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  • Case | HBS Case Collection | April 2009 (Revised August 2009)

    Petrobras in Ecuador (A)

    Aldo Musacchio, Lena G. Goldberg and Ricardo Reisen de Pinho

    On October 18, 2007, Ecuador's President Rafael Correa announced his intention to migrate Petrobras' existing participation contracts to exploit oil reserves in Ecuador's Blocks 18 and 31 to servicing agreements under which Petrobras would be paid a production fee and reimbursed for investment
    On October 18, 2007, Ecuador's President Rafael Correa announced his intention to migrate Petrobras' existing participation contracts to exploit oil reserves in Ecuador's Blocks 18 and 31 to servicing agreements under which Petrobras would be paid a production fee and reimbursed for investment costs but all recovered oil would belong to the government. Correa also announced a dramatic increase in corporate taxes and changes to other contracts to which Petrobras was a party. All foreign oil companies operating In Ecuador would be similarly affected and any company refusing to "renegotiate" its contracts would face a 100% tax on profits. How should Petrobras respond to Ecuador's riding roughshod over its contracts? Should Petrobras take the Ecuadorian government to arbitration? Or would it be better to pursue a negotiated solution similar to that reached in Bolivia a year earlier? How should Petrobras balance its fiduciary duties to and the best Interests of its shareholders with the interests of the Brazilian government? How should it communicate with its various constituencies?

    Keywords: Metals and Minerals; Globalized Firms and Management; Corporate Governance; Government Administration; Taxation; Contracts; Negotiation Process; Negotiation Tactics; Public Ownership; Business and Government Relations; Business and Shareholder Relations; Brazil; Ecuador;

    Citation:

    Musacchio, Aldo, Lena G. Goldberg, and Ricardo Reisen de Pinho. "Petrobras in Ecuador (A)." Harvard Business School Case 309-107, April 2009. (Revised August 2009.)  View Details
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  • Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2019

    Improving Customer Compatibility with Operational Transparency

    Ryan W. Buell and MoonSoo Choi

    Through a large-scale field experiment with 389,611 customers considering opening a credit card account with a nationwide retail bank, we investigate how providing transparency into an offering’s tradeoffs affects subsequent rates of customer acquisition and long-run engagement.
    Through a large-scale field experiment with 389,611 customers considering opening a credit card account with a nationwide retail bank, we investigate how providing transparency into an offering’s tradeoffs affects subsequent rates of customer acquisition and long-run engagement. Although we find transparency to have an insignificant effect on acquisition rates, customers who were shown each offering’s tradeoffs selected different products than those who were not. Moreover, prospective customers who experienced transparency and subsequently chose to open an account went on to exhibit higher quality service relationships over time. Monthly spending was 9.9% higher and cancellation rates were 20.5% lower among those who experienced transparency into each offering’s tradeoffs. Increased product usage and retention accrued disproportionately to customers with prior category experience—more experienced customers who were provided transparency spent 19.2% more on a monthly basis and were 33.7% less likely to defect after nine months. Importantly, we find that these gains in engagement and retention do not come at the expense of customers’ financial wellbeing—the probability of making late payments was reduced among customers who experienced transparency. We further find that the positive effects of transparency on engagement and retention were attenuated in the presence of a promotion that provided financial incentives to choose particular offerings. Taken together, these results suggest that providing transparency into an offering’s tradeoffs may be an effective strategy for informing customer choices, leading to better outcomes for customers and firms alike.

    Keywords: behavioral operations; operational transparency; customer compatibility; customer behavior; Consumer Behavior; Decision Making; Operations; Strategy;

    Citation:

    Buell, Ryan W., and MoonSoo Choi. "Improving Customer Compatibility with Operational Transparency." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-013, July 2019.  View Details
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  • Case | HBS Case Collection | September 2017 (Revised February 2019)

