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This paper aims to explain the fundraising and valuation processes of startups and discuss the conflicts of interest between entrepreneurs, venture capital (VC) firms and stakeholders in the context of startup corporate governance. Further, this paper uses the examples of WeWork and Zenefits to explain how a failure of stakeholders to demand an external audit from an independent accounting firm in early stages of funding led to an opportunity for fraud.

The methodology used is a literature review and analysis of startup valuation combined with the Fraud Triangle Theory. This paper also provides a discussion of WeWork and Zenefits, both highly visible examples of startup fraud, and explores an increased role for independent external auditors in fraud risk mitigation on behalf of stakeholders prior to an initial public offering (IPO).

This paper documents a number of fraud risks posed by the “fake it till you make it” ethos and investor behavior and pricing in the world of entrepreneurial finance and VC, which could be mitigated by a greater awareness of startup stakeholders of the value of an external audit performed by an independent accounting firm prior to an IPO.

An implication of this paper is that regulators should consider greater oversight of the startup financing process and potentially take steps to facilitate greater independence of participants in the IPO process.

Given the potential conflicts of interest between VC firms, investment banks and startup founders, the investors at the time of an IPO may be exposed to the risk that the shares of the IPO firms are overvalued at offering.

This study demonstrates how startup practices can be extended to the Fraud Triangle and issue a call to action for the accounting profession to take a greater role in protecting the public from startup fraud. This study then offers recommendations for regulators and standards entities.

There are few academic papers in the financial crime literature that link the valuation and culture of startup firms with fraud risk. This study provides a concise explanation of the process of valuation for startups and highlights the considerations for stakeholders in assessing fraud risk. In addition, this study documents an emerging role for auditors as stewards of proper valuation for pre-IPO firms.

The purpose of this paper is to develop initial evidence about the nature and features of crowdfunding in China, given it is largely unregulated regulatory frameworks.

The paper used extensive desk research using data collected from the public and private sectors, after which the data was analyzed parallel to existing academic literature, that is, institutional context by Bruton et al. (2014). This paper uncovered patterns of development, profiling crowdfunding platforms, examining the regulatory landscape and providing antecedents of successful crowdfunding projects in China.

When the traditional financial markets are hard to reach, micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) were starved for capital. Crowdfunding can play a major role in funding and risk sharing. It is an innovative and dynamic vehicle for MSMEs as well as enthusiastic investors in China. Since its initial introduction to China in 2009, crowdfunding has gained substantial popularity in a relatively short period. Currently, there is still not an identifiable guideline on how to delineate the significance of the crowdfunding platform. The development of crowdfunding in China faces a few unresolved key issues. As researchers exploring this phenomenon in new ways, crowdfunding platforms can be enhanced in a manner that benefits the capital seeker, investors and society as a whole.

There is a dearth of information on start-up crowdfunding in Asia. With little data available to analyze, so this paper hopes to contribute to knowledge and provide valuable information to researchers and industry representations. Crowdfunding represents a potentially disruptive change in the way that new ventures are funded. This paper represents an initial analysis in the study of new ventures in China. Finally, the authors provide recommendations for entrepreneurs, investors and policymakers as well as researchers and practitioners with suggestions about yet unexplored avenues of research.

This paper aims to adopt a practice-theory, “site ontology” perspective to understand how venture capitalists (VCs) add value to their portfolio companies (PCs).

The empirical research involves a field ethnographic study of a VC firm in Dubai, focused on revealing what constitutes value and what VCs do to add this value to their PCs.

Value adding is a profoundly social, embedded process interconnected with other ecosystem actors, investment practices and organizations. The value adding threads of VC activity are part of a holistic configuration of practices that span the investment lifecycle and different levels within the firm.

This research contributes a rich account of the social, symbolic nature of VC activity, depicting the everyday activities that comprise value adding practices. It is among the first to introduce practice theory to the VC context and open up a new conversation about its social ontology.

The paper aims to explore the nature of initiatives and strategies of inter-organizational cooperation to cross the valley of death in the biopharma industry.

The authors conducted an exploratory case study analysis in the Biopharma Innovation Ecosystem in Greater Boston Area (USA), which is one of the oldest, and most successful IE in the US, specialized in the Biopharma domain, by conducting a round of expert interviews with key informants in the area, chosen as representatives of the different types of actors engaged in the drug development processes at different stages.

