The Art of Sourcing and Engaging Startups
Karen Dams of Brussels Airport and Andrew Erlick of Reckitt on finding the right startups and making the collaboration work.
With Karen Dams and Andrew Erlick
From The Corporate Venturing Podcast, brought to you by Open Road Ventures
4 things this conversation gets into
- 01Why startups drive innovation and agility for corporates
- 02Identifying and evaluating promising startups
- 03Choosing a model: venture clienting, accelerators or CVC
- 04Getting past internal resistance and governance hurdles
Karen Dams is Strategy and M&A Manager at Brussels Airport and Andrew Erlick is Innovation Manager at Reckitt. Together they bring experience of startup collaboration from industries as diverse as aviation and consumer goods.
Davide Ritorto is a management engineer from Italy with an international MBA, currently working at Lamborghini. He is what some call an intrapreneur, passionate about open innovation and corporate venturing, and driven by curiosity about how things work and how to make them work even better. Through Open Road Ventures he sets out to inspire and inform other innovators, intrapreneurs and dreamers.
He founded Open Road Ventures as a weekly publication on open innovation and corporate venturing, and The Corporate Venturing Podcast grew out of it. He also mentors startups at Motor Valley Accelerator and sits on the Open Innovation Advisory Board at UC Berkeley Haas.
The Corporate Venturing Podcast is made by Open Road Ventures. The Bundl Venture Club is a partner of the show.
Read the full show notes
Note: We experienced a minor technical issue with the microphone during this recording, so the audio quality may not be perfect at times. Thanks for your patience—we promise the insights are worth it!
Welcome to another episode of The Corporate Venturing Podcast!
Startups are becoming an increasingly vital source of innovation for corporations—but what does it take to build successful partnerships? How can large enterprises collaborate effectively with agile startups to drive real business impact?
In this episode, I sit down with Karen Dams, Strategy and M&A Manager at Brussels Airport, and Andrew Erlick, Innovation Manager at Reckitt, to explore the art of sourcing and engaging startups. Drawing from their experience in industries as diverse as aviation and consumer goods, they share practical insights on:
• Why startups are a crucial driver of innovation and agility for corporations.
• How large companies can effectively identify and evaluate promising startups.
• The best collaboration models—venture clienting, accelerators, corporate venture capital, and beyond.
• Overcoming common challenges in startup engagement, from internal resistance to governance hurdles.
• The future of corporate-startup partnerships—what trends are shaping the next wave of innovation?
Whether you’re leading an innovation team, a startup founder looking to partner with corporates, or simply curious about the evolving world of corporate venturing, this episode offers actionable strategies to navigate the landscape successfully.
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