Designing the Successful Corporate Accelerator

CHAPTER 1ACCELERATORS AND CORPORATE INNOVATION

Source: Harvard Business Review¹

Innovation is a smoldering hot topic for executives in all industries, all across the globe. As with our allegorical team at FabCo, business leaders are increasingly concerned about the disruptive technologies and business models taking over their industries. In fact, the word disruption was mentioned more than 1,800 times each quarter in public company earnings calls in 2019, up from only ~300 times per quarter in 2009.²

According to a McKinsey survey, 80% of executives think their current business models are at risk to be disrupted in the near future, and 84% say that innovation is important to their growth strategy.³ A similar survey by Accenture tells the same story: 84% of executives in the United States consider their future success to be “very” or “extremely” dependent on innovation.⁴ A survey by KPMG showed that 88% of corporate executives thought that collaboration with startups was essential for their own innovation strategy.⁵ There are a lot of surveys from consulting firms saying essentially the same thing: innovation is important for the future success of most companies, and partnering with startups is a critical component of that innovation plan.

Innovation is good for corporations in important ways – such as enabling faster growth, increasing stock prices, and even sheer survival. ...