As NBA Commissioner David Stern approached the podium, silent anticipation gripped the four thousand Houston Rockets fans gathered at the Rockets Draft Party. "With the 8th pick in the 2006 NBA draft," Stern began, "the Houston Rockets select Rudy Gay from the University of Connecticut." The...

On July 17, 2009, Zappos.com, a privately-held online retailer of shoes, clothing, and other soft line retail categories, learned that Amazon.com, a $19 billion multinational online retailer, had won its Board of Directors' approval to offer to merge the two companies. Amazon had been courting...

Conventional wisdom in retail banking states that firm performance is dependent on higher average process performance. This paper refutes conventional wisdom and provides empirical evidence, which demonstrates that low process variation contributes significantly to firm performance. More...

Firms are increasingly implementing electronic distribution strategies to augment existing physical infrastructure for product and service delivery. However, to date there has been little systematic study on how these distribution channels affect customer profitability. In this study, we explore...