Inorganic business growth

There is much talk in the business world of what might be referred to as “organic” growth, a kind of natural progression from seeded company, to fledgling spinout to…perhaps even multinational corporate entity. But, the converse of organic in this context is planned, inorganic, growth, the kind of growth that emerges from a strategic approach to the company’s inputs and outputs.

Leonard Benning and Tessa Christina of the Technical University of Dortmund, Germany, discuss the notion of planned behaviour and how it affects inorganic growth of a technology venture in the International Journal of Globalisation and Small Business. The team surveyed 153 company founders managing their businesses and investigated how entrepreneurial activities affected inorganic growth. Specifically, the team has looked at acquisitions as part of the strategy for planned, inorganic, growth.

They point out that this is perhaps the first empirical study of its kind that responds to an earlier call from fellow researchers in this field, dating back to 2011, to open up understanding of inorganic venture growth

Benning, L. and Flatten, T.C. (2020) ‘How do new technology ventures grow? A theory of planned behaviour based assessment of inorganic growth’, Int. J. Globalisation and Small Business, Vol. 11, No. 2, pp.88–113.