Start-ups face several issues and challenges in the course of their development as a compa-ny. Open innovation has been discussed in research for more than a decade as a concept, which can bring benefits to a company. Even though most of the research has been focus-ing on large enterprises, some researchers discuss also benefits for small companies like start-ups. Nevertheless, it can be observed that some start-ups decide to adopt the opposite of open innovation, namely closed innovation, through not sharing internal knowledge to the outside world. Hence, start-ups perceive the benefits of open innovation differently and decide accordingly whether to adopt open innovation or not. The purpose of this study is to explore if start-ups decide to actually do the former and what reasons they have to do so. Therefore, this study will further discover at what point in the development of their start-up and with whom they adopt open innovation. As an attractive industry for start-ups, the mobile services industry is selected as a scope for this study. Furthermore, Sweden is selected as the country of study, due to its reputation as one of the most innova-tive countries in the world. A qualitative study has been conducted using in-depth interviews with founders and co-founders of start-ups to retrieve narrative stories about their start-up’s development from the first day of an idea to a scalable business, and their experiences and motivations in re-gards to the application of open innovation practices. The analysis of this study detects pat-terns among the interviewed start-ups and concludes that start-ups in the mobile services industry in Sweden adopt open innovation in each phase of their development process. Furthermore, these patterns include several reasons why the start-ups applied open innova-tion practices and with whom, which are changing over the course of their development.

<p>Many authors (refer: Swayne and Tucker, 1973; Kahneman and Lovallo, 1994; Baron, 1998; Stewart et al., 1998; Simon et al., 1999; Simon and Houghton, 2003; Baum and Lock, 2004; Mathews, 2008) have examined the traits and skills of the entrepreneur. Others have been more interested in their behaviors (refer: Bhave, 1994; Byers et al., 1997; Sarasvathy, 2001; Shook et al., 2003; Baron, 2007; Davidsson, 2008), trying to describe the entrepreneurial processes on the initial stages of venture development. However, studies that try to define how an entrepreneur reacts when facing changes have not been found in the literature. The focus of this research is thus, to explore the attitude of the entrepreneur towards changes throughout the development of the start-up project.</p><p>The theoretical background is divided into three main parts: the entrepreneurial attitude, the attitude towards change, and the relation between perceptions of organizational climate and attitudes. The first section reviews the literature about the traits and behaviors that define an entrepreneur. The second section concentrates on research papers concerning the attitude towards change for middle managers in well-established firms. Finally, the third section, through a review of the relevant literature, emphasizes the importance of the impact of the working environment perception on people’s attitude towards work.</p><p>The approach of this qualitative study is inductive at first, but also incorporates a deductive approach during the data analysis using a grounded theory method. The data were gathered through seven semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs from Cyprus, India, Mexico, United Kingdom, and Sweden.</p><p>The outcome of the present study is a model emphasizing the main results of the research. It presents three main reasons (interest/work experience in the business area, definition of the gap in the market, and desire to create) that lead to the decision to initiate the project. The market and future perception, as they have an impact on the actual start of the process, are presented and discussed as well. Concerning the attitude towards changes occurring during the process, four different reactions have been found to be relevant (adaptation, search for assistance, determination/commitment, and passion/persistence). Furthermore, the help provided by the learning experience, the social networking, and the future planning to overcome changes were also identified. Finally, the perception by the entrepreneur of the change and the overall process are explained.</p>

Many authors (refer: Swayne and Tucker, 1973; Kahneman and Lovallo, 1994; Baron, 1998; Stewart et al., 1998; Simon et al., 1999; Simon and Houghton, 2003; Baum and Lock, 2004; Mathews, 2008) have examined the traits and skills of the entrepreneur. Others have been more interested in their behaviors (refer: Bhave, 1994; Byers et al., 1997; Sarasvathy, 2001; Shook et al., 2003; Baron, 2007; Davidsson, 2008), trying to describe the entrepreneurial processes on the initial stages of venture development. However, studies that try to define how an entrepreneur reacts when facing changes have not been found in the literature. The focus of this research is thus, to explore the attitude of the entrepreneur towards changes throughout the development of the start-up project. The theoretical background is divided into three main parts: the entrepreneurial attitude, the attitude towards change, and the relation between perceptions of organizational climate and attitudes. The first section reviews the literature about the traits and behaviors that define an entrepreneur. The second section concentrates on research papers concerning the attitude towards change for middle managers in well-established firms. Finally, the third section, through a review of the relevant literature, emphasizes the importance of the impact of the working environment perception on people’s attitude towards work. The approach of this qualitative study is inductive at first, but also incorporates a deductive approach during the data analysis using a grounded theory method. The data were gathered through seven semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs from Cyprus, India, Mexico, United Kingdom, and Sweden. The outcome of the present study is a model emphasizing the main results of the research. It presents three main reasons (interest/work experience in the business area, definition of the gap in the market, and desire to create) that lead to the decision to initiate the project. The market and future perception, as they have an impact on the actual start of the process, are presented and discussed as well. Concerning the attitude towards changes occurring during the process, four different reactions have been found to be relevant (adaptation, search for assistance, determination/commitment, and passion/persistence). Furthermore, the help provided by the learning experience, the social networking, and the future planning to overcome changes were also identified. Finally, the perception by the entrepreneur of the change and the overall process are explained.

