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Serguei Netessine

Biography

Serguei Netessine was the Timken Chaired Professor of Global Technology and Innovation at INSEAD. He is now Senior Vice Dean for Innovation and Global Initiatives and Professor at the Operations, Information and Decisions Department at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

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Strategy

A Smarter Way to Design Business Strategies to Serve the Poor

I. Popescu, B.S. Uppari, S. Netessine, R. Clarke

With intelligent modelling, a little data can go a long way when it comes to predicting the performance of bottom-of-the-pyramid strategies.

Leadership & Organisations

Workplace Excellence Can Be Contagious

Collective outcomes soar when top performers mingle with less adept colleagues.

Marketing

Ad Hoc Promotions Can’t Buy Customer Loyalty

Jasjit Singh & Serguei Netessine

Short-term promotions disconnected from your overall strategy will not give your business a lasting lift.
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Economics & Finance

Is Fintech Here to Stay?

2015 was the best year for venture investment in US Fintech start-ups since 2000, with $21.6 billion invested, but the number of deals fell for the first time since 2009.
1 comment

Strategy

Corporates and Start-ups: Engage or Else!

There have never been more ways for big companies and entrepreneurs to collaborate - and you’d be surprised at how common these unlikely pairings are becoming.

Responsibility

Carbon Pricing: Not Such a Clean Option

Carbon pricing has been hailed as the best way to bring down emissions and drive investment in cleaner technologies. New research suggests it could do just the opposite.
2 comments

Responsibility

How the Lean Startup Approach Can Alleviate Poverty

Experimenting before plunging into major investments can pay off in the long run.
1 comment

Entrepreneurship

Geolocation is Changing the Retail Business Model Yet Again

And maybe that’s why Amazon is moving into bricks-and-mortar.

Operations

Product Knowledge Drives Sales Leadership

Retail sales associates with strong brand expertise sell 87 percent more than peers without.

Entrepreneurship

Why Large Companies Struggle With Business Model Innovation

Innovation success stories are all strikingly similar: a bright idea, supported by a zealot-innovator who sees it through. The windfall of goodies follows. But failures happen for all sorts of reasons, and they often occur even when the idea is sound.

Entrepreneurship

A Business Model for Bangladesh

Following the collapse of the Rana Plaza factory building in Bangladesh in April, which caused the deaths of over 1,000 people, many commentators pointed to the absence of building codes, lack of workplace safety rules, and the greed of corporations. But there are business model solutions that can improve supply chain compliance.
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Entrepreneurship

Liberate Your Employees and Recharge your Business Model

As we discussed in our recent blog post on HBR Blogging Network, it finally seems that the uproar overMarissa Meyer’s diktat banning flexible work policies at Yahoo is dying down. While good arguments were made on both sides of the issue, what got lost in the charged debate was the potential for evolving traditional business models through changing the employee-employer relationship.

Entrepreneurship

Tesla’s Model S: Technology Outruns the Business Model

In our recent blog post on HBR blogging network we discussed the Tesla Model S, which is arguably the most promising all-electric contender for a slice of the luxury sedan market, but was panned recently by New York Times reporter John Broder, who finished his test-drive on the back of a flatbed truck. Elon Musk, co-founder of Tesla Motors, was quick to respond with accusations that the test was not performed under fair conditions. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the dispute, though, one thing is clear: Tesla has some way to go before it can get motorists to buy into its vision of an all-electric no-compromises luxury sedan.

Entrepreneurship

When Business Models Trump Technology

In a recent blog post on Harvard Business Review we discuss one of these frequent situations in which business model innovation is necessary to bring technological innovation to life. In case you missed it, the2012 World Food Prize went to Daniel Hillel, an Israeli scientist who, in his own words, “…helped to develop the principle of shifting from low-frequency, high-volume irrigation to high-frequency, low-volume irrigation”, the system known as drip irrigation.

Entrepreneurship

Why Apple Has to Manufacture in China

Apple gets a lot of stick about manufacturing in China, and the issue came up again recently with the release of the iPhone 5. A recent article on the “Cult of Mac”contrasts Apple to Timbuk2, a US producer of traveler and messenger bags, that proudly locates most of its of its manufacturing in San Francisco, one of the most expensive places on earth. The workers in the factory are neither overworked nor are they underpaid, yet Timbuk2 is not struggling financially unlike many other US-based manufacturers. This begs the question: can’t Apple do the same and move jobs back from China? We covered this issue in a recent post on HBR network.

Economics & Finance

Making car manufacturing sane: Business Model Innovation at Volkswagen

After a brief hiatus due to vacations and travel over summer, the Renaissance Innovator blog is back! While I was catching up on the stack of journals which accumulated over summer, a Fortune article about Volkswagen which describes transformation of the company from a local German producer to a global phenomenon with over €160B in sales caught my eye. Volkswagen has quietly passed General Motors and Toyota last year to become the largest automotive maker in the world. So what is its secret?

Entrepreneurship

The Darwinian Workplace in the WinnerS-take-all Organizations

The latest issue of Harvard Business Review features an article “The Darwinian Workplace” on promoting healthy competition in the workplace that I co-authored. The key message of the article is based on several research projects with highly innovative technology companies that implemented tournaments among its workers to increase worker productivity and, at the same time, to increase firm’s profitability.

Entrepreneurship

How to Innovate for a Greener World (and Make Money)

In the minds of both consumers and managers going green is typically thought as being associated with an additional expense. We see this in food stores, for instance, where organic products cost more. Despite this general perception, there exists a simple approach for just about any organization or household to become more sustainable and make more money in the process.