W3: Burgelman & Valikangas (2005): Managing Internal Corporate Venturing Cycles

Question 1

ICV orphans

Answer 1

Situation in which a company has uncommitted financial resources and it can afford to support internal-venturing projects. If the prospects of the mainstream business are sufficient, there is little motivation to support ICV actively. A number of entrepreneurial projects are likely to drift along as “orphan” projects

Question 2

All-out ICV drive

Answer 2

Situation in which a company has financial resources available but the prospects of its mainstream business are expected to be insufficient for profitable growth, top management is motivated to support ICV projects actively. Then, it is likely to form a new-venture division or new-business group. Such a structural arrangement becomes the home for all existing ICV orphan projects

Question 3

ICV irrelevance

Answer 3

If there are few committed financial resources available, but the prospects of the mainstream business look promising, top management is likely to consider ICV irrelevant. All attention is to be focused on exploiting opportunities in the core business

Question 4

Desperately seeking ICV

Answer 4

A lack of uncommitted financial resources combined with a mainstream business with inadequate growth prospects is likely to lead top managers to latch on desperately to the first reasonable-looking ICV project that comes their way. Given the limited choice and substantial uncertainty, the likelihood of failure is high