Marco Iansiti

12 Results

 

One Strategy: Aligning Planning and Execution

Marco Iansiti

Strategy as it is written up in the corporate playbook often becomes lost or muddled when the team takes the field to execute. In their new book, Professor Marco Iansiti and Microsoft's Steven Sinofsky discuss a "One Strategy" approach to aligning plan and action. Read More

Principles that Matter: Sustaining Software Innovation from the Client to the Web

Marco Iansiti

Despite the current strength and promise of the Internet software market, the future pace of growth and innovation is not assured. The principles of choice, opportunity, and interoperability were important in the growth of PC software and in the overall health of the information technology ecosystem, and these same principles will shape competition in Internet software, according to HBS professor Marco Iansiti. Given the unprecedented speed at which this industry is developing, consumers and the industry should watch carefully as different companies compete. Choice, opportunity, and interoperability should serve as an important lens, particularly when focused on companies with especially large footprints in the new markets. Read More

Dynamics of Platform Competition: Exploring the Role of Installed Base, Platform Quality and Consumer Expectations

Feng Zhu and Marco Iansiti

What factors drive platform success, long-run market structure, and market efficiency? Conventional wisdom suggests that for a new platform to be successful, either it must make its technology compatible with the incumbent, or its technical advantage must offer so much value to consumers that it exceeds the combination of functionality, installed base, and complementary goods value offered by the incumbent. Zhu and Iansiti develop a dynamic model to examine the evolution of platform-based markets. They find that a huge quality advantage may not be necessary for an entrant to be successful. Using data from the video game industry, they find support for their theoretical predications. Read More

The Business of Free Software

Breaking with a largely proprietary tradition, large IT vendors have invested several billion dollars into open-source software development. What's their motivation? The observations presented in research by professor Marco Iansiti and coauthor Gregory L. Richards suggest some fundamental changes in strategy used by technology companies. Read More

The Business of Free Software: Enterprise Incentives, Investment, and Motivation in the Open Source Community

Marco Iansiti and Gregory L. Richards

IBM has contributed more than $1 billion to the development and promotion of the Linux operating system, and other vendors such as Sun are ramping up open source software efforts and investment. Why do information technology vendors that have traditionally sold proprietary software invest millions of dollars in OSS? Where have they chosen to invest, and what are the characteristics of the OSS projects to which they contribute? This study grouped OSS projects into clusters and identified IT vendors' motives in each cluster. Read More

Information Technology Ecosystem Health and Performance

Marco Iansiti and Gregory L. Richards

An IT ecosystem is "the network of organizations that drives the creation and delivery of information technology products and services." To understand the health and well being of the IT industry in the context of an ecosystem, the authors looked at three crucial IT ecosystem metrics: productivity, robustness, and innovation. Read More

Why IT Matters in Midsized Firms

Marco Iansiti, George Favaloro, James Utzschneider, and Greg Richards

What does IT actually contribute to a business? Is IT a commodity like electricity or is it a crucial element of competitive advantage? In a study of over 600 medium-sized global firms to analyze the business benefits that IT can enable, the authors found that IT capability was key to profitable business growth. This was true in both the U.S. product and services sectors as well as in Germany and Brazil. Read More

Strategy for Small Fish

Microsoft, Wal-Mart, and eBay provide ecosystems in which other companies thrive or fail. But what are effective strategies for a small fish in a big pond? An excerpt from The Keystone Advantage by HBS professor Marco Iansiti and Roy Levien. Read More

Creating Value in Your Business Ecosystem

The metaphors of keystones and ecology help you think about your business environment, say professor Marco Iansiti and consultant Roy Levien. A Harvard Business Review excerpt. Read More

The Secret of How Microsoft Stays on Top

Marco Iansiti and Alan D. MacCormack

Critics say Microsoft's incredible two-decade run at the top of the computer industry has less to do with innovation than it does with bully tactics. But new research from Harvard Business School professors Marco Iansiti and Alan MacCormack suggest a different reason: the company's ability to spot technological trends and exploit key software technologies. Read More

Why Evolutionary Software Development Works

What is the best way to develop software? HBS professor Alan MacCormack discusses recent research proving the theory that the best approach is evolutionary. In this article from MIT Sloan Management Review, MacCormack and colleagues Marco Iansiti and Roberto Verganti uncover four practices that lead to successful Internet software development. Read More

Presentation Round-Up

This round-up of other panels and presentations at the IS2K conference includes a look at the emerging "e-service" model, the future of the U.S. telecommunications infrastructure, and a discussion of "Genes on the Web." Read More