When science meets the market: a multidisciplinary approach of entrepreneurship education

Abstract

Entrepreneurship education for the scientific community has become more common. Recently, many entrepreneurship programs have been designed for scientists with the purpose of turning research into marketable products. However, despite the raising investments in and the popularity of entrepreneurship education programs, their effects and scope remain largely unknown.This article analyzes the effect of an entrepreneurial program called NoBI designed to develop entrepreneurial skills for the scientific community in Mexico. For nine weeks, participants of Binational Innovation Nodes (NoBI) received training from experts in business, science, and technology to validate their ideas in the market. We evaluated the effect of this education program on the participants’ entrepreneurial self-efficacy (ESE), business model learning and entrepreneurial intention.We performed a two-stage longitudinal study applying a survey to 179 individuals. We used a Wilcoxon Matched-Pairs Signed-Rank non-parametric test to analyze the data. Preliminary results suggest that after the NoBI program, researchers increased their ESE and business model learning. Also, this entrepreneurial program has positively impacted the participants’ entrepreneurial intention. This study provides valuable insights into how entrepreneurial programs can develop skills and raise the intention to start a business in the scientific community.