigeria; South Africa; Kenya; Uganda; California; San Francisco
- January 2025
- Case
PayJoy: Financing for the Next Billion
By: Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott
PayJoy, an impact-driven financial technology company founded in 2015, provides smartphone financing and other financial products to customers who lack access to traditional credit products. As of early 2025, PayJoy had issued $2.5 billion in loans to 13 million... View Details
Keywords: Social Impact; Fintech; Developing Countries; Underbanked; Algorithm; Credit; South America; Mission And Purpose; Start-up; Entrepreneurship; Growth; Data Analysis; Technology; Business Ventures; Business Startups; Business Model; Growth and Development; Information Technology; Social Enterprise; Financial Services Industry; South America; South Africa; Asia
- January 2025
- Case
The VideaHealth AI Factory: CEO Florian Hillen on Speed, Scale, and Innovation (A)
By: Tsedal Neeley, Levi Stroud, Ruth Page and Dave Habeeb
Pre-abstract:
This multimedia case should be assigned to students in advance of class. Instructors should consider the timing of making the (B) Case videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details.
Abstract:
Florian Hillen, co-founder and CEO of... View Details
Keywords: AI; Adoption; Diagnostics; Organization Design; Change Management; Disruption; Transformation; Health Care and Treatment; AI and Machine Learning; Technology Adoption; Disruptive Innovation; Technological Innovation; Management Style; Organizational Culture; Success; Technology Industry; Health Industry; United States
- January 2025
- Supplement
The VideaHealth AI Factory: CEO Florian Hillen on Speed, Scale, and Innovation (B)
By: Tsedal Neeley, Levi Stroud, Ruth Page and Dave Habeeb
Pre-abstract:
This multimedia case should be assigned to students in advance of class. Instructors should consider the timing of making the (B) Case videos available to students, as they may reveal key case details.
Abstract:
Florian Hillen, co-founder and CEO of... View Details
Keywords: AI; Adoption; Diagnostics; Organization Design; Change Management; Disruption; Transformation; Health Care and Treatment; AI and Machine Learning; Technology Adoption; Disruptive Innovation; Technological Innovation; Management Style; Organizational Culture; Success; Technology Industry; Health Industry; United States
- 2025
- Working Paper
Too Much, Too Soon? Early Funding, Technological Unconventionality, and Innovation Capabilities
By: Harsh Ketkar and Maria Roche
The availability of financial resources significantly shapes firm innovation outcomes, especially for early-stage,
innovation-focused technology firms. However, prior research has provided conflicting findings about this
relationship: On the one hand, resource... View Details
- December 2024
- Supplement
Core Innovation Capital: Investing in Fintech for Good (B)
In 2017, Core Innovation Capital invested $725,000 in Hugo Insurance, a pay-as-you-drive auto insurance startup targeting the non-standard market. Core followed with $300,000 in 2019 during a Seed II round. By 2022, Hugo founder, David Bergendahl, sought $10 million in... View Details
- November 2024
- Supplement
AlphaGo (C): Birth of a New Intelligence
By: Shikhar Ghosh and Shweta Bagai
This case, the final of a three-part series, explores DeepMind's pivotal transition from mastering games to solving real-world scientific challenges. In December 2020, DeepMind's AI system AlphaFold 2 achieved a breakthrough by solving protein folding—a 50-year-old... View Details
Keywords: AI; Artificial Intelligence; Machine Learning; Research; Autonomy; Deep Learning; Drug Discovery; Healthcare Innovation; Neural Networks; Information Technology; Research And Development; Scientific Research; Technology Startup; AI and Machine Learning; Technological Innovation; United States
- November 2024
- Teaching Note
Mercado Bitcoin: M&A, IPO, or Series B?
By: Raymond Kluender, Emanuele Colonnelli and Sabrina Howell
Teaching Note for HBS Case No. 825-047. In April 2021, Brazilian cryptocurrency platform Mercado Bitcoin, had to decide how to scale: go public, M&A with a bank, or take a VC big check. In a highly volatile market, Roberto Dagnoni, chairman of the board, viewed the... View Details
Keywords: Cryptocurrency; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Startups; Decision Making; Going Public; Ownership Stake; Strategic Planning; Venture Capital; Problems and Challenges; Business Cycles; Digital Platforms; Emerging Markets; Market Timing; Expansion; Diversification; Valuation; Value Creation; Investment Funds; Initial Public Offering; Price; Price Bubble; Negotiation Offer; Information Technology Industry; Financial Services Industry; Brazil; Latin America
- November 2024
- Supplement
Clara Wu Tsai and Brooklyn Loan Innovation (B)
By: Archie Jones, Mathieu Davis, Mourya Mamidala and Max Hancock
This (B) case provides an update on “Clara Wu Tsai and Brooklyn Loan Innovation (A)” View Details
- 2024
- Working Paper
Catalysts for Climate Solutions: Corporate Responses to Venture Capital Financing of Climate-tech Startups
By: Shirley Lu, George Serafeim and Simon Xu
We study whether incumbent firms increase their product focus on climate solutions in response to venture capital (VC) financing of climate-tech startups. Using large language models to measure a firm's focus on climate solutions, we find that incumbents in similar... View Details
- October 2024
- Case
NextGen CDR Facility: From Davos to Details
By: Peter Tufano, Emily A. Chien and Karina Val
Next Gen CDR is a startup that pools corporate commitments to purchase Tech CDR, which promises to permanently remove and store carbon from the atmosphere to combat climate change. A partnership between South Pole and Mitsubishi Corp., Next Gen has secured initial... View Details