The role of technology transfer offices in growing new entrepreneurial ecosystems around mid-sized universities

Abstract

The role of universities has evolved from its traditional focus on education and research to active participation in regional economic development. Technology transfer offices (TTOs) were created at Canadian universities to help regulate and monetise the transfer of knowledge created by the university researchers to the marketplace. In this paper, we examined the role TTOs can play in developing a new entrepreneurial ecosystem around mid-sized research universities, based on the perceptions and expectations of the key stakeholders, involved in the technology transfer process, about the role of TTOs, and if their role can help in developing entrepreneurial culture in their universities. We found that the ability of TTOs to effectively support the commercialisation of university research results is related to the existence of an entrepreneurial culture in the university. If the culture and an entrepreneurial ecosystem do not exist, the role TTOs can play is more limited to its well-established facilitation role. Our findings confirm that TTOs can play a critical role in coordinating different bottom-up initiatives to promote entrepreneurship, and in attracting and integrating new external resources to the university.