Prof. Cusumano's recent book, Competing on Internet Time: Lessons from Netscape and its Battle with Microsoft (Free Press/Simon & Schuster, 1998, with David Yoffie), examines the competition between Netscape and Microsoft as well as techniques used at both companies for managing strategic planning and software product development for extremely fast-paced and often unpredictable markets. This book was named one of the top 10 business books of 1998 by Business Week and Amazon.com, and even played a noted role in the Microsoft anti-trust trial.

In this seminar (titled the same as the book), Professor Cusumano will focus on the key research issues he faced in conducting this important study and on the high-level scholarly and managerial implications and lessons arising out of this work.

Some quotes form the book:

• "Occasionally, the world experiences a technological revolution that changes the way people live and interact. ...now we have the Internet." (Page.3)
  
  
• "The conventional wisdom about competition in the age of the Internet is that the business world has become incredibly fast and unpredictable, and we need to throw out the old rules of the game. We decided to test this hypothesis." (Page.5)
  
  
• "He [Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale] had read Microsoft Secrets[another best-seller co-authored by Prof. Cusumano] and wasn't sure he wanted to reveal so much about his company to the competition. ...Cusumano and Yoffie pointed out that companies usually learn as much as the authors do when they undergo an in-depth study." (Preface:Page.X)
  
  

About the speaker

Michael A. Cusumano specializes in strategy and technology management in the computer software, automobile, and consumer electronics industries. He is the author or co-author of five books. He also has written approximately fifty articles and working papers on software engineering management, high-tech entrepreneurship, consumer electronics development, manufacturing process innovation, and management of product development teams. He also writes a monthly column for Computerworld.

Professor Cusumano received a B.A. degree from Princeton University in 1976 and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1984. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Production and Operations Management Area at the Harvard Business School during 1984-86.

Location

This research seminar will be held at the New York Information Technology Center, 55 Broad Street, in the "Global Digital Community Sandbox" on the Fourth Floor. (Note: 55 Broad Street is in the Wall Street District of Manhattan, a block away from the New York Stock Exchange.) Click here for directions.

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