A Cautionary Tale?

The accompanying article from the New York Times illustrates the uncertainties that can result from aligning with a strategic - often, larger - partner. Many start-up company leaders are encouraged to seek out and secure strategic partners (for the capital, people, experience and contacts they bring) as an alternative to raising financial capital - i.e., angel and/or venture investment - to finance the company's operations.

As this article demonstrates, this strategy - while meritorious and usually a very smart move - can bring a host of unsolvable problems and insurmountable challenges.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/19/technology/19startup.html?_r=1&am...

Is this a cautionary tale for entrepreneurs of what could - or will - go wrong with a seemingly perfect partner? Or is it a reminder that any alliance, collaboration, partnership and informal/formal combination is more art than science.

Is strategic partnering right for your company?

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Comment by Randy Scott on July 26, 2010 at 10:56pm: I would be interested in knowing what portion of these large corporate + entrepreneurial venture partnershipos actually end up succeeding. I have a hunch the percentage is actually pretty low. It is attractive if you can get it to work, but the differences are so great in workstyles, expectations and relative importance that it sure seems like they rarely live up to expectations. The best outcomes seem to be when the big company gets so frustrated with the small company that they just buy them out to eliminate the aggravation.