2.1.1. Definition(s) of incubation

In the general and the academic literature, many researchers and commentators have tried to define this concept, and a large number of definitions exist. In many aspects, however, these definitions are close.

The table below gives you an overview of the main definitions, mostly issuing from the academic world.

I could also offer you other definitions, issuing in particular from prestigious institutions¹, but I think that, at this stage, you will already have understood that none of them will be identical to any other, while in fact being close.

A common point appears in all the definitions that I have been able to find, stemming back to the biological and medical origins² (Smith and Zhang, 2012) of the term. The incubator helps the entrepreneur in their first steps (their start-up phase) in order that their structure may be able to grow and develop. But, despite the close proximity of these definitions, there is no strict consensus around this concept, for several reasons. We might cite, for example, the fact that research has concentrated over time on different aspects of incubation. From an initial focus on administrative and amenity services, work has since then focused more on business development. Some researchers consider incubators to be organizations, while others see them as entrepreneurial environments. Finally, it should be noted that depending on the country and the continent, the reality of incubation changes.

All these approaches have led the European Commission³ to propose a definition (yet another one), this time a global one for incubation:

“A business incubator is an organisation that accelerates and systematises the process of creating successful enterprises by providing them with a comprehensive and integrated range of support, including: Incubator space, business support services, and clustering and networking opportunities.

By providing their clients with services on a “one-stop-shop” basis and enabling overheads to be reduced by sharing costs, business incubators significantly improve the survival and growth prospects of new start-ups.

A successful business incubator will generate a steady flow of new businesses with above average job and wealth creation potential. Differences in stakeholder objectives for incubators, admission and exit criteria, the knowledge intensity of projects, and the precise configuration of facilities and services, will distinguish one type of business incubator from another.”

This definition, besides seeking in a way to synthesize the different definitions, seems to me to integrate an essential dimension: the operator, the promoter of the incubator themselves and, consequently, their intentions and objectives. I largely agree in this sense, since it does seem useful to me to clearly integrate the promoter of the incubator into the definition we make of incubation, if only for one reason. There is a fundamental reason for the existence of anything. In every case in society, as we know it, everything finds its reason for existing in its objectives. Structures are no exception; they must also have a reason to exist, and thus pursue an objective. The objective may vary according to who operates the structure. It thus seems logical to think that talking about incubation without considering the promoter and their objectives would be to simply truncate our vision of reality.

That being said, it would be useful to express this definition more simply, taking account of what we know of innovation in the field of managing structures: an incubator is a structure which offers services adapted to support the creation or the development of new firms, whose objective varies according to its promoter. This new proposed definition (my own!) seeks to synthesize several dimensions of incubation today. The first, as you will have understood, is to suggest the existence of a goal pursued by the structure’s promoter. Incubators have one or several objective(s), generally entrusted to a designated leader within an organization. The second is the reaffirmation of the incubator as an operational object, supposed to deliver services (whether material or otherwise). Finally, the third is the vocation of the incubator to deal with new topics, that is, to respond to novelty. These three dimensions make it an object that can be grounded in the family of managerial innovations as characterized by some authors, regardless of the environment under consideration.

2.1.2. The different forms of incubation

You can find different criteria that allow us to classify incubators, in particular according to the objectives being pursued, the activities of the incubatees or the promoters. The following table sums up the main classifications proposed in the literature. They agree in classifying incubators into four or five groups, depending on the author.

This approach leads to the emergence of a category of incubators, which has formed the very object of the present research: the corporate incubator of start-ups. This latter, according to the authors, figures in Table 2.2, under the titles “private business development incubator”, “business incubator”, “private business incubator”, “private incubator” or “corporate incubator”. In the research work I have performed, I have chosen the name “corporate incubator of start-ups”, in order to, on the one hand, designate its overall objective, support for start-ups, and additionally the environment which it belongs to, the large group (corporate).

To go further into what these different types of incubators cover, let us zoom in on France, while still considering companies that have international reach.

