The research on entrepreneurship is still looking for a reason to be and sometimes is merely understood as the study of innovation. The major epistemological contribution of this field of research is focused on the study of the phenomena around (1) the recognition of opportunities, (2) their evaluation and (3) their exploitation.

Opportunities are often defined as innovations which, minor or major, tend to fill in a gap in the market.

SME’s are not the only entities where entrepreneurship can be studied. Big corporations are obviously a playing ground too for researchers and those companies try to mimic SME’s in their ability to recognize opportunities and innovate.

Solvay is no exception and after having organized in 2009 a competition to recognize tributes of Solvay employees, the 2010 edition was opened to partners and suppliers. The aim was to honor “innovations which highlight the decisive contribution of vinyl to sustainable development combining environmental efficiency, creativity in design and improvements to quality of life” (Solvay press release of Nov. 2nd, 2010). The Gold SolVin Award was given to Georg Fischer Deka by Barbara Andreani of the Brussels Enterprise Agency (see photo above).

My Take:

The SolVin awards are one of numerous examples of big corporations trying to nurture innovation. My interpretation is double :

- the 2009 edition aimed at recognizing internal contributions. With a financial motivation Solvay was aiming (consciously or not) at stimulating employees to adopt behaviors which are typical of SME’s

- the 2010 was opened to suppliers and partners and reveals how value co-creation becomes crucial nowadays. The value chain becomes exogenous and “value constellations” are created in which several corporations need to collaborate.