Scaling Corporate Innovation: The HEC Paris Way by Mathias Abramovicz
When it comes to innovation, established companies are not being left behind either within the HEC Paris Innovation & Entrepreneurship Institute! For years, its Incubation and Acceleration Center has been at the forefront of corporate innovation, helping companies with their strategic innovation challenges for years. In this interview with the Center’s pedagogic director, Mathias Abramovicz, find out how we blend expertise and practical business sense to build innovation programs that drive performance.
Mathias Abramovicz, Pedagogical Director at HEC Paris Innovation & Acceleration Center
How did a school incubator end up offering programs for companies?
It all came gradually, with the impulsion of the Incubation and Acceleration Center’s director, Antoine Leprêtre. Originally, we were a startup incubator (now based at Station F), but Antoine figured out our know-how and resources, built over time with the startups we supported, could be beneficial to companies' open innovation challenges too. At first, corporations' innovation departments wanted to understand and implement best practices for supporting startups. The collaboration was more like a knowledge transfer and skill-sharing thing. But, while we were pioneers about 5 years ago, the market is now saturated with startup support services.
To stay ahead, we had to understand how companies' needs were changing. To do so, we collaborated very closely with our corporate partners through lots of discussions. That’s how we managed to build a comprehensive offering, and expanded our team, with the goal of helping them scale their innovation activities.
What major challenges do large companies face in innovation today, and how does the Incubation and Acceleration Center help them overcome these?
I’d say that, today, the main challenge for a company is proving that its innovation efforts lead to real results. The days when innovation could just be about creative exercises, startup pitches, or brainstorming are over. Competition is much tougher now, and the companies that stand out are those that can use innovation to achieve strategic goals. That’s the core of our approach: focusing on results, not just formats.
After about ten years of experimenting, I've identified four main goals that an innovation program should contribute to. Identifying this main goal should be the starting point for any innovation initiative:
- Improve operational performance (→ integrate mature technologies at scale)
- Gain competitive advantages (→ position ahead of market trends)
- Serve new market needs (→ build new customer-centric offers)
- Roll out innovations faster (→ speed up the market launch of R&D)
You’ve mentioned building a comprehensive offering for companies. What are your flagship programs, and how are they structured?
It would be too simplistic to describe our corporate programs just by their format. Even though our work revolves around three main offerings (Accelerator of Accelerators, Startup Sprints, and Corporate Transformers - the latest is provided by our Deep Tech Center), each program aims for a specific strategic goal and takes a form that helps achieve it. These three accelerators are a good example:
- L’Oréal Beauty Tech Atelier: This Accelerator focuses on the internal scaling of tech solutions. Startups joining the program come from all over the world and are at a more advanced stage. The emphasis is on integration within the group and collaboration with different brands and regions.
- Meta AI Startup Program: Run in partnership with Hugging Face and Scaleway), it aims to promote the deployment of their open-source artificial intelligence model: Llama. The main activities are work sessions between Meta's research teams and the startups' tech teams, to best integrate the model and maximize its performance.
- TotalEnergies ON: This acceleration program, aimed at scale-ups (more mature startups) in the electricity and renewable energy sector, aims to support the development of new business models across the electricity value chain and achieve their greenhouse gas emission reduction targets. The focus is on collaboration with the Business Units and can lead to acquisitions by the M&A team.
So, you see, the term "Accelerator" means different things in practice. If we could just copy-paste our approaches to each corporation, it would be too easy… and not much fun! You have to remember that an innovation program isn't just a format, but a way to achieve the strategic goals of the executive committee.
That’s why each collaboration involves a strategic analysis phase, where we define the challenges and expectations to build programs that combine different activities.
Once you have defined the challenges and goals, how do you structure the program?
It usually starts with a series of questions: What value and results do you expect? What resources are available? Why would your company want to repeat the initiative?
Based on these answers, we create the program structure, which we summarize in a "bible" that includes the goal, KPIs, duration, types of projects supported, support, selection criteria and key activities.
Can you share an example of a program that helped a partner company transform its innovation processes?
One of the most telling examples is the accelerator program that we specifically designed to bring Research & Development (R&D) to market. The request came from a company operating in the industrial sector, which had a common problem: "How should we approach R&D projects, knowing that they require years of development and present challenges in assessing their market potential?"
