Accelerators for Start-ups as the Strategic Initiative for the Development of Metropolis

The subject of this paper is one of the strategic initiatives of the Metropolitan Association of Upper Silesia and Dąbrowa Basin, usually referred to in Poland as the Silesian Metropolis, which began its activity on January 1, 2018. The Silesian Metropolis lies within one of the largest urban areas in the European Union. The process of building a strong metropolitan center is a long-term process and will cover all areas of social and economic life, including space for the creation, development and further functioning of the start-up community with the support of the launched network of accelerators for start-ups. Accelerators help nascent firms, and particularly high-tech start-ups succeed in the early stages of development by providing services such as office spaces, mentoring, networking and a variety of educational programs. Accelerators are quite a new phenomenon; therefore, little research has done on accelerators. The purpose of this study is to contribute into explain the diversity found among accelerator. On the basis of conceptual reflection, it is shown that the configurational approach can be use in this case in particular, and in research on accelerators in general. In this paper, we have shown that research on accelerators can benefit from the input of configurational approach. To do so, we have given details of how the three main concepts of ideal type, "fit" and equifinality - developed from this approach - play a part in explaining the existence of several categories of accelerators. The main benefits from the conceptual framework lie in its highlighting of five coherent functional-structure pairings to which accelerators can be assimilated.