Strategic alliances as a source of early-stage seed capital in technology-based, entrepreneurial firms

A significant gap exists in early stage seed capital for technology based new ventures. The article reports the results of a survey of embryonic firms which received significant amounts of their initial capital from strategic partners. High levels of satisfaction with the alliance were reported by the capital recipients and the alliances tended to evolve into long term relationships. The prescriptions from the normative literature on alliance formation and operation appear mostly valid in the experiences of the surveyed firms