Corporate-startup Collaboration: Its Diffusion to and within the Firm

Abstract

In an age of digital transformation, startup collaboration as an avenue for corporate innovation has increased in importance. However, the diffusion of corporate-startup collaboration models, to and within firms, is not well researched. The purpose of this article is to view a corporate-startup collaboration model as an organizational innovation and thereby, by using an established framework for the diffusion of innovations on a real case, “FirstBuild”, improve our understanding of how this type of organizational innovation is diffused to and within firms. The theoretical contribution of the article is to be the first study to investigate the diffusion of a corporate-startup collaboration model and thereby fill an existing knowledge gap on how this type of innovation is diffused to and within a firm. This is of relevance for both corporations as well as policy makers in an ongoing digital transformation of countries and their large firms.