Mergers and Acquisitions, Open Innovation and UK High Growth SMEs

This paperexam in es the dyn am ics of en trepren eurial acquisition s un dertak en by UK hig h g row th sm all an dm edium en terprises (S M E s). W hile en trepren eurial acquisition s are in creasin g ly deployed by S M E s, little is k n ow n about their an teceden ts,m otiv ation al driv ers an dorg an isation al outcom es. D raw in g on detailedcase study ev iden ce from S cotlan d,the k ey factor foun d to be driv in g these acquisition s w as the desire to aug m en t an d exploittechn olog ical com plem en tarities betw een the acquirin g an d acquired firm s.A cquisition can therefore be con ceptualised as an adv an ced stag e of the outside-in ‘open in n ov ation ’strateg ies proactiv ely used w ithin these in n ov ativ e S M E s. Firm s executin g this strateg y typically hav e an acute propen sity for risk , a desire for close custom er en g ag em en t, effectiv e busin ess m odels an dstron g extern al orien tation . The w ork sug g ests that g reater atten tion should be paid w ithin M & A theory to the dyn am ics of these types of sm aller scale en trepren eurial acquisition s. WP No 16-012 4th Q uarter2016