Index Incubation model Limitations for startups Limitations This report consists of a study on accelerator organizations and the startups taking part in their programs. First of all, some key concepts will be defined to understand the project. Concepts like Startup, incubation model or accelerators. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original EssayWhen we delve deeper into the main topic, accelerators, we will first conceptualize the origins of accelerators and their evolution, in order to understand how incubation models evolved into accelerators. Subsequently, the concept of accelerator will be defined and we will see in more detail what the structure of an accelerator is by highlighting the five design elements of an accelerator. Once the accelerator concept is clear, we will have a brief overview of the seed accelerator and corporate accelerators to provide some of the little information found in the published literature thus far. Finally we will highlight some limitations encountered during the work, such as the lack of literature due to a relatively new business (accelerators) and finally I will explain the future tasks to be carried out during the thesis. With this project, the author claims to introduce the concept of accelerator, create a future task to carry out a suitable study and highlight research opportunities. With these highlighted ideas I hope to set up a kit of different tasks to create a framework that is missing nowadays in this research field. To perfectly understand the next project on accelerators and startups, it is mandatory to start defining the concept of Startup. A startup could be defined as a newly established business created to seek a repeatable and scalable business model. This is typically a technology-driven company that aims to experience high growth rates by bridging the gap between a business or social need and adapting it to our rapidly evolving, digitally driven environment. Normally, this type of business experiences high growth rates as they fill a gap versus an innovative approach that usually breaks the market. This poses a serious risk for startups as it is really difficult to manage this high growth due to capital, human resources, time and other constraints. Indeed, it has been highlighted that two of the crucial processes that a startup must manage perfectly are product emergence and organizational launch (Stayton and Mangematin, 2016), which is tremendously difficult for startups and specialized accelerators. Once we understand what a startup is and what the relationship between startups and accelerators is (we will delve deeper into this topic in future sections) in the next section we will do a brief review of the origins of the incubation model, which should be the cornerstone of the aspect of the accelerator.Incubation ModelOnce we have defined the concept of Startup, which is the center of the company analyzed here, we define the concept of the incubation model to understand and continue to delve deeper into the accelerator "sector". When we talk about incubation model in this regard, we can define it as the way in which an incubation institute helps startups, which take part in its incubation program, to significantly increase their chances of survival and accelerate their normal progression as a business (Wright, 2016). The incubation model was the previous step to what evolved into different programs such as accelerators. Let's see how it has evolved from the early nineties to today to include the creation of the first accelerator in2005, Y Combinator. In the early 1990s, incubators simply focused on providing office space and financial aid to high-potential businesses (Phan et al., 2005 ). Subsequently, during the 1990s, new incubators were established with the aim of offering greater help. They noticed the lack of management experience in high-level startup situations for potential startups, so they started offering more intangible services to help founders manage growth. Intangible services such as product development, skills, entrepreneur network, consultancy and so on (Soetanto and Jack, 2013). In the early 2000s with the creation of Y combinatorio, a new startup booster model was created, more focused on mentoring and knowledge-intensive services. Once you have seen the concept of Startups and how incubators have evolved until the appearance of the accelerator, it is time to focus on what an accelerator is and learn more about how it works. Accelerators are organizations aimed at promoting the creation of businesses by providing specific incubation oriented towards knowledge-intensive services (Cohen and Hochberg, 2014) The first accelerator was created in 2005 in the United States, its name is Y Combinator, recognized as the mother of all accelerators since all accelerators are based on it. The first European accelerator was founded in 2009, and today there are around 213 accelerators worldwide, according to Seed-DB, supporting around 3,800 startups. And why do these 3,800 seek help in accelerators? Because it is really difficult and risky to manage rapid growth due to time, financial and human resource strains (Stayton and Mangematin, 2016). In this changing world, time becomes crucial to develop startup ideas and promote them properly to be successful. In the promotion process, more than time, financial resources are very necessary, therefore startups must rely on a high cash flow to adequately develop their growth strategy. Finally, this growth strategy requires a lot of human capital to adequately follow the strategic path. In my opinion, in these cases, accelerators can play a huge role in some startups. Let's delve deeper into how Accelerators work and what they offer to better understand what they are and how useful they can be. There are several design elements that determine how an accelerator works. These elements are called “design elements”. There are five design elements that define the characteristics of the accelerator: program package, strategic focus, selection process, funding structure, and alumni relations. The program package refers to the entire group of services opened by the accelerator. As seen in the figure above, there is a different type of services that accelerators can offer, some will offer all of them and others will offer some. The most usual services offered are mentoring services, training programmes, consultancy services, demo days/investor days (where founders pitch investors for funding), localization services and investment opportunities. Regarding the strategic focus it refers to the target point of the accelerator. It can be an industrial or sectoral focus and a geographic focus. When we talk about geographic focus we are referring to which geographic point is being targeted, from small regions to continents. When we talk about industry or sector focus, we are referring to how broad/specific the accelerator might be interested in as far as the company is concerned. There are accelerators that are completely focused on specific sectors such as biotech startups while others are more focusedon retailers in general. The selection process that accelerators often use to filter the different startups are the Team as the primary selection criterion, online open calls and the use of external parties for screening. This topic can also configure different types of accelerators. The funding structure really differentiates a different type of accelerators, as depending on where the funding comes from it can have different effects on how the startup will be supported. Furthermore, it could also be a selection criterion for startups to apply for one type or the other due to the founders' strategies. Depending on the origin of the funding we may find accelerators funded by corporate funding, investor funding, public funding and alternative revenue. Finally, the last design element that characterizes accelerators is the alumni relations they offer to startups immersed in their programs. On the one hand, they can offer an alumni network after the completion of the program (normally when the accelerator obtains capital from the startup), alumni networking during the program, or both. These different elements define how a startup works and characterize it in order to obtain a frame based on its characteristics. What I believe is that by understanding the five major design elements and how they can be structured, we will be better prepared to advance the purpose of the analysis which is to understand the accelerator document in the startup business as a new industry has arisen. Limitations of startupStartup, as stated earlier, fill a gap in the market by applying technology to do so. Normally, in this case, these companies experience huge demand for their product/service and in this case some parameters matter more. On the one hand, product emergence and organizational launch are critical to success, and the time frame used in this will play a significant role (Stayton and Mangematin, 2016). Here, accelerators play an important role as they provide the resources and support to overcome this critical phase of a startup by providing capital, guidance and mentorship to adopt the correct position and strategy to create a suitable environment to grow rapidly. However, not all accelerators will have the same impact on a project as there is significant evidence of the quality of an accelerator depending on the experience and its network which decreases the risk of failure of startups within their programs (Wise and Valliere , 2017). It does so in my personal experience, as the critical element of accelerators is mentorship and startup orientation. Therefore, an accelerator managed by a manager with significant experience on the topic will have a better chance of adequately supporting the companies participating in the acceleration program. However, not all startups need this type of business service offered by accelerators, so there are other ways to obtain funding that may be more convenient depending on the timing of the startup and the expectations that the founders would have. So business angels and so on might be more convenient. This comfort will specifically depend on the main characteristics of the startup (internship, team experience, expectations, etc.). Taking into account the startup stage, there is a special stage where getting funding is quite difficult, such as the seed stage. In this case, seed accelerators have raised their bets on seed startups. The next section will give us a brief introduction to this type of accelerator and then we will take a look at the limitations and future steps to move forward with the project. Citar seed accelerator: The.
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