This case describes Uber’s global market entry strategy and responses by regulators and local competitors. It details Uber’s entry into New York City (United States), Bogotá (Colombia), Delhi (India), Shanghai (China), Accra (Ghana), and London (United Kingdom). In each instance, the case includes information about Uber’s strategy in that market, existing regulations on taxis and transportation in each market, the reactions of competitors and regulators, and regional information. The case allows for instruction related to competitive strategy, global expansion, nonmarket strategy, regulation, market economics, supply restrictions, and related topics.
This paper examines the role that the two lead authors’ personal connections played in the research methodology and data collection for the Partition Stories Project—a mixed-methods approach to revisiting the much-studied historical trauma of the Partition of British India in 1947. The Project collected survivors’ oral histories, a data type that is a mainstay of qualitative research, and subjected their narrative data to statistical analysis to detect aggregated trends. In this paper, the authors discuss the process of straddling the dichotomies of insider/outsider and qualitative/quantitative, address the “myth of informed objectivity,” and consider the need for hybrid research structures with the intent to innovate in humanities projects such as this. In presenting key learnings from the project, this paper highlights the tensions that the authors faced between positivist and interpretivist methods of inquiry, looks at the difference between “insider” and “outsider” categories of positionality and discusses in the quantification of qualitative oral history data. The paper concludes with an illustrative example from one of the lead authors’ past research experiences to suggest that the tensions of this project are general in occurrence and global in applicability, beyond the specifics of the Partition case study explored here.
This article examines the evolution of Indian pharmaceutical manufacturer Cipla towards producing drugs that met the quality standards of European and U.S. regulators. It employs new research in Cipla’s corporate archives, the Creating Emerging Markets database, and interviews with Cipla employees, government regulators, and public health professionals in Africa, India, Latin America, and the United States. The article argues that, along with a longstanding corporate culture of self-reliance rooted in nationalism starting from its inception in 1935, major factors in Cipla’s strategy from the 1960s through the early 2000s included the early adoption and continued use of quality control technology, along with efforts to create global goodwill for affordable, high quality generic drugs during the HIV/ AIDS epidemic of early 2000s.
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Anjali Raina is the Executive Director of the Harvard Business School India Research Centre. In her leadership role at the IRC, Anjali focuses on building and maintaining relationships with senior business leaders in the region to facilitate the work of the center in research, educational programs, community building and faculty development.
Under her leadership, the IRC has facilitated the writing of over 168 case studies on Indian Business Practice and supported half a dozen research projects. Anjali has co-authored several case studies such as Aadhaar: India’s ‘Unique Identification’ System, TeamLease: Putting India to Work (II) Legally; Pratham – Every Child in School and Learning Well; Naina Lal Kidwai: Investing in Her Country; Tech Mahindra and the Acquisition of Satyam Computers (A); HN Agri Serve : Growing Prosperity as well as an HBR Article on The Ordinary Heroes of the Taj.
Anjali wears several additional hats. She is a Director on the Board of Harvard Business Publishing, India, the Regional President (Western Region) of NHRDN, an Advisor to The Akanksha Foundation, Trustee to LIFE Trust, an Advisory Member on the Board of HBS Club of India, and on the Advisory Board of the Indian Business School.
Prior to joining HBS IRC Anjali spent 15 years with Citigroup India, most recently as Country Director, before which she worked for more than a decade with ANZ Grindlays Bank PLC. Anjali holds an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, a bachelor's degree (Eng. Hons) from Loreto College and is an alumnus of HBS having completed the Advanced Management Program.