Even though growth hacking is a new concept, it has become a buzz-word among entrepreneurs and start-ups. Various startups that have achieved extensive growth, such as Dropbox, Uber, Airbnb, have been sharing their success stories. However, to date, the focus of this concept was more on the practicalities instead of the theoretical research. With so many start-ups that fail to grow, it is important to research growth methodologies, that can help young entrepreneurs to successfully establish themselves. This paper studies growth hacking concept, by trying to understand how the growth hacking strategy works and how it could be used to retain a user-base in a start-up. With the help of an extensive literature review, interviews with the entrepreneurs and a case study analysis, this research provides (1) insights into the theory of growth hacking and retention marketing,(2) examples of its practices, and (3) an implementation of suggestions made based on the findings. The results of this study indicate that growth hacking is a broad concept and has numerous interpretations. Growth hacking framework has been applied at the early stages of start-ups, however, the growth hacking concept has not been defined as well as it has not been determined whether it is a relevant method to improve user retention. In this study, it was discovered that growth hacking practices can improve to set up theuser retention strategy. However, growth hacking strategies must be tailored and adapted to the entrepreneurial venture’s business model. / Även om growth hacking är ett nytt koncept, har det blivit ett buzz-word bland företagare och nystartade företag. Olika nystartade företag som använt growth hacking och uppnått omfattande tillväxt t.ex Dropbox, Uber och Airbnb har alla förmedlat sina framgångshistorier. Men hittills har fokus legat mer på det praktiska i stället för den teoretiska forskningen. Med så många nystartade företag som inte lyckas växa, är det viktigt att undersöka tillväxtmetodik, som kan hjälpa unga företagare att framgångsrikt etablera sig. Denna uppsats studerar growth hacking konceptet, genom att försöka förstå hur denna strategi fungerar och hur det kunde användas för att behålla en användarbas. Med hjälp av en omfattande litteraturgenomgång, intervjuer med företagare och en fallstudie, ger denna forskning (1) insikter i teorin om growth hacking och retention marknadsföring, (2) exempel på dess praxis, och (3) en implementering av förslag har gjorts baserat på resultaten. Resultaten av denna studie visar att growth hacking är ett brett begrepp och har många tolkningar. Growth hacking ramverk har tillämpats i tidiga stadier på nystartade företag, dock har growth hacking koncept inte definierats, liksom har det inte fastställts huruvida det är en relevant metod för att förbättra användarbevarande. I denna studie upptäcktes det att growth hacking metoder kan förbättra utvecklingen av strategier för bibehållning av användare. Dock måste growth hacking strategier vara skräddarsydda och anpassade till det entreprenöriella företagets affärsmodell.

第一個由政府主導的創業競賽－科技部創新創業激勵計畫始於2013年。邁入第三年，已舉辦了六個梯次。根據科技新報指出，截至2015年4月，其中真正走向新事業發展的僅有38間。因此，本研究欲瞄準獲得優勝的參賽團隊，研究其在創業的歷程中面臨到什麼樣的改變因素，使得參賽團隊改變其方向。 本研究採用個案研究的方式，從FITI計畫歷屆獲得前十名優勝隊伍中挑選出四組作為研究個案，並搭配Timmons Model中所提到的「機會」「團隊」、「資源」及「動態關係」，透過這些面向來探討個案後續新創企業發展的改變因素，及如何與此理論相呼應。 研究結果發現，參與FITI計畫的創業團隊，其後續改變最主要的兩大原因為對未來機會拿捏的不確定性及團隊之間的不協調性；參照Timmons Model，可以很清楚地界定出創業團隊後續改變的因素為何；創業者對「機會」的可控程度為Timmons Model尚未考慮進的因素。 另外，針對研究結果亦提出建議給予未來參賽隊伍，及如何給予FITI計畫政策上的建議。對於參賽團隊而言，一切的因素如合作模式、股權分配等都應在事前談妥。而針對FITI計畫亦提出評審機制、白皮書、技轉三點未來可改進之建議。 / The first entrepreneurial contest held by government was the From IP to IPO (FITI) in 2013. FITI contest had held over two years, nearly 160 entrepreneurial teams, but only 38 of them established companies. Thus, this study aims to explore the reasons why these winning entrepreneurial teams change after the FITI contest. With the method of case study used in this study, four of the top ten winning entrepreneurial teams from over the past years had been chosen as case studies. And by the support of “Opportunity”, “Teams”, “Resources” and “Dynamic Relationships” from Timmons Model, this study aims to explore the reasons why these entrepreneurial team’s changing reasons, also to see how it fits in Timmons Model, and how it interacts with each other. This study finds out that the entrepreneurial teams change because of two reasons, which is the uncertainty to opportunity and the incoherence between team members. Next, the changing reasons can be clearly defined by the use of Timmons Model. Lastly, how much of the controlling power the team held to the opportunity, is one of the factors that Timmons Model had not been considered yet. Last but not least, this study also gave suggestions to the entrepreneurial teams that wanted to attend to FITI contest that everything like division of work should be negotiated at the very first place. On the other hand, three suggestions are also given out to FITI.