Main findings suggest that cooperation can contribute to surviving the valley of death by reducing the barriers within the drug development pipeline through the promotion of strategic relationships among actors of different nature, including the establishment of government-led thematic associations or consortia, agreements between university and business support structures, proximity to venture capitalist and the promotion of a general culture of academic entrepreneurship within universities.

The authors believe that this paper contributes to the literature by shedding light on the nature of the specific cooperative initiative the barriers in drug development and help to survive the valley of the death.

This study aims to explore Accelerators and their practices in sustaining start-ups within their innovative programs for these companies based on the resource-based perspective. Moreover, with an ever-increasing demand for Accelerators amongst start-up companies, this study also demonstrates the importance of Accelerators, as it pertains to new venture creation.

This research uses an exploratory case study approach to examine a comparative view of leading Accelerator companies in the USA and Korea based on resource support.

The results of this study show that there are a number of differences between Accelerators of the two countries in terms of the resources they support for early-stage start-ups. The findings also show some similarities. However, in Korea, the Accelerator landscape is limited, where mentorship, resources and investments are not readily accessible, resulting in low success rates for Korean start-up companies. These limitations have had a negative trickle-down effect when providing entrepreneurs with strong access to resources and investors, which highly affects the success rates of early-stage start-ups.

In terms of the resource-based theory, this study contributes to the growth of early start-ups by emphasizing the role of the accelerator and suggesting the extent and impact that entrepreneurs have access to resources and investors.

With significant growth in start-ups around the world, the necessity for start-up funding and mentorship has increased drastically. Start-up companies need various types of assets, systems, knowledge and information to achieve their goals. In Accelerators, start-ups receive all the aforementioned resources while also improving their entrepreneurial skills. Start-up companies have many options in seeking investors who support both tangible and intangible resources to boost growth. While there is a wealth of information on traditional funding methods, there are few studies that shed light on the role of Accelerators from the resource-based point of view.

This study aims at exploring how small and medium enterprises (SMEs) can implement a more open and co-creational business model by actively collaborating with startups.

Because of the novelty of the SME–startup collaboration phenomenon and to the depth of the investigation required to grasp the mechanisms and logic of an open and co-creational business model, a single-case study has been performed related to investigating a collaboration between an SME and a startup.

The authors provide detailed empirical evidence on how SMEs may structure a “systematic” approach to design and execute an open business model enabled by startup collaboration. Moreover, this study suggests that the business model innovation process represents a necessary forerunner of an open business model. Finally, the authors contend that research on open business models should entail a broader perspective beyond the innovation process, to include business model validation through testing approaches like the lean startup.

This study takes as the locus of investigation the original perspective of the external partner of a focal firm willing to innovate. This study offers a unique contribution because, to date, few studies adopted such view within a relevant and under-remarked empirical setting linking SMEs and innovative startups.

Waqf (Islamic endowment) in the form of cash is important to address the problem of developing idle waqf lands. Although there are various existing models of cash waqf, there is still a need for innovative cash waqf models. This paper aims to offer an alternative mode of financing for developing idle waqf lands using the concepts of cooperatives and waqf.

The present study first evaluates relevant literature on financing issues faced by waqf institutions in developing idle waqf lands as well as existing models of cash waqf. Based on the prevailing gap in cash waqf models, the study proposes a hybrid model of cooperative-waqf to finance idle waqf lands in Malaysia.

The proposed model is unique owing to the new dimension of membership being embedded into the waqf project. It considers donors as members of the waqf project, which is funded through the cash waqf collected, and thus, donors are given the privilege to receive benefits from the commercialised projects that are developed on the waqf lands. The existing models of cash waqf use traditional methods in which donors merely contribute cash waqf without any awareness of how the contributions are utilised. Usually, this problem occurs due to the lack of reciprocal communication between cash waqf donors and waqf institutions.

The present study examines the case of waqf land development in the context of Malaysia only. Secondly, the paper does not contain any empirical analysis, and the development of the paper is based on existing literature that discusses various models of cash waqf practised in Muslim-majority and -minority countries. Future research can conduct surveys of donors and other stakeholders on the practicality of the model.

It is expected that the proposed cooperative-waqf model will be able to create a synchronised relationship between cash waqf donors and waqf institutions and hence boost participation in developing waqf lands.

The present study adds to the existing literature in the area of waqf and cash waqf models, especially the application of this instrument in the context of Malaysia. It also offers a new hybrid model to the State Islamic Religious Councils (SIRCs) – Malaysia’s sole trustee of waqf assets management – such that the implementation of the proposed model could boost the collection of cash waqf in developing commercial projects on idle waqf lands.