How can young companies generate growth?

Alan Irwin, Professor from Department of Organization, opened the "Enabling Accelerated Startup Growth" conference on 8 June (photo: Jacob Møller Rasmussen).

Think globally from the beginning. You may know a great deal, but you have to be receptive to coaching. The level of growth for a lone founder cannot compare to what a team with a variety of skills can accomplish. For three years CSE has studied how to generate growth in start-ups in the Go Grow project, which will wrap up with the Enabling Accelerated Startup Growth conference, with presentations on what works and what doesn’t, in co-operation with The Danish Industry Foundation.
 
The director of CSE, Karina Rothoff Brix, says that a handbook will be published in connection with the conference for organisations that would like to support start-ups in order to share their experience.

The handbook encourages, for example, Danish start-ups to think globally from the get-go. According to CSE the best strategy is often to think big from the beginning rather than adapt a Danish company to the global market subsequently. This depends of course on the individual company, however.

“You often spend just as much time developing a company with a global focus as you would if the company didn’t have that focus. The likelihood that a company in Denmark will grow is small because the market is often limited.”

The Danish Industry Foundation has supported the project, which involves 65 start-ups. Rothoff Brix explains that CSE is in the midst of finding partners for the new programme, where knowledge from the three-year project will be applied, further developed and adapted to various industries.

“Our focus on growth must be more specific and involve looking at selected industries in depth,” adds Rothoff Brix.

Read more about Go-Grow, and contact project manager Dorthea Haldrup Nielsen if you have any questions.

Read a press release from CSE and The Danish Industry Foundation (in Danish).