Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 22, 2013

Your company has just developed an amazing new product. Years of development, energy, and, of course, money have gone into it. Having observed management teams for decades as a mutual fund and portfolio manager, I have watched numerous companies vanish after a disastrous launch of a product or service.

Productivity 8

Productivity Products Biotechnology IPO 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 26, 2011

In the last year, however, early-stage investments in clean energy production technologies have fallen substantially (see the table at the end of this piece for more detail). A star example is Google, which raised a mere $40 million in private funding before its IPO at a $23 billion valuation.

Energy 11

Energy Finance IPO Biotechnology 11

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 6, 2018

Financial value is the stuff of business school and stock markets. Strategic value, on the other hand, has little to do with any of those things and almost everything to do with how a company’s product and/or market position help or hinder another company’s (usually a bigger one’s) ability to be successful.

Price 12

Price IPO Wilde Examples 12

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 26, 2018

On February 13, 2018, the New York Times reported that Uber is planning an IPO. Twitter reported a loss of $79 million before its IPO, yet it commanded a valuation of $24 billion on its IPO date in 2013. Many digital companies have no physical products and have no inventory to report.

Company 8

Company Intangible Assets Depreciation IPO 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 23, 2013

The most motivated and productive people I’ve seen recently work in an older company on the American East Coast deploying innovative technology products to transform a traditional industry. Their products are early stage, which means daily frustrations as they run through successive iterations.

Motivation 11

Motivation IPO Norton Open-book 11

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 8, 2018

Morgan projected up to $1T in investment would be deployed this decade — which would make impact investing twice the size of official development aid to the world’s less develop countries (as defined by the United Nations) , presuming historic levels of aid stayed constant since 2010. In 2010, J.P

Microfinance 8

Microfinance IPO Real Estate Industry 8

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 28, 2016

Then the banks decided to turn the associations into for-profit companies, IPO them, and cash out. MasterCard IPO’d in 2006, and Visa followed two years later. That standard may then become a platform for many firms that produce complementary products and their customers. Now they are very focused on making money.

IPO 8

IPO Succession Technology Software 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 16, 2011

Such a strategy limits an early venture's funding in order to force the business to develop a profitable business model and then invests heavily in growth once such a model is identified — Christensen terms such investments "good money" for incubating growth businesses and extols the strategy for three reasons.

Christensen 19

Christensen Fixed Costs Metrics Business Model 19

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 12, 2012

A few weeks ago, I read an article in the Wall Street Journal about people who had opened up their very first investment accounts just to get in on the Facebook IPO. It also seems likely that he's kicking himself today, as the value of the stock has dropped almost 25% since its May 17 IPO. But was that so?

IPO 10

IPO Bond Long-term Short-term 10

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 2, 2016

True platform innovators aren’t just market matchmakers using data-driven algorithms to drive better buyer-seller matches; they invest in new value creation. In platform markets, cultivating user capability becomes as strategically important as reducing transaction costs. Successful platforms empower their users.

IPO 8

IPO Human Capital Insurance Business Model 8

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 2, 2013

I founded the nonprofit African Institution of Technology to help universities in the region develop capabilities in emerging areas like microelectronics, biotech, and nanotechnology. Great universities will spur firms to design and manufacture products locally.

Education 8

Education Technology IPO GDP 8

Harvard Business Review

MARCH 28, 2014

Er brands rely on other products or brands to explain their own. It also puts your brand under constant pressure to introduce new products on Brand X’s time line, because now your brand value is tied to Brand X’s product. That sets the bar quite high, and I understand not every product can be truly new to the world.

Brand 10

Brand IPO Marketing Strategy Airlines 10

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 18, 2014

The company was hell-bent on entering a new market but knew it had to automate its warehouse to do so. Warehouse automation systems are big and complicated; if they don’t work, you’re worse off than before since it becomes almost impossible to ship product. BlueArc’s new product hit the market and was an instant success.

CFO 8

CFO Venture Funding IPO Retail 8

Rajesh Setty

DECEMBER 4, 2008

We used agile method to build the product using the latest open source stack and some mashups with a few online services. We had offshored our development team but when we did a rightshoring exercise, we found that a dual-shore approach works better. In the interim we might also look at piloting an Affiliate Marketing Strategy.

