Concept and Network Development in Innovative Startups

Abstract

The purpose of this work is to shed light on the relationship between concept development and network development in innovative new ventures. In particular, our interest is to understand how the development of the product concept pushes startups to develop a certain type of network and how, conversely, the concept progressively evolve owing to the interaction with the network itself. The literature in this regard is not well developed yet, for this reason we first proceeded by analysing the two branches of literature separately and then we tried to see if the conjectures made on how the two affect each other are reflected in the empirical analysis. In the first chapter we analyse one of the main processes faced by new ventures, namely the development of the innovative product or service concept. In the second chapter our attention focuses on social networks as one of the most critical variables that affect the entrepreneurial process. Finally, in chapter three we analyse two case studies of startups operating in different contexts and we determine if there is an agreement between our conjectures based on the theoretical framework and our empirical analysis.