We built a 3-month program (Corporate Transformers) that allows industrial innovation projects to test the market and engage with customers. The goal is to identify market opportunities and link tech development with customer needs. Through this approach, we also aimed to build a common language between engineers focused on the product and top managers whose investment decisions are based on performance metrics.
"For the past 3 years, we've worked with Veolia, which has incorporated this program worldwide to help its R&D champions streamline their market opportunities and generate initial sales leads."
How can a large group scale its innovation initiatives? Is there a magic formula?
Unfortunately, there’s no magic formula! But sticking to certain principles can help reduce risks and generate impact at a larger scale. The key factors for success are:
- Aligning innovation activities with the CEO's strategic roadmap
- Starting with business needs and the performance metrics of the departments
- Selecting projects that fit internal realities (interoperability, procurement, IT, legal, etc.)
- Providing support that boosts results (access to data, customers, technical, and sector-specific expertise, etc.)
- Engaging the business teams by giving them the resources, time, and means to scale the innovation
Beyond programs related to collaborations with startups or industrial performance, do you support other players on social and environmental impact issues?
Absolutely, our corporate activity isn't just about optimizing collaboration between startups and large groups, or improving internal innovation initiatives. Several of our corporate partners are pursuing goals set by public policies or are carrying out missions of public interest.
In late 2021, after the COVID crisis, we launched WomenEntrepreneurs4Good, a program in partnership with the Women's Forum, Bank of America, and Bredin Prat to support women entrepreneurs. The starting point was simple: women entrepreneurs get little support or resources in developing their businesses, and they are statistically less likely to receive funding. So, our goal was to change this status quo by supporting women from all geographical backgrounds and social classes. We mobilized our partners to build a program structured around three main phases:
- A Startup Sprint phase to help candidates identify a market opportunity, and formalize a value proposition and business model.
- A support phase within the Incubateur HEC Paris, where they are mentored by Bank of America mentors and have access to HEC Paris' expert platform and various masterclasses.
- A visibility phase at the annual Women's Forum Global Meeting, where the 10 laureates pitch to investors and potential customers, get exposure to international decision-makers, and reach an audience of tens of millions of people.
In 2024, the 4th edition took place, and we're proud to have supported over 1,000 women entrepreneurs aged 18 to 60 from over 80 countries since the beginning.
Why should a company turn to HEC Paris Innovation & Entrepreneurship Institute instead of internal teams or specialized firms? In short, what's your added value?
Our added value doesn’t come from competing with consulting firms or internal strategy teams. I'd say we're more complementary, by putting into action the strategic directions defined earlier.
Compared to other accelerators or innovation agencies, our main difference is that we blend academic knowledge, field experience, and a focus on results. We've supported thousands of entrepreneurs and companies, giving us a broader perspective than just one sector or approach. Our credibility comes from our proven track record, the fact that we adapt to the specific needs of our corporate partners, and our ability to quickly tap into experts within our Alumni network. All this strategic and operational expertise is combined with our professors and the school's academic research.
"More generally, the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Institute (which the Center belongs to) is the only place that brings together everything a company needs to scale its innovation: practicing consultants, proven methodologies, high-value resources and an ecosystem that fosters excellence."
About the Corporate Accelerator programs
Corporate Accelerator is a program designed by HEC Paris Incubation & Acceleration Center to help companies in their open innovation efforts with startups. We bring together all our entrepreneurial know-how and the best resources available on the market to support startups that corporates wish to work with. This way, corporates can further focus on developing sector expertise and creating synergies with them.
About the Corporate Transformers program
Corporate Transformers is an intensive 3-month program offered by the HEC Paris Deep Tech Center to accelerate R&D projects’ go-to-market. It consists in reducing uncertainty while decreasing time, effort and resources spent on tackling new opportunities. At the end of the program, projects can be excubated at the Incubateur HEC Paris within a wide community of entrepreneurs and innovators.
About HEC Paris Innovation & Entrepreneurship Institute
The HEC Paris Innovation & Entrepreneurship Institute is composed of three distinct centers (the Incubation Center, the Deep Tech Center, and the Social Entrepreneurship Center) and is dedicated to supporting entrepreneurs from all backgrounds. To achieve this, it offers a variety of support programs tailored to all stages of business development.