Blue Ocean Strategy 30

Blue Ocean Strategy CPM Licensing Open-book 30

Harvard Business Review

MAY 16, 2016

Strategic alignment, for us, means that all elements of a business — including the market strategy and the way the company itself is organized — are arranged in such a way as to best support the fulfillment of its long-term purpose. But corporate leaders today seem to agree that strategic alignment is high on the list.

Banking 14

Banking Strategy Film Operations 14

Harvard Business Review

JULY 24, 2017

Major organizational changes, covering everything from recruiting and branding to regulatory approvals and marketing, happened in rapid succession, with a hard deadline of 12 months to get it all done for the IPO — and 18 months from the IPO until our full separation from GE. It was a highly valued change.

Management 10

Management IPO Diversity Long-term 10

Harvard Business Review

MAY 24, 2013

In the book, I tell the stories of scale-up entrepreneurs from around the world, and how they beat the odds to make a mark on their markets. I used to think our great technology would take us to leadership in our market — now I realize it is our team, our organization, our marketing and our ambition to sell.

Entrepreneur 8

Entrepreneur IPO Open-book Marketing 8

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 7, 2018

These ICOs are nearly always held when a project is at an immature stage of development akin to a seed stage startup — when it is testing hypotheses around its consumer value proposition and forming a founding team. To generate publicity that allows them to solicit broad feedback on their beta product. 3 Defenses of Large ICOs.

Cost 8

Cost Decentralization Finance Entrepreneur 8

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 13, 2015

Warren Buffett has earned his nickname because he’s proven time and again that he has an eye for predicting how markets will change and which companies will succeed in the aftermath. When markets or technologies change, it often requires entire segments of the value network to be reimagined. What’s changed?

Software 8

Software Trends Mass Marketing Marketing 8

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

After five years, in 2004, Tickle was profitable with more than $20 million in revenue; it received an acquisition offer for $100 million, as well as IPO entreaties. Develop deep expertise — your best risk-mitigation strategy . Lean Product Development and Customer Development processes) decreases the chance of a startup’s failure.

Career 8

Career Company IPO Christensen 8

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 6, 2014

In May of 2005, Yahoo CEO Terry Semel, cofounder Jerry Yang, corporate development executive Toby Coppel, and I — I was then chief financial officer of the Silicon Valley internet company — went on what would turn out to be a fateful trip to China. Things hadn’t gone well up until that point. search engine company Inktomi in 2002.

Chief Financial Officer 10

Chief Financial Officer Operations Learning-by-Doing IPO 10

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 21, 2014

One the most interesting challenges that 2014 is going to bring is the IPO of Alibaba in the United States. It makes its revenue and profits not on product sales but on advertising and premium services. Customers can only search for products inside the Alibaba website. But here’s the problem: Alibaba has no margins at all.

Business Model 8

Business Model Advertising Retail Disruptive Innovation 8

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 10, 2013

After all, China produces 600,000 engineering graduates each year, and as a former Google product manager I thought knew how to attract them. They wanted to know what my plans were for IPO. China's population has developed a significant gender imbalance, with 119 boys for every 100 girls.

Engineering 9

Engineering IPO Real Estate Price 9

Harvard Business Review

JULY 18, 2012

Ever thought air mattresses in living rooms would grow into a billion dollar company that would take on the vacation rental market and the hotel industry? Billion-dollar companies do not happen if the founding team is not extremely well suited to the market (now called " founder/market fit "). No 20,000 tech jobs.

Venture Capitalist 17

Venture Capitalist Software Entrepreneur Engineering 17

Harvard Business Review

JULY 18, 2012

Ever thought air mattresses in living rooms would grow into a billion dollar company that would take on the vacation rental market and the hotel industry? Billion-dollar companies do not happen if the founding team is not extremely well suited to the market (now called " founder/market fit "). No 20,000 tech jobs.

