Seed accelerators and the speed of new venture creation John Stayton 1 • Vincent Mangematin 2 Ó Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2018 Abstract Technology startups need to launch, simultaneously and quickly, innovative products (or services) and organizations, but some are able to launch more quickly than others. This paper explores how some ventures start up very quickly, and the mechanisms by which accelerator programs assist nascent technology ventures to minimize startup time. Through four in-depth case studies of clean technology ventures that started up quickly, two with and two without the aid of accelerators, the rapid launch of startups is explored and accelerator mechanisms are clarified: survival (starting up quickly is a matter of survival), resource network (starting up quickly requires leveraging pre-existing net- works) and catching up (accelerators fill gaps to allow inexperienced entrepreneurs to start up quickly). The three mechanisms speed up the launch process and organize scarcity management to motivate the top management team. The paper proposes to extend the minimum viable product concept to the minimum viable start-up as a consequence of acceleration. These three mechanisms for speeding up innovative venture launch are tied to increasing entrepreneurial orientation in the startup technology firm. The practical per- spective assists managers of accelerator programs (university-based, economic develop- ment, non-profit or for-profit) to design and implement programs that will more effectively fill gaps to help ventures to start up more quickly. Keywords Accelerators Á Seed accelerators Á Startup accelerators Á Technology commercialization Á Clean technology Á Business incubators Á New venture creation JEL Classification M130 Á O310 Á O320 & John Stayton stayton@sonoma.edu 1 School of Business and Economics, Sonoma State University, 1801 E Cotati Ave, Rohnert Park, CA 94928, USA 2 Grenoble Ecole de Management, 12 rue Pierre Semard, 38000 Grenoble, France 123 J Technol Transf https://doi.org/10.1007/s10961-017-9646-0