THE ROLE OF INCUBATORS AND ACCELERATORS IN DRIVING THE INTERNATIONALIZATION OF B2B STARTUPS

Nowadays, business-to-business (B2B) startups are no longer confined to their local markets; they aim to expand globally in order to survive and stay competitive in dynamic industries (Mintz and Lilien, 2024; Olivieri and Hu, 2025). However, entering international markets poses significant challenges, including navigating new regulatory landscapes, overcoming cultural differences, and establishing business relationships with foreign actors without prior recognition. In this context, accelerators and incubators have emerged as key actors in addressing these challenges, offering startups tailored programs, mentorship, and resources to facilitate their internationalization process (Dourado Freire et al., 2023). For example, they provide startups with key resources, including insights and expertise on international target markets, and equip them with specific skills, such as social media management (Hussain and Barman, 2025). Moreover, through acceleration and incubation programs, these actors assist startups in identifying funding opportunities to support their finance capacity (Paoloni and Modaffari, 2022), as well as establishing business relationships with international suppliers, partners, and institutions. Although the academic debate has addressed the issue of startups’ internationalization in recent years (e.g., Kuster and Rezende, 2022; Olivieri and Testa, 2024), there is lack of research on the role of accelerators and incubators in supporting B2B new ventures’ access to international markets. This study aims to investigate the role of accelerators and incubators in the internationalization process of B2B startups. To achieve this research aim, we are conducting a qualitative study (Yin, 1994) based on semi-structured interviews with professionals operating in both accelerators and incubators, and startups that participated in the programs offered by these actors. The interview transcripts represent the material used by researchers in the data analysis phase, together with other documents shared by key informants, such as company presentations, reports, press releases and magazine articles. The preliminary findings of this research highlight the key role that incubators and accelerators play in facilitating the internationalization of B2B startups, focusing on (1) the duration of the programs offered, (2) the types of services and both tangible and intangible resources provided, and (3) the development of networking opportunities. However, some differences have also emerged in the role of incubators and accelerators.