2.1.3. The diversity of forms of incubation in France

Based on my own experience, and as suggested in the preceding proposed definition, privileging the promoter is an essential criterion. Thus, the following table is intended to share the characteristics of types of incubators of start-ups, while still distinguishing their promoters. This allows us to highlight the specificities of corporate incubators in comparison to all other types of incubators.

Let us pause for a few moments on the characteristics of these incubators. Most of them present themselves as not being for profit. Incubators of economic development, academic and scientific incubators, as well as social incubators seem to relate to what we might consider contributing to the development of the digital economy, essentially to the creation of jobs and value. This should however not hide the fact that these types of incubators are certainly given a budget. It is not an “open bar” for their targets, as it is necessary to steer these structures which have operating costs and cannot (or can no longer) count exclusively on grants from their public sponsors. You will also notice that corporate incubators, just like private investors’ incubators – we might even say “non-corporate private incubators”, that is, those not backed by a large group – display a for-profit goal (for the company and for the start-ups as well). This is a fact, but we must also recognize their vocation to indirectly create employment. Doing business with a start-up means allowing them to develop and to recruit staff. Doubtless, large groups would benefit from being more explicit as to the objectives and benefits of their CIs for themselves, but also for the start-up.

Sharing these characteristics specific to the different types of incubator, and capitalizing on the definition I have previously given for incubation in the wider sense, I propose the following definition for CIs: corporate incubators are structures which offer services adapted to support the creation and development of new firms, whose objective is to develop innovation within large groups… In relation to the stance of large groups today, I cannot go further for this definition, even though you will have understood that we should probably add: …AND to allow start-ups to generate value and jobs. I would like at this stage to confine myself to clearly affirming in this definition the intention of “open innovation“ on the part of these companies to develop their innovations, and we will see throughout this work that this is a tangible reality.

CIs are structures for welcoming the projects of entrepreneurs external or internal to the large group. In the first case, we speak of “entrepreneurship”, that is, projects born outside of the organization and carried forward, for example, by start-ups. In the second case, we speak of “intrapreneurship”, that is, projects born within the organization and carried forward by employees whom we call “intrapreneurs”. In summary, projects external to the company for within the company, and projects internal to the company for within the company⁵.

To be more complete without being exhaustive, we should also note another notion or rather a subtlety in this world of support for start-ups. We often hear about accelerators of start-ups, and we should wonder about the difference with incubators. Is it only a semantic difference, or is it more?

2.1.4. The “accelerator/incubator” subtlety

The end of the 1990s saw the emergence of structures called “incubators” of start-ups, in the USA, in France and in many other countries. Among the best-known incubators in the world, we could mention Bill Gross’s Idealab, and there are many others that the reader can discover by typing “incubator” into any search engine on the web.

The aim of our remarks and this short section is to put the emphasis on support structures for start-ups called “accelerators”, “cousins” of incubators. The emergence of this type of structure is more recent. Many observers consider Paul Graham’s Y Combinator, created in 2005, to be the first structure of this type, quickly followed by TechStars in 2006, and SeedCamp in 2007. Since then, they have multiplied.

As suggested by the definitions given, incubators and thus their cousins, accelerators, are structures whose vocation is to support start-ups in the dimensions of technology, marketing, human resource management or finances, with the support of various services. These latter may also involve helping the start-up to move from an idea to a prototype product or service, or helping the start-up with marketing, technical or commercial development or even financial assistance. Incubators and accelerators can however be distinguished by the nature of their targets (more or less mature start-ups) and by the time frame of their support for the start-up (longer or shorter). Moreover, accelerators are as diverse as incubators with respect to their geographic areas, their activities, their objectives and their owners. It is difficult at this stage to identify any particular trend, as things vary so much from one region to another or within a single region.

In the case of accelerators, note that they generally involve supporting start-ups that mostly already have marketable or marketed products and services. This context is not anecdotal, as it shows that these start-ups need important financial contributions to ensure their growth, that is, to find clients and increase turnover. Their online media presence is more often an echo of their fund-raising than their real goal: commercial partnerships that can be created by the start-ups supported by accelerators. However, a start-up, like all economic structures, has as its main objective (or at least should have as its main objective) finding customers for its solution. An accelerator is by nature a support structure, which allows the start-up to either raise funds, create commercial partnerships, or both in the service of a single goal: rapid growth in its market, by which we mean accelerated growth.

