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Introduction
Startups play a key role in innovation processes (Colombo and Piva, 2008; Davila et al., 2003; Mustar et al., 2008). According to the well-known definition by Steve Blank (2010) a startup is a company, a partnership or temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. Through the startup phase, new ideas are brought to the market and transformed in economically sustainable enterprises. New firms are artefacts for transforming entrepreneurial judgement into profit (Spender, 2014). Existing research indicates that forming relationships with external partners is a priority for the success of startups (Teece, 2010; Pangarkar and Wu, 2012; Kask and Linton, 2013).
Due to their smallness, startups suffer a structural lack of tangible and intangible resources (Wymer and Regan, 2005). The lack of financial and human resources hinders the development of new innovation processes. Adopting open innovation (OI) practices is a necessity for startups in order to overcome both the liability of newness and the liability of smallness (Bogers, 2011). From a scientific point of view, the startup phenomenon and OI are closely related.
Research in OI has followed several different strands, giving evidence of the multidimensional nature of the concept of openness. Many studies have examined the complex features of OI (Huizingh, 2011; Aslesen and Freel, 2012), focussing on its different aspects, such as OI classification in terms of: modulation of openness level (Herrmann et al., 2007); the adoption modality of OI (Bigliardi et al., 2012; Dahlander and Gann, 2010); knowledge flows (Lichtenthaler and Ernst, 2009); innovation practices (Baldwin and von Hippel, 2011; Galati et al., 2015; Saguy and Sirotinskaya, 2014); effectiveness of OI activities and practices (Tomlinson, 2010; Dahlander and Gann, 2010; Tomlinson and Fai, 2013; Greco et al., 2015). Besides, other streams of research have taken into consideration the context of OI as for internal and external environmental characteristics (Harison and Koski, 2010; Huizingh, 2011), and for OI processes.
A complex network of knowledge flows between firms emerges, that needs to be managed and affects the internal choices of the startup company. While several existing studies have examined the impact of partnerships and networks on the decision to start a new venture and on the outcomes of entrepreneurial processes, a research gap...