Publications

January 2019 (Revised March 2021)
Case

SoundCloud: Subscription Streaming?

By: Ashish Nanda, Eric Van den Steen, Andy Wu, Jeffrey Boyar and Bonnie Bennett Slater

Established in 2007, SoundCloud already boasted the second largest number of active music listeners among all streaming services and was recognized as the go-to platform for new artists by early 2014. Yet, its founders were questioning the robustness of the firm’s... View Details

June 2023 (Revised August 2023)
Background Note

Subscription Models: Recurring Revenues for Lasting Growth

By: Elie Ofek and Amy Konary

This note offers a comprehensive exposition to subscription revenue models and aims to explain their recent rise. It covers the advantages to firms of employing a subscription-based approach to monetization (as opposed to “one-off” upfront payment), as well as the... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Revenue; Product Design

Fast Answer

Library Subscriptions

News Sources We have special digital access to several news sources (use your HBS email to sign up): Bloomberg.com The Financial Times Harvard Business Review The Information The New York Times The Wall Street Journal The Washington Post... View Details

27 Jan 2011
News

A Subscription Survivor (video)

Keywords: News, Library, Internet, and Other Services; Information; Retail Trade

17 Oct 2023
HBS Case

With Subscription Fatigue Setting In, Companies Need to Think Hard About Fees

sort of subscription offering, according to a new industry and background note coauthored by Harvard Business School Professor Elie Ofek. And they’re expected to multiply in the years ahead, with View Details

Keywords: by Jay Fitzgerald; Consumer Products; Information; Information Technology

04 Jun 2001
What Do You Think?

What’s the Future of the Subscription Model?

Summing Up The Subscription Model: Down but Not Out Just as manufacturing organizations are once again adopting a subscription model as a means of pricing product-service packages marketed as solutions, it... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

30 Mar 2022
News

Why Apple’s Hardware Subscription Service Could Be a ‘Huge Deal for the Company’

September 2021 (Revised December 2021)
Case

STARZPLAY: Shooting for the Stars

By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini and Alpana Thapar

In mid-2021, Maaz Sheikh, cofounder and CEO of STARZPLAY, a Dubai-based subscription video on demand (SVOD) provider that catered to the Middle East and North Africa region, was wrestling with how to find the right balance between continued subscriber growth and... View Details

November 2020 (Revised May 2023)
Case

Holaluz: Taking on the Spanish Energy Market

By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini, Oded Koenigsberg, Elena Corsi and Emer Moloney

In 2020, the three cofounders of Holaluz, a newcomer to Spain’s electricity retail market, are preparing to launch a new offering: installing and managing solar panels on households' roofs at no extra cost for the consumer, who would still benefit from the energy... View Details

Keywords: Electricity; Solar Power; Subscription Business; Renewable Energy; Entrepreneurship; Service Delivery; Business Model; Product Launch; Marketing; Energy Industry; Spain

November 2020 (Revised September 2021)
Case

HP Instant Ink: (Self) Disrupting the Consumer Printing Market

By: Elie Ofek, Marco Bertini, Oded Koenigsberg and George Gonzalez

Seeking to disrupt the consumer printing market (before being disrupted by others), and in response to customer pain points, in 2013 HP Inc. launched an ink replenishment service called Instant Ink, where customers pay a monthly subscription fee based on the number of... View Details

Keywords: Printing; Ink; Subscription Model; Customers; Information Infrastructure; Service Delivery; Business Model; Disruption; Growth and Development Strategy

May 2024
Case

Naked Wines: The Profit vs. Growth Decision

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Edward A. Meyer

Nick Devlin faced a difficult strategic decision in October 2022. As the CEO of a UK-based subscription business connecting wine drinkers in the US, UK, and Australia with winemakers from around the world (which one journalist called the “Netflix of Wine”), he had to... View Details

March 2019 (Revised July 2020)
Case

MoviePass: The 'Get Big Fast' Strategy

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel W. Fisher

In August 2017, MoviePass dramatically lowered its subscription price from $50 per month to just $10 for up to one movie per day. The idea was to rapidly scale the business to the point where they could generate incremental revenue streams from related businesses... View Details

Keywords: Market Entry; Growth Strategy; Profit Vs. Growth; Subscription Business; Cash Burn; Data Analytics; Get-big-fast; Buyer Power; Strategy Implementation; Movie Industry; Racing; Entrepreneurship; Market Entry and Exit; Growth and Development Strategy; Business Strategy; Value Creation; Disruption; Motion Pictures and Video Industry; United States

January 2020 (Revised July 2020)
Supplement

MoviePass: The 'Get Big Fast' Strategy

By: Benjamin C. Esty and Daniel Fisher

In August 2017, MoviePass dramatically lowered its subscription price from $50 per month to just $10 for up to one movie per day. The idea was to rapidly scale the business to the point where they could generate incremental revenue streams form related businesses... View Details

September 2021 (Revised March 2022)
Case

Katie Couric Media: Landing the First Client

By: N. Louis Shipley and William R. Kerr

In May 2018, celebrated journalist Katie Couric and her husband, John Molner, had recently launched a full-service media firm called Katie Couric Media (KCM). Couric treasured the opportunity to address important social issues like gender equality, environmental... View Details

Keywords: Customer Acquisition; Subscription Model; Entrepreneurship; Business Startups; Media; Customers; Acquisition; Social Issues; Brands and Branding; Media and Broadcasting Industry

October 2022
Case

Volt Lines: Leading a B2B Service Provider through a Crisis (A)

By: Navid Mojir and Gamze Yucaoglu

Volt Lines was a next-generation transportation service in Istanbul, Turkey. The company was trying to disrupt the traditional corporate transportation market by developing software that allowed it to offer subscription-based transportation. Under the subscription... View Details

Keywords: Business To Business Marketing; B2B Marketing; B2B Pricing; Subscription Model; Crisis Marketing; Startup; Service Management; Information Technology; Transportation; COVID-19 Pandemic; Disruptive Innovation; Digital Platforms; Business Model; Price; Crisis Management; Opportunities; Transportation Industry; Technology Industry; Turkey

May 2014
Article

Making 'Freemium' Work: Many Start-ups Fail to Recognize the Challenges of This Popular Business Model

By: Vineet Kumar

The article discusses the "freemium" business model, which is used by some Internet businesses and smartphone application developers to give users free basic features of a digital product and access to premium functionality for a subscription fee. The discussion topics... View Details

Keywords: Freemium; Startups; Product Design; Business Model; Marketing; Business Startups

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December 2012 (Revised September 2022)
Case

BabbaCo

By: Jeffrey J. Bussgang and Gaurav Jain

Having just raised a Series B financing, the case protagonist is faced with a tough decision: should she "step on the gas" and scale the customer base, or continue focusing on fine-tuning the product and business model. The case describes the various marketing channels... View Details

Keywords: Subscription; Marketing; Scaling; Product-market Fit; Online Marketing; Customers; Decisions; Expansion; Marketing Channels; Business Startups; Growth and Development Strategy; Digital Marketing; Marketing Strategy