The concept of incubators, like that of accelerators, is thus just as malleable as the other, and depends on the people controlling it. We acknowledge for accelerators, just as we did previously for incubators, the importance of the promoter that we spoke of.

For the aim of this book, we have deliberately not made a distinction between incubators and accelerators, and thus between a corporate incubator and a corporate accelerator, for two reasons. On the one hand, concentrating on this difference would mean focusing on the specific services that these structures might provide. It is evident that these services are often linked to the imagination that the leaders of these structures are able to show, as well as to the needs of the start-ups they support. This is the natural malleability of these structures, and we will have the opportunity to come back to this at length. On the other hand, we do not wish to lose sight of the purpose of this book, which is first of all to deal with the art and the manner in which leaders implement these corporate structures while interacting with their corporate environment. Whether these corporate structures are accelerators or incubators, in the end, matters little or not at all.

Let us, however, narrow down the definitions given previously. I propose the following definition of accelerators, insisting on the notion of growth because this is the leitmotiv for the so-called “accelerated” start-ups: accelerators are structures which provide services adapted to supporting the growth of new firms and whose objective varies according to the promoter. From this definition, there is only one step further when we specify the corporate context: corporate accelerators are structures which provide services adapted to supporting the growth of new firms, and whose aim is to preempt innovations through investment or by commercializing innovations among clients through commercial partnerships.

My interest in giving all these definitions in this book is not to add new definitions to those which already exist. Rather, it is to allow you to perceive what my convictions are after so many years of experience and based on the background I have built through these numerous researches.

Incubation, in particular corporate, is not a matter of chance. On the contrary, it is the fruit of reflection, of managerial practices or techniques, which far exceed the concrete services provided to start-ups. To understand this, it should be realized that large groups have little choice. Constraints and opportunities mix together in the great digital stew. What are the motivations of these large groups? How does this translate strategically for them? What issues then do their support structure for start-ups represent? So many questions which, as you will guess, will help us descend a little more into the mysteries of CI.

2.2.1. An omnipresent political world

The political world is obsessed with topics relating to digital technology, and in particular the topic of young innovative enterprises (start-ups), with the ambition that these latter and the innovations that they convey might contribute to boosting employment and the country’s growth.

This preoccupation of political power has largely been motivated by numerous studies which have appeared in recent years.

An example is a study by McKinsey in 2014, which compared France to 12 other countries that accounted for more than 70% of global GDP (the G8 countries, Brazil, China and India, South Korea and Sweden). The first observation showed us that the share of digital technology in total GDP varied greatly from one country to another (see Figure 2.1). With an eighth place out of 13 in 2013, France featured at the same level as in 2010, in other words slightly below the average, and very far from the leading countries. In the UK, for example, the share of digital technology in GDP reached 10%. This country surpassed France in all the digital components of GDP: e-commerce (>90 billion euros per year in the UK⁷, compared with 51 billion euros in France⁸); business investments (+8 points in total business investments versus France⁹) and public expenditure in the digital field (1.7% of GDP in the UK compared to 0.7% in France).

Apart from this study, we can note that the political world has had (and moreover still has) a desire to better understand the economic changes stemming from digital technology, having ordered many reports. These include that of Christian Blanc: “For an ecosystem of growth” (May 2004), and that of Jean-Luc Beylat and Pierre Tambourin: “Innovation, a major challenge for France” (2013). Whether these reports have been sources of findings or of recommendations, they are all signs that the subject of the digital economy and of young innovative companies was and is considered to be a motor for growth, competitiveness and jobs in a crisis-racked French economy.

“Everywhere in the world, growth and the creation of jobs are mainly determined by young companies basing their development on innovation. In this context, the creation of innovative companies is a major challenge, to be articulated with an ambitious policy in favor of supporting the growth of these companies” (Beylat and Tambourin, 2013).

