IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/por/fepwps/502.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Determinants of the economic performance of Portuguese Academic Spin-offs: do Science & Technology infrastructures and support matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Aurora A.C. Teixeira

    (CEF.UP, Faculdade de Economia, Universidade do Porto; INESC Porto; OBEGEF; UTEN)

  • Marlene Grande

    (University Technology Enterprise Network (UTEN))

Abstract

Academic and political interest in Academic Spin-offs (ASOs) has increased significantly in Portugal in the last few years. Although these firms, created to exploit the results of scientific research, are considered important contributors to employment and wealth creation, in the Portuguese case, their impact has been modest, at best. Based on a sample of 101 ASOs associated to the members of the University Technology Enterprise Network (UTEN), we found that ASOs are quite small (employing on average 9 full time equivalent individuals and a turnover of 300 thousand euros). Besides being highly R&D intensive, Portuguese ASOs are internationally-led with almost half of the respondent firms involved in exporting. An econometric analysis revealed the relevant role of certain types of S&T infrastructures and support mechanisms for the economic performance of ASOs In particular, access to incubators, access to skilled labour, and support in terms of business mentoring and counselling emerged as significantly and positively related with ASOs’ sales per worker. Moreover, their economic performance is extremely dependent on internationalization dynamics, with firms that export outperforming their domestically-based counterparts. The lack of economic return on R&D performed and patents registered by firms indicates that the steady investment in science, technology and innovation in Portugal in the last decade, although undoubtedly necessary, has not yet materialized sufficiently to push the system towards solid, productive and value added firms. Therefore, policies aimed at accelerating ideas and knowledge into internationally competitive ideas and products are required.

