Abstract
The phenomenon of the entrepreneurial university has received considerable attention in recent decades, since the entrepreneurial orientation of academia could put regions and nations at an advantage in areas of economic activity where the focus is on emerging knowledge. Empirical research on entrepreneurial initiative incentives within universities and involving students and lecturers is scarce. This article examines the impact of competitions for ideas and business plans on start-up creation and patent registration, given the involvement of lecturers, the existence of R&D underpinning the idea and the technological area. The data used refer to 20 business ideas finalists in competitions between 2008 and 2014 at the Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra. The results show that these incentives have a significant impact on firm creation and patent registration and that the ideas and business plans competitions are important instruments to encourage the entrepreneurial spirit in an academic environment, motivating students and lecturers.
Highlights
The university is an institution with a long history that has gone through several stages in its development
Initially conceived as an institution with an educational mission, universities later came to be sources of knowledge generation (R&D). They have taken on a third mission by contributing more directly to society and economic development (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 2000). This process has been conceptualised in different ways: for example, as a change in the “social contract” between university and the state (Guston and Keniston 1994), as a change between the modes of knowledge production (Gibbons et al 1994) or as a result of the dynamics of the triple helix (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 1996)
This paper looks at how the vocation of universities as entrepreneurial institutions has encouraged, within the Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra (IPC), the organisation of business idea competitions among students and lecturers and business plan competitions
Summary
The university is an institution with a long history that has gone through several stages in its development. Initially conceived as an institution with an educational mission, universities later came to be sources of knowledge generation (R&D). In recent years, they have taken on a third mission by contributing more directly to society and economic development (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 2000). They have taken on a third mission by contributing more directly to society and economic development (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 2000) This process has been conceptualised in different ways: for example, as a change in the “social contract” between university and the state (Guston and Keniston 1994), as a change between the modes of knowledge production (Gibbons et al 1994) or as a result of the dynamics of the triple helix (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff 1996). According to Etzkowitz (2008), this entrepreneurial university rests on four pillars: (1) academic leadership able to formulate and implement a strategic vision; (2) legal control of academic resources, including ownership of tangible assets such as buildings and intangible ones such as intellectual property emanating from research; (3) organisational capacity for the transfer of technology through patents and firm creation, licensing and incubation; (4) entrepreneurial culture among administrators, lecturers and students
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