About Corporate Venture Building
How do corporates stay ahead of their game? Businesses need to constantly re-invent themselves to keep thriving. This is where Venture Building comes in. It means implementing new business models in a separate start-up spin-off.
Corporate Ventures ditch traditional structures and benefit from the corporate assets of their mother company. This means that the speed of a start-up is boosted by the economic power of an established corporate player.
Access to corporate capabilities such as Sales, Production, Supply Chain Management, Finance, Legal, and others, gives ventures a functional head start.
Expertise and know-how regarding market insights, models for risk & fraud detection, AI & ML models, and cybersecurity enable ventures to build cutting-edge solutions.
Capabilities such as large-scale contracts to source licenses, resources, raw materials, components, enable ventures to scale-up fast.
Corporate Ventures benefit from a spillover of brand and reputation, access to customers and an initial customer base, channel partners and access to ecosystems, as well as intellectual property (IP). As a result, they are able to differentiate themselves and accelerate their development.
Access to technological resources reduces investments and unit costs during the Scaling Phase. This can refer, for example, to individual technologies, technology platforms and toolkits, IT for transactional purposes, safety and security systems, Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Access to data allows fast and effective statistical analysis and training of AI models.
HYVE and Pioneers – two leading innovation consultancies – are joining forces to offer 360-degree solutions which can be tailored to corporate needs. With our proven approach, and experienced team of in-house experts, we build and enable successful ventures.
Together, we form teams that have a proven track record in innovation and entrepreneurship. HYVE’s corporate innovation experience and Pioneers’ many years of successful start-up and corporate innovation work make us your 360-degree partner for Corporate Venture Building.
Each team is led by an experienced venture architect and staffed with venture consultants who have relevant industry experience. And when you need them, our diverse team structure and combined expert network means we have the right professionals on hand to perfect your offering – from research and design to marketing and sales, and more.
A successful corporate venture building process is rooted in corporate strategy and consists of two major building blocks:
As dedicated experts for corporate innovation & entrepreneurship, we help corporates with ideating, selecting, and evaluating ventures that are ready for take-off and are aligned with corporate innovation strategy.
SETUP PHASE: In collaboration with the management team, we define a strategic portfolio for positioning and building future ventures.
PROCESS DESIGN PHASE: Based on the companies’ assets, capabilities and structures we design a venture process ready to roll-out.
OPPORTUNITY GENERATION & SELECTION PHASE: By connecting to existing processes, we ramp-up the Venture Studio program and start the ideation, evaluation, and selection of promising opportunities.
As enthusiastic innovators and product developers, we help corporates to grow their ventures. We do so by adding needed capabilities to the team, getting involved in coaching and providing network access.
EXPLORATION PHASE: To start off, we explore customer needs with different research methods. Based on the results, we build first prototypes and test them iteratively through user experiments.
PROTOTYPING & REFINEMENT PHASE: We develop a first functional solution and launch pilot projects in suitable markets. In parallel, a powerful venture team is being recruited.
GO-TO-MARKET PHASE: Once the Prototyping & Refinement Phase is completed with success, we conclude the necessary contracts and define the target markets, as well as an organizational setup for efficient operation.
Together, HYVE and Pioneers have more than 28 years of combined experience working with corporations. The majority of DAX- and ATX-listed companies are among our customers. At the same time, we have successfully launched start-ups and guided our customers on the way to start-up ventures..
At first glance, the corporate and the start-up world seem to be opposites. Start-ups operate in an environment of the highest uncertainty. They require significant initial investments and fast-paced action, as well as decision making. At the same time, corporate enterprises have a long-term perspective. They strive for short-term ROI and therefore highly efficient structures and processes.
Successful Corporate Venture Building means bridging the gap between these economic, cultural, and operational differences. We know corporate innovation logics and will integrate existing corporate assets throughout the venturing process.
Our Venture Building Ecosystem consists of numerous organizations, founders and experts, who share our passion for exploring and empowering new ideas. Numerous successful venture program and venture start-up launches, for our customers, as well as by ourselves, proof our approach.
HYVE
Giordano is Managing Director at HYVE and lecturer at the University of Salzburg, SMBS, Munich Business School and École des Ponts Business School. Besides 11+ years of professional experience in consulting and innovation management, he is the founder of Homefox.
Pioneers
Anton is a Managing Partner of Pioneers.io, STRABAG Client Lead, and Venture Building Expert. He specializes in the planning, management, and further development of long-term innovation portfolios as well as the development of new ventures outside the core business. Furthermore, he was part of the management team at startup 300 Ag and zero21 accelerator program.
OFFNER.tech GmbH
Thomas is a designated expert in building and managing start-up programs. Throughout his career, he founded and ran several corporate Venture Programs, among others Saturn‘s MS-Spacelab, the EY Start-up Challenge, and the ProsiebenSat.1 SevenVentures Pitch Day. Next to his management positions at Audi, Intel, and Siemens he successfully founded internet start-ups like the Media Service Group.
HYVE
Florian is the founder of the fashion start-up bforest.de. As a Business Developer for CEP, he created an innovative fitness line and established a brand collaboration with freeletics.de. Currently, he co-initiates the think tank troublemaker-thinking and supports HYVE as an innovation consultant. In this role, he supports various clients in finding and implementing innovative solutions.
