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2014
Conference Paper
Titel
Methodological facilitation of collaboration in innovation networks
Abstract
Organizations in the start-up phase are facing scarce resources and lacking experience. The 'valley of death' describes this danger along the development of a new organization mainly focusing on the financial perspective. However, the danger of failure along the development of an organization is not only due to financial reasons. The financial status can easily be monitored by performance indicators and actions can be derived from these. Other important aspects that are crucial and need to be monitored and improved are the structural capital (e.g. organization/management), human capital (e.g. professional competence and soft-skills) and relational capital (e.g. relations to Venture Capitalists, universities). These aspects are intangible by nature and therefore more difficult to evaluate than the financial status, but the success of a company highly depends on these aspects. Furthermore interdisciplinary problem definitions are increasingly demanding professional expertise and technological applications from different research fields. As a solution an assessment and improvement of intellectual capital combined with the identification of collaboration potential with partners can support organizations to survive the 'valley of death'. Therefore we developed an integrated methodology that assesses the intellectual capital and resources of an organization and evaluates the collaboration potential between different organizations to improve the success of each organization. As a result the combination of entrepreneurial knowledge in networks can lead to multiplying effects for all involved parties and lead to multiple-win situations. The bundled expertise of research organizations, universities, enterprises and start-ups improves the overall performance of the participating organizations concerning acquisition, problem solving and efficiency. The methodology puts a strong focus on practical application.