| dc.description.abstract | Companies engage in ambidextrous practices to develop a competitive edge by maintaining a solid ground in exploiting existing businesses while simultaneously exploring and growing new business ventures. This thesis focuses on how the corporate companies attempt to scale the new business ventures. For that purpose, the thesis studies two new business ventures undergoing scaling in two separate established companies in the Nordic region; DNV and Orkla. The data collection process was qualitative, with the primary participants being members of the companies directly working on scaling a new venture. The new business venture at DNV was DNV’s cyber security which aims to re-brand DNV as a cyber security assurance company due to increasing digitization. At Orkla, the new venture is referred to as Påfyll, which is a venture that aims to innovate the process around the single use of plastics in consumer goods products. Interviews were held with two employees from the new venture team of 4-5 members. The methodology was structured to adopt a deduction approach. Realising the broad nature of scaling, the thesis focuses on four factors. First, the ideology guiding the scaling process, then relevant frameworks and their utilization, a synthesis of the scaling practice, and the nature of relationship between the parent, peer, and new business venture unit. The theoretical literature also focuses on three broad themes. First, an analysis of literature on ambidexterity to understand the motivation behind the formation of the new ventures. Next, an analysis of literature on exploration to understand the background preceding the scaling process. Finally, an analysis of literature on the growth of new business ventures in the corporate context to establish a holistic view of what is already known. The case-finding showed that a company that began scaling to ensure long-term firm survival and sales growth took a more predictive foresight strategic planning approach to scaling and focused on speed in the scaling process. In comparison, a company that engaged in scaling due to the innovation of outdated processes took a more agile perspective and focused on efficiency in the scaling process. The frameworks utilized were either commercial or technical, of which the commercial frameworks were outlined based on the needs, e.g., an outline needs to understand customer insight was guided by a design thinking framework, while the need to innovate with trends calls for the use of the four-lens innovation frameworks. The same approach applies to other needs such as value chain, business structure, and other needs. Furthermore, in practice, a new venture can adopt a core and edge view of scaling. The view entails that growth begins in the core market to develop competence before extending towards other edge markets. In one of the cases, the practice was setting co-targets in revenue and innovation with established businesses in the core market. Furthermore, in the other case, a focus on the core regional market where competencies are built before replicating the process on the edge markets. Finally, relationship between the new venture and other business units was dictated by the motivation behind the new venture. In essence, for a new venture established to serve the parent company through sales growth and firm survival, the new venture tends to be more integrated into the company, and the parent’s decision overrides and dictates the new venture. While for the case where a change of process and innovation was the main priority, the new venture unit was more isolated to simulate a start-up, and the decisions were made in the best interest of the new venture and not the parent company. | eng |