Abstract
The present paper explores corporate entrepreneurs' use of personalized bonds for innovation and new product development. Much has been written about the importance of networks for entrepreneurial action. However, proportionally few studies have explored corporate entrepreneurs' cultivation and development of direct and indirect bonds beyond the firm's internal network. The paper presents empirical results from a qualitative study of corporate entrepreneurs and interorganizational relationships at a multinational telecommunications company. The result emphasizes the value of corporate entrepreneurs' diverse external bonds for innovation performance. Furthermore, it stresses the importance of the social-effective dimension and the corporate entrepreneur's own motivation for making use of these bonds. A model is proposed of corporate entrepreneurs' personalized bonds and their implication for managerial practice and further research.