    Blackstone's GSO Capital: Crosstex Investment

    Victoria Ivashina, John D. Dionne and Jeffrey Boyar

    This case focuses on the Blackstone credit arm, GSO Capital as it evaluated a proposal for an equity investment into the distressed company, Crosstex Energy L.P., an integrated midstream energy company, that was hit hard by declining natural gas prices during the 2008 global financial crisis.
    This case focuses on the Blackstone credit arm, GSO Capital as it evaluated a proposal for an equity investment into the distressed company, Crosstex Energy L.P., an integrated midstream energy company, that was hit hard by declining natural gas prices during the 2008 global financial crisis. At the time, Crosstex was burdened by significant bank debt in the form of a secured revolving credit line. After some initial restructuring, Crosstex was forced to stop quarterly dividend payments as part of a new covenant structure. In order to resume dividend payments, Crosstex needed to reduce its leverage ratio in accordance with its existing covenants. As part of the steps undertaken toward recovery, Crosstex management decided to find a preferred equity investor, ahead of a larger plan to raise up to $700 million in market debt. This case provides a setting for discussing a so-called “rescue financing” transaction which is a strategy within “direct lending” segment of the private debt space. It can also be used as a vehicle for discussing three core debt alternatives: (i) bank debt; (ii) public bonds, and (iii) private debt

    Keywords: distress investing; rescue financing; Investment; Borrowing and Debt; Financial Condition;

    Citation:

    Ivashina, Victoria, John D. Dionne, and Jeffrey Boyar. "Blackstone's GSO Capital: Crosstex Investment." Harvard Business School Case 218-008, September 2017. (Revised February 2019.)  View Details
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  • Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2009

    Private Equity and Industry Performance

    Josh Lerner

    The growth of the private equity industry has spurred concerns about its potential impact on the economy more generally.
    The growth of the private equity industry has spurred concerns about its potential impact on the economy more generally. This analysis looks across nations and industries to assess the impact of private equity on industry performance. Industries where PE funds have invested in the past five years have grown more quickly in terms of productivity and employment. There are few significant differences between industries with limited and high private equity activity. It is hard to find support for claims that economic activity in industries with private equity backing is more exposed to aggregate shocks. The results using lagged private equity investments suggest that the results are not driven by reverse causality. These patterns are not driven solely by common law nations such as the United Kingdom and United States, but also hold in Continental Europe.

    Keywords: Private Equity; Investment; Common Law; Industry Growth; Performance Productivity; Europe; United Kingdom; United States;

    Citation:

    Lerner, Josh. "Private Equity and Industry Performance." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 10-045, December 2009. (NBER Working Paper Series, No. 14861, April 2009.)  View Details
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  • Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2009

    The End of Chimerica

    For the better part of the past decade, the world economy has been dominated by a world economic order that combined Chinese export-led development with US over-consumption.
    For the better part of the past decade, the world economy has been dominated by a world economic order that combined Chinese export-led development with US over-consumption. The financial crisis of 2007-2009 likely marks the beginning of the end of the Chimerican relationship. In this paper we look at this era as economic historians, trying to set events in a longer-term perspective. In some ways China's economic model in the decade 1998-2007 was similar to the one adopted by West Germany and Japan after World War II. Trade surpluses with the U.S. played a major role in propelling growth. But there were two key differences. First, the scale of Chinese currency intervention was without precedent, as were the resulting distortions of the world economy. Second, the Chinese have so far resisted the kind of currency appreciation to which West Germany and Japan consented. We conclude that Chimerica cannot persist for much longer in its present form. As in the 1970s, sizeable changes in exchange rates are needed to rebalance the world economy. A continuation of Chimerica at a time of dollar devaluation would give rise to new and dangerous distortions in the global economy.

    Keywords: History; Globalized Economies and Regions; Currency Exchange Rate; Economic Growth; Trade; Financial Crisis; China; United States;

    Citation:

    Ferguson, Niall, and Moritz Schularick. "The End of Chimerica." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 10-037, November 2009.  View Details
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  • Teaching Note | HBS Case Collection | October 2017 (Revised August 2019)

