Haim Mendelson, Erica Plambeck, Stefanos Zenios, Dominic Mirabile, Jose Ignacio Garcia Suarez
2022
This case study traces Tesla’s ascent from an ambitious startup to the world’s leading electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer, highlighting its innovative evolution in business and operating models. Guided by Elon Musk’s strategic vision, Tesla began with…
Haim Mendelson, Erica Plambeck, Stefanos Zenios, Dominic Mirabile
2022
Tesla was founded in 2003 on the mission to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable transport through the production and sale of electric vehicles. The scope of this mission required staged business model development, beginning with low-volume…
Stefanos Zenios, Meredith Colton-Hazy
2020
This case describes how Microsoft became a leader in cloud products from 2014 to 2019. It concisely defines “the cloud” and dives into how the leadership of Satya Nadella, the development of Azure, and the shifts within the sales organization transformed…
Stefanos Zenios, Julie Makinen
2018
In 2000, Boeing was scrambling to define itself for the 21st century. The American aviation leader was facing an existential threat from its European competitor, Airbus. In 1999, Airbus had passed Boeing in total sales, and was eroding Boeing’s market…
Robert Chess, Julie Makinen
2018
Paul Markovich felt that a time bomb was ticking inside his industry. Each year, the cost of healthcare was rising steadily, while incomes were only inching upward. In 2018, the median income for a family of four in the United States was $65,000. His…
Michael Lepech, Erica Plambeck, Margot Sutherland
2018
This case describes the 2016 market entry in California of an innovative construction system for housing: BONE Structure, developed by the Canadian company of the same name. The choice of this structural system and construction method for a single family…
Haim Mendelson
2014
Evernote is a suite of cloud-based software and services designed to augment the user’s brain by capturing pieces of information in multiple formats, organizing, indexing and storing them, and making them easily searchable. The company grew dramatically…
James Lattin, Kirk Bowman, Maryanna Quigless
2014
CEO, Ryan Smith and the rest of the founding team at Qualtrics grew the company to 350 employees and an estimated $50M in revenue through an inside-sales model. After ten years of bootstrapping however, the company took on $70M in funding from prominent…
Jim Ellis, Justin Randolph
2014
The case profiles the protagonist, Luke Tashie, CEO of Yobella — a self-serve frozen yogurt retail chain that Tashie acquired via a search fund — as the company struggles post-acquisition.
The case provides an overview of Luke Tashie’s background, his…
Hau Lee, Christopher Tang
2014
As the world population exceeded 7 billion by the end of 2011, various agencies working to alleviate poverty had come to a general consensus that pure charity was not a sustainable solution. In the absence of venture capital and angel investors in…
Hau Lee, Michael Kennedy, Jonathan Elist
2014
After deciding to transform a former government-owned poultry farm in Ethiopia, two American business partners encounter challenges related to input costs, inventory management, delivery, government relations, and other key challenges that are common to…
Hau Lee, Christopher Tang, Jawad Masood
2014
In 1984, Trung Dung fled political persecution in Vietnam, the country of his birth, to arrive in the United States as a refugee with only $2 in his pocket. Over the next two decades, he proved his mettle as one of the most astute and successful…
William Meehan III, Davina Drabkin
2013
In 2007 a group of eight friends wanted to give. With so many charities out there, the friends wanted to know which ones were doing the most good. They had two basic questions: (1) what did the charitable organization do with donors’ money and (2) what…
Lyn Denend, Tim Elliott, Stefanos Zenios
2013
This case provides an overview of the nonprofit organization PATH and its Safe Water Project—a five-year effort launched in late 2006 with $17 million in funding from the global development unit of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The purpose of the…
Lyn Denend, Tim Elliott, Stefanos Zenios
2013
This case provides an overview of the nonprofit organization PATH and its Safe Water Project—a five-year effort launched in late 2006 with $17 million in funding from the global development unit of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The purpose of the…
Lyn Denend, Tim Elliott, Stefanos Zenios
2013
This case provides an overview of the nonprofit organization PATH and its Safe Water Project—a five-year effort launched in late 2006 with $17 million in funding from the global development unit of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The purpose of the…
Lyn Denend, Tim Elliott, Stefanos Zenios
2013
This case provides an overview of the nonprofit organization PATH and its Safe Water Project—a five-year effort launched in late 2006 with $17 million in funding from the global development unit of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The purpose of the…
Michael Marks, David Hoyt
2013
Ben Kaufman founded Quirky in 2009 to enable anyone with a product idea to access an online network of people to help evaluate and improve the idea, and potentially bring it to market. By the end of 2012, Quirky was shipping 74 products, and had many…
Hau L. Lee, Sonali Rammohan
2013
Before opening its first store in India in 1996, McDonald’s spent six years building its supply chain. During that time, the company worked to successfully source as many ingredients as possible from India. However, French fries (“MacFries”) were a…
David Hoyt, Hau Lee, Michael Marks
2013
This is an update to GS-61, describing developments at the company through 2011, including a major acquisition, distribution in China, and an initiative to cultivate start-ups that might grow into future clients.
Arar Han, Haim Mendelson
2012
Prototypes allow you to consider and test your product or service concept quickly and at low cost, and they play an important role in the development of new ventures. This quick introduction elaborates on the concept and illustrates the use of prototypes…
Arar Han, Charles Holloway, John Morgridge
2012
Venture capitalist Atul Kapadia was inclined to provide seed funding for Sujeet Kumar and Michael Sinkula to found Envia Systems, a lithium-ion battery company. Admittedly, Envia was little more than the founders’ vision of an affordable electric vehicle…
Charles Holloway, Claire Magat, John Morgridge
2012
Part A of the case opens in July of 2009 with Becky Splitt, CEO of StudyBlue, facing a series of difficult decisions. These include: determining the appropriate business model to monetize the StudyBlue site, which customer segment to target, and how much…
Charles Holloway, John Morgridge, Sara Rosenthal
2012
Part A of the case opens in July of 2009 with Becky Splitt, CEO of StudyBlue, facing a series of difficult decisions. These include: determining the appropriate business model to monetize the StudyBlue site, which customer segment to target, and how much…