The process of new venture creation is characterized by the need to decide and take action in the face of uncertainty. Especially in the context of technology-based ventures uncertainty is substantial, posing difficulties for strategic decision-making based on prediction and planning. and how entrepreneurs' emphasis on these logics shifts and re-shifts over time. From our data, we induce a dynamic model which extends the literature on strategic decision-making in venture creation, illustrating how external and venture conditions -including not only uncertainty but also resource position and stakeholder pressure -lead to changes in venture scope, and thereby to shifts in the use of decision-making logics.

Firms increasingly adopt an open innovation model in which they rely on technology alliances to complement and supplement their internal innovation efforts. Although previous studies provide in-depth insight into the impact of technology alliances on the innovation performance, they remain relatively silent on how technology alliances eventually influence the financial performance of the firm. The purpose of this paper is to develop and test a conceptual framework that disentangles both the value-enhancing and cost-increasing effects of technology alliances on financial performance. The model was tested with a sample of 305 Belgian manufacturing firms. Combining data from the Belgian Community Information Survey (CIS IV) database and the BELFIRST database, structural equation analyses were conducted on the connection among technology alliance portfolio diversity, product innovation performance, and financial performance. This study's data provide empirical confirmation for the assumption of existing research that technology alliance portfolio diversity has an indirect positive impact on financial performance via increased product innovation performance. However, a direct cost-increasing effect of technology alliance portfolio diversity on financial performance is observed. Moreover, the structural equation analyses suggest that, in the short-term, the direct cost-increasing effect of technology alliance portfolio diversity exceeds the indirect value-generating effect of technology alliances. These findings contribute to the current research on open innovation in two important ways. First, these results support the open innovation model by illuminating the interconnectedness between internal and external innovation strategies. In particular, technology alliance portfolio diversity has a positive impact on internal innovation efforts, which increases product innovation performance. Second, the findings complement the focus of existing open innovation research on the value-generating properties of technology alliances, directing attention to the cost-increasing effects of such collaborative strategies. On a managerial level, these findings suggest that, when making technology alliance decisions, managers not only should consider the potential benefits of such collaborative strategies but also should take into account the additional costs of intensifying the technology alliance portfolio.

Ventures operating under uncertainty face challenges defining a sustainable value proposition. Six longitudinal case studies reveal two approaches to business model development: focused commitment and simultaneous experimentation. While focused commitment positively affects initial growth, this commitment and lack of variety jeopardize long-term survival. Simultaneous experimentation implies lower initial growth levels, but facilitates long-term survival by enacting variety in a resource-effective manner. This article enriches organizational learning theory by demonstrating that not only distant search but also simultaneous experimentation results in variety. Moreover, simultaneous experimentation implies effectual behavior and reconciles the apparent juxtaposition between 'action' and 'planning.'

New ventures as well as new business units experience significant difficulties in finding a viable business model. They often need to adapt their initial business model due to the presence of uncertainty and ambiguity. Technology-based companies are confronted with particularly high degrees of uncertainty and ambiguity. We hypothesize that adaptation is crucial for the performance (measured as survival) of these businesses, but that this effect is moderated by the (in)dependence of the new technology-based business and by the industry in which it is active. We test the adaptation-performance hypothesis through a survival analysis of a sample of 117 independent new ventures and business units. Our findings suggest that adaptation is beneficial in less mature, capital-intensive and high-velocity industries but not so in more mature, stable industries. Also, adaptation reduces failure rates in dependent business units as compared to independent ventures. Copyright Springer 2007business model adaptation, performance, new technology-based businesses, D83, M13, O32,