Public projects on innovation in the broad sense are today many and varied and can be summed up along the major axes that are to be found in political discourse and governmental and regional reports. They talk as much about communication as about education, innovation and its many domains (business creation, technology transfer, etc.), or of investment capital. Who has not heard about the activities of the BPI, of French Tech, or more recently of French Fab? Are our ministers and other secretaries of state not, furthermore, omnipresent on the social networks and at diverse and various events related to start-ups?

This listing, without being exhaustive, is another way of illustrating the priority placed by our public authorities on the business of innovation and in particular digital innovation for several years now.

Having surveyed the political context, let us now simplify the debate without reducing it, by focusing on two actors whose roles are considered by many to be essential at the national level for growth, competitiveness and employment: large groups and start-ups.

2.2.2. The context of large groups

Whether originating in former State monopolies or from the sphere of private enterprise, large groups in France can be considered to be deeply rooted in political, economic and social realities. These large groups benefit the most from the economic opportunities that France has to offer, but also suffer the most from constraints and criticism in cases of national difficulties in all or part of its social and economic activity.

Moreover, with globalization, it should be noted that these roots no longer constitute a guarantee of stability for large groups, as competition at both national and international levels is exacerbated.

Competition now takes place within each single ecosystem, but also between the ecosystems, as “digital” is a cross-border affair. For example, banks offer services online, accessible via terminals such as smart-phones, while mobile operators in turn become bankers, offering financial services via mobile. The business models of the large groups are permanently dissolving and being rebuilt, influenced by this phenomenon of convergence.

Inevitably, the large groups must constantly think and re-think how to ensure their competitiveness and growth, while keeping an eye on the maintenance of employment and the social dialog, to which politicians are very attentive. Seeking competitive advantage, and more broadly performance, is thus more than ever at the heart of the debates that interest the strategists of large groups and attentive observers of a digital universe which continues to expand, and to do this the large groups know that they must undergo managerial evolution.

It is essential for these large groups to rapidly find innovative solutions for their customers, and it must be emphasized that traditional engines of innovation within large groups may prove to be problematic. In fact, I am not telling you anything new if I say that producing innovation based on human and technological assets can often cause delays, as well as redundancies. Delays, because the organization of large groups is still pyramidal, whatever they say. Proposing a new idea means running a gauntlet for its proponent, in order to finally arrive at pseudo-alignment of all the hierarchical strata. Moreover, proposing a new idea on the basis of a certain form of internal culture of types of innovation also naturally leads to not fully challenging oneself with regard to the field of the possible. Finally, a question arises: are we really capable of innovating while remaining totally open to all ideas within large groups? The latter are big machines, and nothing is harder than making large cruise ships turn around. Between the moment when you have the idea, the moment that you turn the wheel and the moment that you actually see that the machine has changed course, a certain amount of time will have passed. The large groups are aware that this time is no longer appropriate today, and thus they approach start-ups for whom wasting time is instantly fatal.

2.2.3. The context of start-ups

As for start-ups, they embody a speed and creativity that the large groups envy and wish to regain. For sure, this often involves single-project structures, that is to say concentrating on a single solution on which a very limited number of people work. Suffice to say that their capacity to pivot and to redefine themselves is total. But a start-up, as Ries suggested to us in 2011, is: “a commercial structure organized by people seeking to design a new product or service in conditions of extreme uncertainty” (Ries, 2011). If this definition gives the start-up a human face – which I find particularly relevant, because these are life stories above all else – it nevertheless places the structure in its reality: its need to rapidly attract customers and investments, and above all the uncertainties that relate to it.

Today, many agree in speaking of and demonstrating the major role of start-ups in the digital economy. But it should be noted that support for start-ups is not unanimous. The impact of start-ups is sometimes seen as destructive of value. However, considering the Schumpeterian process of creative destruction, we can consider that start-ups may destroy value in a particular area or areas, but may also create it at least as much in some other area or areas. The result would then be positive overall, even if the debate remains open. Furthermore, what use does this debate have? Start-ups exist and their actions are irreversible. We must deal with it, because no declarations for or against start-ups will change the state of things: ICT gives latitude to create unprecedented things in human history. For my part, as you will have guessed, I am a fervent defender of the value brought by start-ups.