Venture Capitalist 17

Venture Capitalist Software Entrepreneur Engineering 17

Harvard Business Review

OCTOBER 7, 2016

Few things are more damaging to a brand’s reputation than a hack in the headlines, and in the event of a public security incident, it’s highly likely that the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) and the Chief Security Officer (CSO) will be the first people the CEO looks to and says “What do we do now?”

Planning 9

Planning Company Crisis Brand 9

Harvard Business Review

JANUARY 5, 2011

If you think about how new products and services are hatched and brought to market today, it isn't usually the doing of just one entity — least of all the corporate R&D labs that once served as our engines of tomorrow. million developers to contribute to 260,000 projects. First, why is it a sector? You get this.

Entrepreneur 15

Entrepreneur Innovation Intellectual Capital Mission Statement 15

Harvard Business Review

APRIL 13, 2015

With limited exit opportunities via initial public offers ( IPOs ) and acquisitions, smart young people understand that stock options rarely bring a big payday. He invested in training his staff, but that backfired as those individuals then became more marketable and moved on. I observed their interests.

Venture Capitalist 8

Venture Capitalist IPO Entrepreneur Banking 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 27, 2017

Talented founders know that corporations simply cannot replicate the deep experience private VCs have in starting companies, nor their expertise in assisting startups with complex challenges such as deal making, business modeling, resolving disputes among founders, executing a successful IPO, and so on. Creating the Venture Client Model.

Venture Capitalist 8

Venture Capitalist Meyer Innovation Fixed Costs 8

Harvard Business Review

FEBRUARY 24, 2015

The first category is exogenous factors over which the business has little control: the growth of the markets into which it sells; the competitive intensity and thus the average profitability of the industry in which it operates; or the fragmentation of its industry and thus the scope for a growth-by-acquisition approach.

Chemicals 8

Chemicals How To Kahneman Reputation 8

Harvard Business Review

MAY 30, 2013

He had developed an extensive plan, and had the promise of grant money behind him. It''s not about price, or code, or agile development. He is currently creating new businesses inside the Hearst Corporation, where he''s been driving the development of Manilla.com for almost 2 years.

Company 9

Company Ries Maturity Innovation 9

Harvard Business Review

AUGUST 27, 2018

In a parallel development, the number of companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges has declined by almost 50% from its peak in 1996, despite dramatic increase in aggregate market capitalization. Furthermore, as production shifts to Asia and more and more U.S. stock exchanges.

IPO 11

IPO Company First-mover Advantage Intangible Assets 11

Harvard Business Review

NOVEMBER 20, 2013

China leads all emerging markets with 89 companies on the latest Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest. To many skeptical consumers in developed markets, Brand China still means lower quality. Western brands also want access to China and recent global market turmoil has exposed many targets for astute Chinese brands.

Brand 8

Brand Globalization Company Development 8

Harvard Business Review

SEPTEMBER 4, 2015

However, CEOs often don’t have the career background and education that would equip them to personally lead the process of new product development. This would mean, for example, working in R&D to lead pharma innovation, new product development for high tech, and product design or merchandising for fashion retail.

CEO 8

CEO Innovation Pharmaceuticals Merchandising 8

Harvard Business Review

JUNE 1, 2015

For many consumer tech companies, this post-IPO pressure on financial returns is too high. Because they are innovative by nature, consumer tech companies need to invest heavily in research and development, which could be done if they had a portfolio of products at different stages of maturity, with some of them being established cash cows.

IPO 8

IPO Company Maturity Short-term 8

Harvard Business Review

JULY 12, 2017

Digital players wield outsize market power. With products that rely on network effects, these players enjoy economies of scale and dominant market share. With products that rely on network effects, these players enjoy economies of scale and dominant market share. Digital markets are uneven.

Innovation 8

Innovation Policies Technology Politics 8

Harvard Business Review

DECEMBER 19, 2017

Previously dominated by the likes of newspapers, magazines, gyms, utilities, and telecommunications firms, more products and services are being offered to more people through subscriptions than ever before. went public in June, then saw its stock price fall 70%, making it the worst performing IPO of a major company so far in 2017.

IPO 8

IPO How To Metrics Bottom-up 8