Suggested Citation

  • Aurora A.C. Teixeira & Marlene Grande, 2013. "Determinants of the economic performance of Portuguese Academic Spin-offs: do Science & Technology infrastructures and support matter?," FEP Working Papers 502, Universidade do Porto, Faculdade de Economia do Porto.
    • Handle: RePEc:por:fepwps:502
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.fep.up.pt/investigacao/workingpapers/wp502.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joel A. C. Baum & Tony Calabrese & Brian S. Silverman, 2000. "Don't go it alone: alliance network composition and startups' performance in Canadian biotechnology," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(3), pages 267-294, March.
    2. Aurora Teixeira & Joana Costa, 2006. "What Type of Firm Forges Closer Innovation Linkages with Portuguese Universities?," Notas Económicas, Faculty of Economics, University of Coimbra, issue 24, pages 22-47, December.
    3. Christine Cooper & Stephanie Hamel & Stacey Connaughton, 2012. "Motivations and obstacles to networking in a university business incubator," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 37(4), pages 433-453, August.
    4. Iván Arribas & Mariel Fornoni & Jose E. Vila, 2012. "An entrepreneur’s social capital and performance The role of access to information in the Argentinean case," Discussion Papers in Economic Behaviour 0712, University of Valencia, ERI-CES.
    5. Walter, Achim & Auer, Michael & Ritter, Thomas, 2006. "The impact of network capabilities and entrepreneurial orientation on university spin-off performance," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 21(4), pages 541-567, July.
    6. Colombo, Massimo G. & Grilli, Luca, 2010. "On growth drivers of high-tech start-ups: Exploring the role of founders' human capital and venture capital," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 610-626, November.
    7. Phillip Phan & Donald S. Siegel & Mike Wright, 2016. "Science Parks and Incubators: Observations, Synthesis and Future Research," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Phillip H Phan & Sarfraz A Mian & Wadid Lamine (ed.), TECHNOLOGY ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND BUSINESS INCUBATION Theory • Practice • Lessons Learned, chapter 9, pages 249-272, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    8. van Burg, E. & Gilsing, V.A. & Reymen, I.M.M.J. & Romme, A.G.L., 2008. "Creating university spin-offs : A science-based design perspective," Other publications TiSEM ed13609d-fde4-43dc-ba8a-d, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. Nuria Calvo & Laura Varela-Candamio & Isabel Soares & David Rodeiro, 2012. "Critical analysis of the role of universities in the creation and survival of university spin-offs. Proposal of an academic model of support," Advances in Management and Applied Economics, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 2(2), pages 1-3.
    10. Panagiotis Ganotakis, 2012. "Founders’ human capital and the performance of UK new technology based firms," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 495-515, September.
    11. Mike Wright & Bart Clarysse & Philippe Mustar & Andy Lockett, 2007. "Academic Entrepreneurship in Europe," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 4041.
    12. Junfu Zhang, 2009. "The performance of university spin-offs: an exploratory analysis using venture capital data," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 34(3), pages 255-285, June.
    13. Gimmon, Eli & Levie, Jonathan, 2010. "Founder's human capital, external investment, and the survival of new high-technology ventures," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(9), pages 1214-1226, November.
    14. Clarysse, Bart & Wright, Mike & Lockett, Andy & Van de Velde, Els & Vohora, Ajay, 2005. "Spinning out new ventures: a typology of incubation strategies from European research institutions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 183-216, March.
    15. Garbe, Jan-Nicolas & Richter, Nicole Franziska, 2009. "Causal analysis of the internationalization and performance relationship based on neural networks -- advocating the transnational structure," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 413-431, December.
    16. Franz Tödtling & Peter Prud'homme van Reine & Steffen Dörhöfer, 2011. "Open Innovation and Regional Culture—Findings from Different Industrial and Regional Settings," European Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(11), pages 1885-1907, January.
    17. Caldera, Aida & Debande, Olivier, 2010. "Performance of Spanish universities in technology transfer: An empirical analysis," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(9), pages 1160-1173, November.
    18. Elicia Maine & Daniel Shapiro & Aidan Vining, 2010. "The role of clustering in the growth of new technology-based firms," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 127-146, February.
    19. Rory O’Shea & Harveen Chugh & Thomas Allen, 2008. "Determinants and consequences of university spinoff activity: a conceptual framework," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 33(6), pages 653-666, December.
    20. Lockett, Andy & Siegel, Donald & Wright, Mike & Ensley, Michael D., 2005. "The creation of spin-off firms at public research institutions: Managerial and policy implications," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(7), pages 981-993, September.
    21. Einar Rasmussen & Simon Mosey & Mike Wright, 2011. "The Evolution of Entrepreneurial Competencies: A Longitudinal Study of University Spin‐Off Venture Emergence," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48, pages 1314-1345, September.
    22. Bart Clarysse & Mike Wright & Els Van de Velde, 2011. "Entrepreneurial Origin, Technological Knowledge, and the Growth of Spin‐Off Companies," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48, pages 1420-1442, September.
    23. Lehrer, Mark & Asakawa, Kazuhiro, 2004. "Rethinking the public sector: idiosyncrasies of biotechnology commercialization as motors of national R&D reform in Germany and Japan," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(6-7), pages 921-938, September.
    24. Mozhdeh Taheri & Marina van Geenhuizen, 2011. "How human capital and social networks may influence the patterns of international learning among academic spin‐off firms," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 90(2), pages 287-311, June.
    25. Michael S. Dahl & Olav Sorenson, 2012. "Home Sweet Home: Entrepreneurs' Location Choices and the Performance of Their Ventures," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(6), pages 1059-1071, June.
    26. Margarida Fontes, 2005. "Distant networking: The knowledge acquisition strategies of 'out-cluster' biotechnology firms," European Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(6), pages 899-920, September.
    27. O'Shea, Rory P. & Allen, Thomas J. & Chevalier, Arnaud & Roche, Frank, 2005. "Entrepreneurial orientation, technology transfer and spinoff performance of U.S. universities," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(7), pages 994-1009, September.
    28. Shane, Scott, 2004. "Encouraging university entrepreneurship? The effect of the Bayh-Dole Act on university patenting in the United States," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 127-151, January.
    29. Vohora, Ajay & Wright, Mike & Lockett, Andy, 2004. "Critical junctures in the development of university high-tech spinout companies," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 147-175, January.