Why and how are start-ups important? To answer this question, we must deal with things in a concrete fashion based on precise economic criteria. This means avoiding superficial analyses or baseless debates and analyzing things more precisely. I have three criteria that explain the motivation for large groups to attract start-ups.

First, start-ups as a vector of innovations for growth? Start-ups have risk written into their DNA. Taking risks means the chance of losing, but also of winning. This singular character of start-ups leads us to perceive them as vectors of innovation. Perception matches reality for many authors. In his 1997 book The innovator’s dilemma. Why new technologies cause great firms to fail, Clayton M. Christensen supports the idea that disruptive innovations (or innovations of rupture, that is, those based on non-existent technologies) can only arise from the initiative of the largest companies because their mode of development is too costly. For the author, a disruptive technology is a new technology whose economic potential is still unknown, but costly at each stage of its development (research, launch, industrialization and marketing). However, if this potential is realized, such a disruptive technology harms the existing technologies from which companies draw their profits and, in the majority of cases, benefit from monopoly rents. Start-ups, due to their capacity to develop such innovations of rupture, can then be considered as vectors of innovation for growth. Furthermore, such technologies of rupture which often allow the expansion of markets and the acquisition of new customers therefore do not lack interest from large groups. We can thus again understand, as said before, the interests of large groups in start-ups.

Second, start-ups as vector of employment? Let us think for a moment on the scale of a larger country than France: the USA. Three million jobs: that is the figure advanced by the Kauffman Foundation in 2010, analyzing the impact of start-ups on the American economy between 1992 and 2005. This foundation also concludes that this compensated for the net loss of jobs in existing companies. To cite another institution, the OECD in its 2013 report “Innovation in the service of growth” confirms this trend for the USA as well as for Europe. It is, according to this organization, newly created companies that create jobs and the older ones that shed them. This observation remains true ten years later: before, during and after the financial crisis, from 2001 to 2011. The interested reader may, if they wish, complement this analysis with many other studies that reach the same conclusions.

Third, start-ups as a vector of transformation? Two aspects of “transformation” may be proposed. First is the transformation of society (in the sense of a country) itself; therefore, it is necessary to return to the point of “start-ups as vector of innovations”. All these innovations which are offered to us only find legitimacy in the fact that we take them on board. That is to say, they change our relationship with our environment by modifying our habits. Another aspect of “transformation” deals with large groups in terms of new modes of management. It is agreed by many authors that the activism of start-ups leads large groups to be much more concerned with innovations, thus to not rest on their laurels – that is, on their core business as if it were a guaranteed income. Start-ups act as agents that do not cease propagating their ideas. To benefit from start-ups, it is necessary at least to act like them, or to appropriate from them in one way or another. The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail (Christensen, 2013) shows that the role of start-ups has for 30 years helped the evolution of large groups to become more active in matters of innovation. This has also been observable for at least the last ten years in France. The “confrontation” between Free and Orange on the Internet is an excellent illustration. Would Orange have had its Livebox without Free, then a young Internet start-up, and its Freebox? I will not offer a firm opinion on this question and will content myself with saying that this must surely have accelerated the implementation of Orange’s Livebox.

The most pertinent way of judging an innovation, whatever its nature, is the welcome it receives from a majority of its target audience. Furthermore, producing innovation of whatever kind is expensive, at least in terms of time and resources. Finally, an innovation always involves actors from very different fields. The large groups have well understood this and have translated it into a willingness to work with start-ups, these new champions of innovation. This willingness is embodied precisely in the “corporate incubator“, one of the expressions of the entrepreneurial policy of large groups.

2.3.1. Distrust is necessary

But we must recognize that, whatever the strategies for working with “start-ups”, proponents of “purchasing” or “partnerships” within large groups believe that start-ups possess financial ratios and organizational robustness, which are not in line with the “purchasing or partnerships” criteria of large groups. In fact, start-ups with weak funds of their own, a limited turnover and structures whose organization is young and little tested remain fragile in the eyes of actors in large groups.

