Corporate Accelerator Programs. Supporting Startup Success by Fostering Entrepreneurial Networking

Master's Thesis from the year 2017 in the subject Business economics - Company formation Business Plans grade: 1.0 Católica Lisbon School of Business & Economics language: English abstract: Recent years have seen the rapid emergence of a new format of corporate-startup engagement: the corporate accelerator program. This format aims to support early-stage ventures to overcome their initial challenges while fostering corporate innovation within established firms. Extant literature has emphasized the importance of networking for entrepreneurs to increase their chances of survival. Accordingly networking opportunities constitute a major reason for startups to join an accelerator. To date research on corporate accelerators has remained scarce and left it unclear how networking happens in this context. This thesis sheds light upon why and how startups network within corresponding programs and explores the implications of corporate accelerators on entrepreneurial networking. An inductive multiple case study of six startups that graduated from different programs in Germany was performed. The results revealed four mechanisms that corporate accelerators provide to foster networking: pitch events expert mentoring referrals and physical proximity. These mechanisms were used differently given the participants' stage of product development and prior network support. Interestingly an initial exploratory study unveiled two distinct types of corporate accelerators: innovation vehicle and investment vehicle programs. The type of program appeared to shape the configuration of the four mechanisms and thus the opportunities and possible networking outcomes for participating startups. In general corporate accelerator programs seem to increase intensity efficiency and successfulness of startups' network tie formation. This study enhances the theoretical understanding of corporate accelerators and contributes to the literature on entrepreneurial networking. It further