Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship is a featured research topic and an initiative at Harvard Business School
 
Our long tradition of research in Entrepreneurship goes back to the 1930's and 1940's with the “the father of venture capitalism,” General Georges Doriot, and Joseph Schumpeter’s theory of innovation as a process of “creative destruction.” Building on our intellectual roots, our scholars come from disciplines including economics, finance, sociology, strategy, business history, management, and social entrepreneurship. A number of our faculty come from practice as venture capitalists and start-up founders. We focus our research on the identification and pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities; domestic and international funding of entrepreneurial endeavors; innovation, particularly technological innovation in international ventures; the environments in which entrepreneurs make decisions; and social entrepreneurship. As our research contributes new insights, we are advancing the world’s understanding of complex entrepreneurial issues and helping to increase the entrepreneurial success of our students and practitioners worldwide. 

Featured Works

 

  2. Case | HBS Case Collection | August 2018

    Tailor Brands: Artificial Intelligence-Driven Branding

    Jill Avery

    Using proprietary artificial intelligence technology, startup Tailor Brands set out to democratize branding by allowing small businesses to create their brand identities by automatically generating logos in just minutes at minimal cost with no branding or design skills required. As it sets out to raise its Series B, the founders make some critical changes to their business model, moving to a subscription model and adding additional products and services to automate other parts of the branding and marketing process. Can algorithms, machine learning, and artificial intelligence help Tailor Brands outperform graphic designers and branding agencies in developing brand identities? And, can Tailor Brands differentiate itself from the many other logo generators popping up in the market?

    Keywords: marketing; brands and branding; marketing strategy; Startup; venture capital; services; technology; artificial intelligence; Machine learning; digital marketing; brand management; entrepreneurship; Marketing; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Technology; Entrepreneurship; Venture Capital; Business Model; Advertising Industry; Service Industry; Technology Industry; United States; North America; Israel;

    Citation:

    Avery, Jill. "Tailor Brands: Artificial Intelligence-Driven Branding." Harvard Business School Case 519-017, August 2018.  View Details
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  3. Case | HBS Case Collection | August 2018

    Alvogen: Scaling Entrepreneurship

    Daniel Isenberg, William R. Kerr and Alexis Brownell

    Keywords: Pharmaceutical Companies; Iceland; entrepreneurship; scaling; leadership; generic drugs; Entrepreneurship; Leadership; Pharmaceutical Industry; Asia; Europe; United States; Iceland;

    Citation:

    Isenberg, Daniel, William R. Kerr, and Alexis Brownell. "Alvogen: Scaling Entrepreneurship." Harvard Business School Case 819-038, August 2018.  View Details
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  4. Article | Journal of Political Economy | August 2018

    Growth Through Heterogeneous Innovations

    William R. Kerr and Ufuk Akcigit

    We build a tractable growth model where multi-product incumbents invest in internal innovations to improve their existing products, while new entrants and incumbents invest in external innovations to acquire new product lines. External and internal innovations generate heterogeneous innovation qualities, and firm size affects innovation incentives. This framework allows us to analyze how different types of innovation contribute to economic growth and how the firm size distribution can have important consequences for the types of innovations realized. Our model aligns with many observed empirical regularities, and we quantify our framework by matching Census Bureau operating data with patent data for U.S. firms. We observe that internal innovation scales moderately faster with firm size than external innovation.

    Keywords: Endogenous Growth; innovation; Research and Development; patents; Citations; Scientists; entrepreneurs; External; Internal; Patents; Innovation Strategy; Entrepreneurship; Economic Growth; Research and Development; Science;

    Citation:

    Kerr, William R., and Ufuk Akcigit. "Growth Through Heterogeneous Innovations." Journal of Political Economy 126, no. 4 (August 2018): 1374–1443.  View Details
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  5. Book | 2018

    Trust: Creating the Foundation for Entrepreneurship in Developing Countries

    Tarun Khanna

    Entrepreneurs in developing countries who assume they will have the same legal, governmental, and institutional protections as their counterparts in the West will fail. To succeed, they need to build trust within the existing structures—and this book shows how it's done.

    Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Developing Countries and Economies; Trust;

    Citation:

    Khanna, Tarun. Trust: Creating the Foundation for Entrepreneurship in Developing Countries. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2018.  View Details
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  6. Case | HBS Case Collection | July 2018

    Hironobu Tsujiguchi and His Sweet Revolution

    Boris Groysberg and Naoko Jinjo

    Hironobu Tsujiguchi, a Japanese chocolatier, had chosen an unusual path to success as a pastry chef. Instead of spending most of his time in his kitchen and focusing on one or two confectionery categories like most pastry chefs, he chose to work on diverse projects and leverage his reputation as a winning competitive chef to experiment with tastes and achieve business success. While Tsujiguchi enjoyed popularity and success in a broad array of projects, such as managing 10 brands and 26 shops across different categories, he also felt the need to reinvent his core confectionery business since not all stores of all his brands were thriving as he had wished. Equally central to the mission was the need to restructure the brand portfolio and operational model. Tsujiguchi asked himself: How can I orchestrate these efforts? Can I continue to rely on the diversification model that has led me to success so far, or should I be more focused? What should I continue, start, or stop doing to stay relevant?

