Strategic renewal through corporate venturing units

This study addresses the challenge of incumbent firms to continuously renew their competitive advantage in order to achieve future profitable growth, and identifies the distinctive organizational characteristics of emerging corporate venturing units that serve as vehicles for such strategic renewal. Using theoretical sampling, cross-case analysis of semi-structured interviews and archival data from 29 established European companies uncovers a planned or opportunistic innovation logic, along with sidesensing, seizing, and/or transforming capabilities within the unit as key differentiators. This leads to the identification of (i) six types of corporate venturing entities, of which (ii) three types achieve a planned innovation logic through networked structures and procedural ambidexterity, of which (iii) one type offers the highest strategic potential by also covering sensing, seizing and transforming capabilities.