    Fuyao Glass America: Sourcing Decision

    Willy Shih

    This case is about globalization: a Chinese company has decided to locate a production facility close to its customers in the U.S., but a recent contract bid means it will lose money, at least initially, by supplying product from that factory.
    This case is about globalization: a Chinese company has decided to locate a production facility close to its customers in the U.S., but a recent contract bid means it will lose money, at least initially, by supplying product from that factory. The purpose of this case is to expose students to the key drivers of sourcing location choices in a global economy and the trade-offs associated with local versus offshore sourcing. It provides an opportunity to examine labor arbitrage and factor costs, as well as the practical questions of when it makes sense to ship products great distances. This is foundational for understanding international trade and globalization today, and provides the motivation for the structuring of global supply chains. Though the numbers in the case are scaled and therefore disguised, they offer a rare opportunity for students to examine realistic labor and factor cost differences between China and the United States, and to consider the broader implications of labor arbitrage, trade, and government policy. Teaching Note for HBS No. 618-007.

    Keywords: supply chain; supply chains; labor market; labor supply; arbitrage; tradable sector; Supply Chain Management; Supply Chain; Labor; Globalization; Globalized Markets and Industries; Geographic Location; Auto Industry; United States; China;

    Citation:

    Shih, Willy. "Fuyao Glass America: Sourcing Decision." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 618-032, October 2017. (Revised August 2019.)  View Details
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  • Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2014

    The Global Agglomeration of Multinational Firms

    Laura Alfaro and Maggie Chen

    The explosion of multinational activities in recent decades is rapidly transforming the global landscape of industrial production.
    The explosion of multinational activities in recent decades is rapidly transforming the global landscape of industrial production. But are the emerging clusters of multinational production the rule or the exception? What drives the offshore agglomeration of multinational firms in comparison to the agglomeration of domestic firms? Using a unique worldwide plant-level dataset that reports detailed location, ownership, and operation information for plants in over 100 countries, we construct a spatially continuous index of pairwise-industry agglomeration and investigate the patterns and determinants underlying the global economic geography of multinational firms. Our analysis presents new stylized facts that suggest the emerging offshore clusters of multinationals are not a simple reflection of domestic industrial clusters. Agglomeration economies including capital-good market externality and technology diffusion play a more important role in the offshore agglomeration of multinationals than the agglomeration of domestic firms. These findings remain robust when we address potential reverse causality by exploring the regional pattern and process of agglomeration.

    Keywords: Geographic Location; Multinational Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Market Entry and Exit; Industry Clusters;

    Citation:

    Alfaro, Laura, and Maggie Chen. "The Global Agglomeration of Multinational Firms." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 10-043, December 2009. (Revised April 2014. NBER Working Paper Series, No. 15576, December 2009)  View Details
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  • Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2010

    The Mirroring Hypothesis: Theory, Evidence and Exceptions

    Carliss Y. Baldwin

    The mirroring hypothesis predicts that the organizational patterns of a development project (e.g. communication links, geographic collocation, team and firm co-membership) will correspond to the technical patterns of dependency in the system under development.
    The mirroring hypothesis predicts that the organizational patterns of a development project (e.g. communication links, geographic collocation, team and firm co-membership) will correspond to the technical patterns of dependency in the system under development. Scholars in a range of disciplines have argued that mirroring is either necessary or a highly desirable feature of development projects, but evidence pertaining to the hypothesis is widely scattered across fields, research sites, and methodologies. In this paper, we formally define the mirroring hypothesis and review 102 empirical studies spanning three levels of organization: within a single firm, across firms, and in open community-based development projects. The hypothesis was supported in 69% of the cases. Support for the hypothesis was strongest in the within-firm sample, less strong in the across-firm sample, and relatively weak in the open collaborative sample. Based on a detailed analysis of the cases in which the mirroring hypothesis was not supported, we introduce the concept of actionable transparency as a means of achieving coordination without mirroring. We present examples from practice and describe the more complex organizational patterns that emerge when actionable transparency allows designers to "break the mirror."

    Keywords: Infrastructure; Product Design; Organizational Design; Practice; Groups and Teams; Social and Collaborative Networks; Information Technology;

    Citation:

    Baldwin, Carliss Y. "The Mirroring Hypothesis: Theory, Evidence and Exceptions." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 10-058, January 2010. (Revised June 2010.)  View Details
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