    Keywords: entrepreneurship; relevance; diversification; Entrepreneurship; Diversification; Personal Development and Career; Decision Making; Food and Beverage Industry; Japan;

    Citation:

    Groysberg, Boris, and Naoko Jinjo. "Hironobu Tsujiguchi and His Sweet Revolution." Harvard Business School Case 419-011, July 2018.  View Details
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  7. Case | HBS Case Collection | July 2018 (Revised September 2018)

    Hidrovias do Brasil: Navigating Unchartered Waters

    Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott

    Since its founding eight years earlier, Hidrovias do Brasil (“Hidrovias”), an integrated logistics provider serving corporate customers exporting products from South America via the Atlantic Ocean, had grown to 900 employees and $253 million in annual revenues. Hidrovias was founded by the Brazilian private equity firm, Pátria Investments, who had built the business from the ground up, forging and nurturing relationships with customers, investors, government entities, and suppliers. As Bruno Serapiao, Hidrovias’s CEO pondered next steps for the company, he considered the following questions: What had been the key drivers of Hidrovias’s success to date? What were the major challenges? And, what was the best path for the company going forward?

    Keywords: growth and development; leadership; operations; human resources; private equity; Brazil; emerging markets; entrepreneurial organizations; operation management; strategy; general management; Entrepreneurship; Finance; Growth and Development; Leadership; Operations; Problems and Challenges; Transportation; Human Capital; Strategy; Emerging Markets; Brazil;

    Citation:

    Groysberg, Boris, and Sarah L. Abbott. "Hidrovias do Brasil: Navigating Unchartered Waters." Harvard Business School Case 419-007, July 2018. (Revised September 2018.)  View Details
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  9. Article | Foundations and Trends® in Entrepreneurship | July 2018

    Personality Traits of Entrepreneurs: A Review of Recent Literature

    Sari Pekkala Kerr, William R. Kerr and Tina Xu

    We review the extensive literature since 2000 on the personality traits of entrepreneurs. We first consider baseline personality traits like the Big-5 model, self-efficacy and innovativeness, locus of control, and the need for achievement. We then consider risk attitudes as well as the goals and aspirations of entrepreneurs. Within each area, we separate studies by the type of entrepreneurial behavior considered: entry into entrepreneurship, performance outcomes, and exit from entrepreneurship. This literature shows common results and many points of disagreement, reflective of the heterogeneous nature of entrepreneurship. We label studies by the type of entrepreneurial population studied (e.g., Main Street vs. those backed by venture capital) to identify interesting and irreducible parts of this heterogeneity, while also identifying places where we anticipate future large-scale research and the growing depth of the field are likely to clarify matters. There are many areas, like how firm performance connects to entrepreneurial personality, that are woefully understudied and ripe for major advances if the appropriate cross-disciplinary ingredients are assembled.

    Keywords: entrepreneurs; venturing; personality traits; characteristics; Big-5; Risk Attitudes; Success; goals; demographics; skills; Entrepreneurship; Personal Characteristics; Goals and Objectives; Competency and Skills; Success; Demographics; Research;

    Citation:

    Kerr, Sari Pekkala, William R. Kerr, and Tina Xu. "Personality Traits of Entrepreneurs: A Review of Recent Literature." Foundations and Trends® in Entrepreneurship 14, no. 3 (July 2018): 279–356.  View Details
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  10. Article | Harvard Business Review | July–August 2018

    When Technology Gets Ahead of Society

    Tarun Khanna

    New technologies can be unsettling for industry incumbents, regulators, and consumers, because norms and institutions for dealing with them don’t yet exist. Interestingly, businesspeople in emerging economies face similar challenges: The rules are unclear and infrastructure is lacking. In this article, the author suggests that tech pioneers would do well to heed a lesson he’s gleaned from his research in the developing world: For long-term success, companies must invest in the surrounding ecosystem.
    The author presents examples of entrepreneurs who have done just that in China, Bangladesh, Africa, and Chile, benefiting the public as well as their own enterprises. He then describes how an Indian health care organization is tackling institutional voids as it expands into medical tourism in the Cayman Islands. An in-depth look at the nascent drone industry follows, with profiles of companies that are helping create the conditions for the industry’s growth by amassing knowledge about best practices, influencing the development of regulations, exploring new uses for drones, developing a professional workforce, and so forth.
    The argument is that when firms launching innovative products or services look beyond their self-interest and work to collectively build the institutional infrastructure, they—and society as a whole—are more likely to prosper.

    Keywords: Technological Innovation; Society; Situation or Environment; Infrastructure; Entrepreneurship; Performance Effectiveness; Cooperation;

    Citation:

    Khanna, Tarun. "When Technology Gets Ahead of Society." Harvard Business Review 96, no. 4 (July–August 2018): 86–95.  View Details
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    11.  
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Initiatives & Projects

  • Entrepreneurship

    The Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship supports Harvard Business School's mission to "educate leaders who make a difference in the world" by infusing this leadership perspective with an entrepreneurial point of view.

  • Social Enterprise

    The Social Enterprise Initiative at HBS applies innovative business practices and managerial disciplines to drive sustained, high-impact social change.

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Faculty

Seminars & Conferences

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HBS Working Knowledge

Pic
re Geoffrey G. Jones
Geoffrey Jones examines the career of Ernesto Tornquist, a cosmopolitan financier considered to be the most significant entrepreneur in Argentina at the end of the 19th century.
What are the ingredients that make an entrepreneur successful? Here is a collection of stories and research that shows the way to making a difference in industries as diverse as green technologies, b
Pic
re Tarun Khanna
Legal and social institutions that support entrepreneurs often aren't well established in developing countries. Tarun Khanna's new book explains how businesses can make up for that by building trust.

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Harvard Business Publishing

Article
by Deepak Malhotra
Case
by Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott
Press Book
by Richard S. Ruback and Royce Yudkoff

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