This understanding is all the more present when large groups are far from keen to multiply their external partners. Large groups tend rather to take the opposite approach, especially in this era of crisis. They define themselves historically and culturally as industries and intend to put in place industrial programs. Start-ups are often regarded as too young and entailing risks which large groups do not always want to take. Equally often the question arises of how to choose them and observe them long enough to be reassured and to implement partnerships.

These assessments may provide contexts for involvement, which are at the same time strong but not greatly compelling on the part of large groups with regard to start-ups. It is, in the end, quite simple for large groups to call upon financial resources to set up ecosystems, create communication or invest through funds. They thus respond to the political demand to support ecosystems, and to the pressure of the ecosystem itself. In the process they take the opportunity to self-promote, hope for some gains on their investments and give some of their staff the opportunity to discover start-ups, all without actually engaging further with the start-ups. Rather, in a way they remain on active standby.

Conversely, some large groups are aware of the creativity, the operational speed and the flexibility of start-ups. They offer ruptures or incremental innovations, whether in terms of technology, usage or models. Capitalizing on this vibrant force for large groups means benefiting from the development resources of start-ups and thus minimizing their costs, while closely following the trends and other weak signals of a digital world, which innovates every day. Finally, start-ups, who rarely work hand in glove with a single large group, may constitute bridges or points of meeting between large groups, facilitating relations between the latter.

These paradoxical assessments are real. What finally and increasingly prevails is what the news shows us: things advance towards ever more concreteness. The ambiguity of large groups on the subject stems from pragmatism in strategy, bringing together without too much risk the conflicting views cited above.

The gradual emergence of corporate support structures for start-ups, which act like airlocks of intermediation, is its undeniable expression. This expression in its operational mode is in itself a new method, a new practice for the large group that adopts it. It is enough to consult the web to find many examples suggesting that large groups intend to engage further and take advantage of start-ups, no longer only to cultivate their image, but also in the dimensions of improving their performance in innovation. These structures of open innovation are structures internal to large groups, over which they therefore have control. They can shuffle significant volumes of start-ups, duly selected according to the needs of the moment. They deal directly with the start-ups (sparing them as much as possible from their internal rigidities) and in (rapid) time-frames, which allow the large groups to evaluate the soundness and relevance of proposals coming from the start-ups.

In this context of hyper-competition, the corporate incubator seems to offer the large group an ideal and secure framework in which to implement a series of actions and responses, relying on a myriad of start-ups. These actions and responses are dynamic strategic interactions (D’Aveni, 1995), an approach that constitutes a way of managing competitive advantages in a dynamic fashion, while always considering the position of competitors.

The phenomenon of corporate incubators of start-ups in business expands a little every day, even if we must recognize that this activism among start-ups is nothing new. Remember that a number of large groups in France, as well as overseas, began investing in start-ups many years ago¹¹. These were the first experiments which, over time, transformed into a clearer approach of supporting start-ups as a way to supervise, organize and even mediate the innovation policy of large groups. Some believe that CIs are anything but a mutation of older types of approaches dealing with start-ups.

2.3.2. A marriage of challenges

The emergence of CIs is thus to be considered as a component of the entrepreneurial policy of large groups. However, this is not obvious, as the position of the CI in the overall organization, its independence, its need for involvement from internal actors or even its capacity to show results to remain in the organization seem yet to be established. These are all the points which our cases will illustrate.

The direct relationship between a start-up and a large company carries a major risk of death for the start-up. The old saying “time is money” is never as true as for a start-up dealing with a large company. Projects in the field of innovation within large groups often encounter delays in implementation, which are not tolerable for a small structure like a start-up, assuming of course that these projects are not re-prioritized or even canceled by the large group in the process. In fact, a start-up is a structure of human scale, with few contacts interacting with innumerable contacts at any given moment, when of course the latter do not change frequently over time within the large company. There is also another reason for losing time, beyond getting acquainted with new people or abandonment of projects.

