5 The insight that collaboration — rather than disrup- tion — characterizes corporate-startup relationships is not new. The term “Open Innovation” was first coined at the turn of the 21st century to denote the dramatic rise in the number of leading corporations advancing their innovation goals through engage- ments with external audiences, including startups. The trend was boosted by the fact that many of the largest corporations today, including Amazon, Meta, Tesla, and Google, were themselves small startups just a couple of decades ago. Now, 25 years into this century, we have an opportunity to take stock and assess corporations’ experience with various venturing strategies. Indeed, our research has noted substantial diversification of corporation- startup collaborations and, perhaps most notably, a greater variety of strategic objectives behind them. Far from adversaries, corporations and startups are increasingly becoming indispensable allies, forging a variety of arrangements that blend the agility of the former with the scale and resources of the latter. It’s a landscape rich with potential, where innovation no longer resides solely within the walls of corporate R&D labs or in the garages of entrepreneurial dreamers but thrives in the new spaces where the two worlds mingle. Collectively, we refer to these practices as Corporate Venturing — the deliberate effort by corporations to create structures that harness startups’ capabilities in pursuit of strategic business objectives. This report presents the results of the Mack Institute’s study of the corporate venturing practices of the world’s 500 largest companies from the Forbes 2023 Global 2000 List, described in their annual reports and on corporate websites as of January 2024 (see the Appendix beginning on page 34 for details). We undertook this project to show the variety of ways in which corporations are scaling and broadening their interactions with startups. Below are just a few anecdotes that illustrate the diversity of emerging symbiotic relationships. These stories, among many others, illustrate how corporations and startups see each other today: not exclusively as rivals or investment opportunities but as complementary forces to manage and work alongside. Together, they are working to shape a future that neither David nor Goliath could achieve alone. For corporations seeking to design or refine their startup engagement strategies, the report offers a valuable compass for navigating an increasingly sophisticated landscape. For entrepreneurs, it offers insight into the corporate approach to innovation and how startups fit into it.