Influence of the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem and its knowledge spillovers in developing successful university spin-offs

Regional entrepreneurial ecosystems: how family firm embeddedness triggers ecosystem development

“…In this context, Cohen (2006) explored how formal and informal networks, physical infrastructure, and culture contribute to innovative entrepreneurial activities within communities. Recently, Prencipe et al (2020) showed that innovative spin-offs from universities are strongly influenced by the regional context, which also supports Krueger (2012), who highlights the complex dynamics between regional stakeholders. Motoyama et al (2014) emphasized the generation of regional benefits through local entrepreneurs acting as role models and increasing tie-strength in local networks.…”

“…Previous literature highlighted the distinctive characteristics regional EEs (de Villiers Scheepers et al 2018;Prencipe et al 2020). Thus, in our investigations we primarily focus on family entrepreneurs' perceptions of embeddedness, as we showed that there exists a demand for more research on the social factors that shape EEs (Brown and Mason 2017).…”

“…The knowledge exploitation subsystem focuses on entrepreneurs, delivering products or services to customers, where they act as central (Stam 2015) but also evolving actors (Boesen et al 2017;Strobl 2014;Strobl and Kronenberg 2016). The knowledge generation subsystem includes support systems such as universities, training programs (Prencipe et al 2020) and H&T industry-specific co-creation characteristics (Higuchi and Yamanaka 2017;Thees et al 2020). The socio-political subsystem features intermediaries and government bodies, including destination management organizations (DMO) and helping to facilitate entrepreneurial activities (Baggio 2011;Beritelli et al 2014).…”

“…Conceptually, we draw on previous embeddedness work (Granovetter 1973;Gulati 1998;Uzzi 1997) and integrate embeddedness into a three dimensional framework. This helps to better understand the underlying processes of entrepreneurial activity, especially in the context of regional EEs (de Villiers Scheepers et al 2018;Prencipe et al 2020;Villegas-Mateos 2020). Our research contributes to the theoretical foundations of EE research by specifying the relational dimensions between the individual level of family entrepreneurs and their environment into horizontal, vertical and spatial embeddedness.…”

“…EEs are seen as a primary reason for the regional agglomeration of start-up firms in entrepreneurial hubs around the world (e.g., Berlin, Tehran, San Francisco, Malmö etc.). EEs have become popular also among practitioners and policymakers on the regional level because they elevate the relevance of a like-minded and supportive local environment for both outstanding entrepreneurship and regional development (Prencipe et al 2020). While early research (Feld 2012;Isenberg 2010) was inspired by high-tech and start-up ecosystems in the United States and Israel, more recently scholars also considered regional EEs to explain entrepreneurial success in other contexts and regions (Cohen 2006;de Villiers Scheepers et al 2018;Eichelberger et al 2020).…”