CVC: current trends and future directions

Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) investments consist of minority equity stakes in relatively new, not publicly traded companies that are seeking capital to continue operation. Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) has been recognized as important vehicle for fostering entrepreneurial development. Although there exists already an amount of theoretical as well as empirical studies aiming at explaining, predicting or understanding CVC activity in firms growth, there seems to be a growing dissatisfaction among scholars with the fragmented findings that have emerged to date. In fact CVC activities play an increasingly important role in value creation for both start-ups and the large companies that invest in them, but it remains unclear how both corporate venturers and start-up recipients capture and measure the strategic value of corporate venture capital investments. The current paper intends to present a review of the existing literature. Results present a fragmented literature with a proliferation of different perspectives.