A start-up is innovative but cannot always protect its ideas by filing patents when dealing with a large company. Have the impressive R&D centers of large groups not often already explored or thought about, without having produced, the innovations proposed by start-ups? You will always find someone within a large group who will tell you that. The objectives of collaboration thus become quite uncertain for start-ups, even if for them it is sometimes quite difficult to say “no” to a large group. A start-up needs the financial means to establish its rapid growth and must also often produce expensive models if it wants to convince a large group. This is a way that the latter has found to reassure itself about the merits of spending time on the start-up.

I might add that, despite efforts being made, delays in payments by large groups to small structures still remains a more than delicate issue. This is certainly a major point for improvement on the part of large groups with regard to start-ups and more generally with regard to all their providers. Having delays in payment, for example, of 60 days or even of 30 days requires these small structures to undergo certain kinds of financial turbulence, which is particularly time consuming. Suffice to say that the already fragile structure of a start-up may find itself, whatever the sum involved, becoming even more fragile.

A start-up transforms itself and pivots rapidly over short periods of time, and a large group decides slowly whether to take this or that direction. The pyramidal structure and its many hierarchical layers are equally brakes on the large group’s decision-making process. These are all facts that may sometimes lead many in the ecosystem to see a large group as a graveyard. Where a start-up comes to seek life and growth for its activity, there it finds death. This is a scenario which, you might say, is quite a grim picture, even pessimistic. Yet this gives us not only reasons to hope, but also arguments for continuing to advance towards building more efficient relationships between start-ups and large groups.

2.3.3. Good heart against bad fortune, or the marriage of convenience!

In fact, start-ups seem to want to play along with large groups by joining CIs. Three elements, among others, may explain this desire for marriage, which we may describe as a marriage of convenience. Firstly, remember that, for start-ups, it is not generally design in itself that constitutes a challenge. The design of the service or product is the very purpose of the birth of the start-up. In contrast, market knowledge is no easy thing for a small structure, which rarely has sufficient resources to evaluate the congruity between its proposal and the market. If the start-up produces a potential service or product, expansion becomes a major problem for small structures. It may have a product or service, use the Internet as a means to make it known, but run up against expansion difficulties to the point of not being able to ensure the necessary quality of service. In other words, the motivation of customers for the product or service then finds itself sharply reduced. Finally, with a few customers, all is well, but very rapidly reaching a customer base, which is large enough and capable of positioning the start-up as the leader of the new product or service, is often vital. The digital world also creates imitations that are sometimes better than the original, and we as users are prone to switch our attention without a second thought.

To be supported by or in a partnership with a large group thus brings security of execution and expansion, as well as an essential guarantee for all the actors in the economic world, and even allows them to imagine the international level. Despite the dangers, start-ups are still currently interested in these marriages of convenience and have clear expectations of large groups, which may be summarized as follows: better support in their day-to-day operations, in particular through the development of support programs, to build collaborations throughout the duration.

Large groups tend to respond to this expectation, as it should be noted that corporate incubators quickly offer themselves to targeted start-ups. These start-ups have a wide variety of incubators to choose from, which are operated by universities, independents or regions. We should then recognize that CI would constitute an ideal framework for a start-up seeking its market. Why? On the one hand, a start-up will then have access to a dedicated structure with contact people at their disposal. It will always have an ensured point of mediation. On the other hand, the start-up during its corporate incubation period has access to competent people in charge of business units, through the intermediation of the corporate incubator. Moreover, a start-up that joins an incubator must be legally offered a contract in due form (in the case of serious large groups). Though this contract may vary from one company to another, it sets out the relationship in advance and aims overall to protect at the same time the start-up (for example, in its intellectual property) and the large group (for example, in the reclassification of an external presence among its employees). Finally, a start-up benefits from the infrastructures and events put at its disposal by the large group within the limits that this latter will have set, according to the proposed program. In such a context, the question is no longer “why would the large group want to make a contract with such a start-up?”, but rather “how will the large group and the start-up make a contract?”. We are no longer in the domain of “why?”, but of “how?”, as the chosen start-up will necessarily motivate the large group. There are many candidates for corporate incubation, but few are chosen. Such a context is thus less risky for the start-up, which can concentrate on the implementation of its partnership with the large group.

