Beyond bricolage: Early-stage technology venture resource mobilization in resource-scarce contexts

This inductive, multiple-case study advances scholarly understanding of resourcefulness by examining the combination of resource mobilization behaviors over time, and associated performance outcomes, within seven early-stage medical technology ventures in the relatively resource-scarce context of Kampala, Uganda. Our analysis reveals two resource mobilization trajectories, characterized by different dynamic combinations of bricolage and resource seeking as ventures develop. High-performing ventures increased resource seeking as they developed and dynamically alternated lower and higher levels of bricolage, opting back into bricolage upon substantial resource acquisition. We explain the divergence in trajectories with ventures' reactions to catalytic events and reinterpretation of their resource spaces beyond local environs. •Early-stage tech ventures adopt distinct resource mobilization behaviors over time.•High-performers dynamically combine resource seeking and selective bricolage.•Nature and sequence of early catalytic events affect ventures' resourcing behaviors.•To seek resources, ventures enact contextual layers of space and time.•Resourcefulness manifests in dynamic combinations of resource seeking and bricolage.