IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/h/elg/eechap/16417_10.html
   My bibliography  Save this book chapter

The under-researched role of alumni spin-off entrepreneurs in upgrading a university’s entrepreneurial support structure: essential ingredient or just a decorative accessory?

In: Handbook of Universities and Regional Development

Author

Listed:
  • Arne Vorderwülbecke
  • Rolf Sternberg

Abstract

University spin-off formation can impact local economic growth. This paper addresses the contribution to a university's entrepreneurial support structure by individuals who started a company out of a university. If this contribution is sustainable enough, it may induce a self-amplifying process by which the university's entrepreneurial support-structure is continuously upgraded. Based on a qualitative case study of Leibniz University Hannover, including expert interviews and an in-depth document analyses, it is shown that alumni spin-off entrepreneurs indeed play an important role for a university's entrepreneurial support structure. However, the empirical findings indicate to a differentiation in respect of the nature of such a contribution. While it is an essential ingredient for the realization of particular support measures, it is only a decorative accessory for the evolution of such a structure. The contribution of alumni spin-off entrepreneurs to the upgrade of a university's entrepreneurial support structure leads to the named self-amplifying process.

Suggested Citation

  • Arne Vorderwülbecke & Rolf Sternberg, 2019. "The under-researched role of alumni spin-off entrepreneurs in upgrading a university’s entrepreneurial support structure: essential ingredient or just a decorative accessory?," Chapters, in: Attila Varga & Katalin ErdÅ‘s (ed.), Handbook of Universities and Regional Development, chapter 10, pages 166-191, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    • Handle: RePEc:elg:eechap:16417_10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.elgaronline.com/view/edcoll/9781784715700/9781784715700.00017.xml
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:elg:eechap:16417_10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Darrel McCalla (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.e-elgar.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.