Viacom, Inc.: Carpe Diem (Condensed)

Joseph L. Bower; Thomas R. Eisenmann

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Case | HBS Case Collection | January 1998 (Revised March 1998)

Viacom, Inc.: Carpe Diem (Condensed)

by Joseph L. Bower and Thomas R. Eisenmann

Abstract

Viacom has built a powerful position in the global entertainment industry through skillful and bold acquisitions. Now its expansion is challenged by the moves of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Different businesses within Viacom have contradictory positions on how to deal with major opportunities and how Viacom top management should manage the decision-making process.

Keywords: Acquisition; Cost vs Benefits; Decisions; Entertainment; Competition; Corporate Strategy; Expansion; Entertainment and Recreation Industry;

Format: Print

20 pages

Educators Purchase

Citation:

Bower, Joseph L., and Thomas R. Eisenmann. "Viacom, Inc.: Carpe Diem (Condensed)." Harvard Business School Case 398-086, January 1998. (Revised March 1998.)

About the Authors

Joseph L. Bower

Donald K. David Professor of Business Administration, Emeritus

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Thomas R. Eisenmann

Howard H. Stevenson Professor of Business Administration

Entrepreneurial Management

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Book | 2020

Capitalism at Risk: How Companies Can Lead

Joseph L. Bower, Dutch Leonard and Lynn S. Paine

Citation:
Bower, Joseph L., Dutch Leonard, and Lynn S. Paine. Capitalism at Risk: How Companies Can Lead. 2nd ed. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2020. View Details

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Poppy (B)

Thomas R. Eisenmann, Scott Duke Kominers, Jeff Huizinga and Allison Ciechanover

Avni Patel Thompson, founder and CEO of Poppy, an online marketplace for on-demand childcare, revisits the venture's final months, and discusses the steps she took in the wake of the shutdown. This case explores experiments the company conducted to refine its original business model, as well as how Patel Thompson rekindled her entrepreneurial ambitions. It is part two of an A and B case, the A case being: Poppy: A Modern Village for Childcare Case 818 075, November 2017.

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Marketplace Matching; Business Model; Business Exit or Shutdown; Personal Development and Career; United States;

Citation:
Eisenmann, Thomas R., Scott Duke Kominers, Jeff Huizinga, and Allison Ciechanover. "Poppy (B)." Harvard Business School Case 820-715, March 2020. View Details

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Case | HBS Case Collection | March 2020

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Joseph L. Bower, Elizabeth Hansen and Michael Norris

In the summer of 2019, Mike Klingensmith, CEO of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the Twin Cities metro region’s largest newspaper, reviewed subscription trends and plans for future experimentation. The newspaper industry across the U.S. had suffered a steep decline for the previous several decades as digital offerings supplanted print subscriptions. Under Klingensmith’s leadership, the Star Tribune had fared better than many papers, emerging from bankruptcy with a robust newsroom and with print profitable and digital growing. But given ongoing shifts in consumer media habits, flat EBITDA was still the best-case scenario that the Tribune could reach for. To meet this goal, Klingensmith and his team had put in place new digital offerings and had developed a number of creative additions to the print paper to offset subscription declines and print ad losses. Klingensmith believed that the plans they had put in place would allow the paper to survive in the new news landscape of the 21st century, but as he prepared to meet with the paper’s owner, a local, family-owned holding company, he wondered how confident he could be in his forecasts.

Keywords: financial performance; industry evolution; Business Earnings; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategic Planning; Journalism and News Industry; Minnesota;

Citation:
Bower, Joseph L., Elizabeth Hansen, and Michael Norris. "Minneapolis Star Tribune." Harvard Business School Case 920-302, March 2020. View Details

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Viacom, Inc.: Carpe Diem (Condensed)

Abstract

Citation:

About the Authors

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