The Role of The Pitch: Gatekeeping and Pitch Development in a High Technology Business Accelerator

Abstract

In the top business accelerators across the world, entrepreneurs are asked to pitch many times, and at each of these junctures, the pitch plays an important role as a gatekeeper, determining whether entrepreneurs can access the funding, mentorship, and networking that accelerators provide. To detail this role that the business pitch plays in business acceleration is the point of this presentation. Through the support of a Fulbright Open Research Grant to Chile, I spent eight months at one of the top business accelerators in the world, Start-Up Chile, and this presentation describes my findings during that period of data collection.