The knowledge spillover theory of entrepreneurship seeks to explain the sources of entrepreneurship and its consequences with regard to economic performance. This paper extends this theory and links it to innovation performance. We propose that a high rate of entrepreneurship facilitates the process of turning knowledge into innovative products while it has no effect on the relation between knowledge and imitative products. We use European country-level data to test our propositions. Our results show that a high rate of entrepreneurship increases the chances that knowledge turns into innovative products. The findings highlight the importance of entrepreneurs in the process of commercialization of knowledge. Implications for innovation policy are discussed.
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Paper provided by Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus University Rotterdam. in its series Research Paper with number
ERS-2009-049-ORG Revision_Date: 2009-11-09.