This double interest, for the large group at the same time as the start-up, places on the corporate incubator a particular responsibility. This unique object, an intermediary agent and architect of relations, is at the same time devoted to its guest, but also the company which it represents. We thus understand better the essential importance of the efficiency of such a structure of corporate incubation which, far from being a passing fad, may be considered a major mode of open innovation between large groups and start-ups. This suggests inquiring as to the adjustment or alignment between the start-up’s CI and its environment, that is, the “host” company, and beyond that, what the managers of these structures must implement, often in a situation of quiet adversity for the companies.

To this end, it seems to me once again useful to explore the literature to understand how the subject of incubation is treated today by researchers, in parallel with an approach of questioning CI actors in France. Concerning the research component, this is what we can say in a succinct manner.

2.4.1. No direct research on CI

Concerning CIs specifically, I have not identified any research dealing with them. This is doubtless due to the fact that a CI is a new structure dedicated to open innovation for the company that seeks to adopt it. I thus encountered in my research and reflections a double challenge. In the first place, it meant questioning the ability of theories and research results on incubation in the wider sense to enlighten me. In the second place, it meant ensuring that I could identify the phenomenon of corporate incubation with enough precision, that is, to avoid the generalizations that we so often read.

Overall, what we know about incubators can be summed up as follows (Hackett and Dilts, 2004): first, in a “transaction costs”¹² and market perspective, incubators constitute a systematic approach to monitoring resources and reducing costs during the emergent phase of the incubated companies. Second, the configuration of the incubator must respond to local needs and norms. Third, the process of incubation relies at the same time on the incubator as well as the incubated company. It is an effort shared between the incubator and the incubatee. Fourth, the time and intensity of intervention of the incubator’s leader, combined with the involvement and alignment of the incubator/incubatee pair, affect the success of the incubatee. Fifth and finally, relationships within networks, such as institutionalized transfers of knowledge, improve the likelihood of success of the incubation.

2.4.2. The emergence of a perspective

For the goal of my work, the perspective relating to the theory of contingency and its extensions (configurations) seems most apt to shed light on the adjustment of the incubator to its environment. Some words of explanation will be useful. Work on contingency seeks to identify variables to which incubators adjust to achieve a maximum level of performance. We might, for example, demonstrate the adjustment of incubators to their local context to define their objectives and their missions (Autio and Klosfsten, 1998). Furthermore, the theory of configurations developed in the field of organizational research adds to the theory of contingency a systematic vision of the organization (Meyer et al., 1993). The organization is understood as a whole comprising multiple variables combining in a coherent manner, that is, the analysis of multiple interactions within a single system is omnipresent because the variables (which may be human beings) mutually interact and influence each other.

A recent work (Bakkali et al., 2012) in this area of contingencies/configurations may usefully make it possible to approach the corporate incubator as a structure requiring consequent managerial work of adaptation for its adoption by the organization. Several “function/structure” pairs which incubators tend to resemble are highlighted, based on two findings. The first finding suggests that we may attribute to incubators five functions (Carayannis and Von Zedtwitz, 2005; Aernoudt, 2004; Grimaldi and Grandi, 2005; Albert et al., 2003). The second finding is that “the choice of structure is relatively free of constraint, that is that incubators are not limited in the choice of their organizational structure by contingent factors” (Bakkali et al., 2012, p. 10). Based on these findings about functional diversity and structural freedom, the researchers suggest that “groups of existing incubators tend towards five coherent function/structure pairs with maximized performance” (Bakkali et al., 2012, p. 11).

Using Mintzberg’s typologies of 1982, five “function/structure“ pairs appear, and I share them with you in table 2.5.

These results that I have found in the academic literature are precious, in that they allow the better formalization of CI. The vocation of CI for start-ups is the development of innovation. CI for start-ups can thus easily be qualified as an “adhocratic” structure voluntarily set up by large groups with the objective of being more innovative and agile, through collaborating with start-ups. My research on CIs thus allows me to extend the few existing works on the subject of incubation, and this also constitutes one of the original features of this book. Armed with this conviction, I approached the subject hoping to bring solutions to the problem of the implementation of CI.