    30. Zheng, Yanfeng & Liu, Jing & George, Gerard, 2010. "The dynamic impact of innovative capability and inter-firm network on firm valuation: A longitudinal study of biotechnology start-ups," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 593-609, November.
    31. Anders Malmberg & Bo Malmberg & Per Lundequist, 2000. "Agglomeration and Firm Performance: Economies of Scale, Localisation, and Urbanisation among Swedish Export Firms," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 32(2), pages 305-321, February.
    32. Landry, Rejean & Amara, Nabil & Rherrad, Imad, 2006. "Why are some university researchers more likely to create spin-offs than others? Evidence from Canadian universities," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(10), pages 1599-1615, December.
    33. Scott Shane & Rakesh Khurana, 2003. "Bringing individuals back in: the effects of career experience on new firm founding," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 12(3), pages 519-543, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. María Jesús Rodríguez-Gulías & David Rodeiro-Pazos & Sara Fernández-López, 2016. "The Regional Effect on the Innovative Performance of University Spin-Offs: a Multilevel Approach," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 7(4), pages 869-889, December.
    2. María Jesús Rodríguez-Gulías & Sara Fernández-López & David Rodeiro-Pazos, 2016. "Growth determinants in entrepreneurship: A longitudinal study of Spanish technology-based university spin-offs," Journal of International Entrepreneurship, Springer, vol. 14(3), pages 323-344, September.
    3. María Jesús Rodríguez-Gulías & David Rodeiro-Pazos & Sara Fernández-López, 2017. "The effect of university and regional knowledge spillovers on firms’ performance: an analysis of the Spanish USOs," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 13(1), pages 191-209, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mariluz Fernández-Alles & Carmen Camelo-Ordaz & Noelia Franco-Leal, 2015. "Key resources and actors for the evolution of academic spin-offs," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(6), pages 976-1002, December.
    2. Christian Sandström & Karl Wennberg & Martin W. Wallin & Yulia Zherlygina, 2018. "Public policy for academic entrepreneurship initiatives: a review and critical discussion," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 43(5), pages 1232-1256, October.
    3. Christopher S. Hayter & Andrew J. Nelson & Stephanie Zayed & Alan C. O’Connor, 2018. "Conceptualizing academic entrepreneurship ecosystems: a review, analysis and extension of the literature," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 43(4), pages 1039-1082, August.
    4. María Jesús Rodríguez-Gulías & David Rodeiro-Pazos & Sara Fernández-López & Christian Corsi & Antonio Prencipe, 2018. "The role of venture capitalist to enhance the growth of Spanish and Italian university spin-offs," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 1111-1130, December.
    5. Marius Tuft Mathisen & Einar Rasmussen, 2019. "The development, growth, and performance of university spin-offs: a critical review," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 44(6), pages 1891-1938, December.
    6. Einar Rasmussen & Mike Wright, 2015. "How can universities facilitate academic spin-offs? An entrepreneurial competency perspective," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(5), pages 782-799, October.
    7. Good, Matthew & Knockaert, Mirjam & Soppe, Birthe & Wright, Mike, 2019. "The technology transfer ecosystem in academia. An organizational design perspective," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 82, pages 35-50.
    8. David Urbano & Maribel Guerrero, 2013. "Entrepreneurial Universities," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 27(1), pages 40-55, February.
    9. Giuliano Sansone & Daniele Battaglia & Paolo Landoni & Emilio Paolucci, 2021. "Academic spinoffs: the role of entrepreneurship education," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 369-399, March.
    10. Stefano Poponi & Alessio Maria Braccini & Alessandro Ruggieri, 2017. "Key Success Factors Positively Affecting Organizational Performance of Academic Spin-Offs," International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 14(05), pages 1-18, October.
    11. Bharat Rao & Bala Mulloth, 2017. "The Role of Universities in Encouraging Growth of Technology-Based New Ventures," International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 14(04), pages 1-22, August.
    12. Juan Pablo Diánez-González & Carmen Camelo-Ordaz, 2016. "How management team composition affects academic spin-offs’ entrepreneurial orientation: the mediating role of conflict," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 530-557, June.
    13. Gümüsay, Ali Aslan & Bohné, Thomas Marc, 2018. "Individual and organizational inhibitors to the development of entrepreneurial competencies in universities," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 363-378.
    14. Roland Helm & Oliver Mauroner & Kendra Pöhlmann, 2018. "Towards a better understanding of performance measurements: the case of research-based spin-offs," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 12(1), pages 135-166, January.
    15. Stefan Marc Hossinger & Xiangyu Chen & Arndt Werner, 2020. "Drivers, barriers and success factors of academic spin-offs: a systematic literature review," Management Review Quarterly, Springer, vol. 70(1), pages 97-134, February.
    16. Scott Shane & Sharon Dolmans & Joseph Jankowski & Isabelle Reymen & A. Romme, 2015. "Academic entrepreneurship: Which inventors do technology licensing officers prefer for spinoffs?," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 273-292, April.
    17. María Elena Gómez-Miranda & Isabel Román-Martínez, 2016. "Las spin-off universitarias españolas: análisis económico-financiero y factores que condicionan su cifra de negocios," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 217(2), pages 131-155, June.
    18. Berbegal-Mirabent, Jasmina & Ribeiro-Soriano, Domingo Enrique & Sánchez García, José Luis, 2015. "Can a magic recipe foster university spin-off creation?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(11), pages 2272-2278.
    19. Marco Ferretti & Salvatore Ferri & Raffaele Fiorentino & Adele Parmentola & Alessandro Sapio, 2020. "What drives the growth of academic spin-offs? Matching academics, universities, and non-research organizations," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 137-163, March.
    20. F. I. Vega-Gómez & F. J. Miranda González & J. Pérez-Mayo, 2020. "Analyzing the Effects of Institutional- and Ecosystem-Level Variables on University Spin-Off Performance," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(2), pages 21582440209, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Academic Spin-offs; S&T infrastructures; Portugal; UTEN;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L25 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Performance
    • L29 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Other
    • O34 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Intellectual Property and Intellectual Capital
    • O38 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Government Policy

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:por:fepwps:502. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/fepuppt.html .

    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.