Academic Entrepreneurship: Spin-offs in Sweden and the UK

Abstract

Discussions of academic entrepreneurship often focus on efforts to commercialize inventions appropriated within the intellectual property (IP) system. However, studies in the U.S. have shown that a substantial amount of entrepreneurship happens outside of the formal IP system.In the UK each university sets its own rules on ownership of IP. In a few European countries, like Sweden, an inventor ownership model is dominating. There is a lack of studies of European academic entrepreneurship outside of the formal IP system; and accordingly there have been few possibilities to analyze the effects of different institutional set ups.To help fill this gap, this chapter analyses how different institutional settings affect academic entrepreneurship in Europe. By analyzing both patents and spinoffs (from Oxford University, UK and Chalmers University, Sweden) we will shed light on two processes for commercialization of university research. We empirically investigate university technology transfer at two different universities in two countries with a different inventor ownership regulation.

University entrepreneurial ecosystems and spinoff companies: Configurations, developments and outcomes

“…It is important to acknowledge that not all university generated knowledge may become disclosures that follow a formal commercialisation route at universities. Some intellectual property leakage has been observed (Markman et al 2008;Gianiodis et al 2016;Lindholm Dahlstrand et al 2016), where academic staff bypass the technology transfer offices and establish companies outside of that channel. This has not been captured in the data collected for this paper.…”

The Composition of University Entrepreneurial Ecosystems and Academic Entrepreneurship: A UK Study

“…Furthermore, the literature concerning the critical perspectives and problems of academic spinoffs and spinoff company formation has been growing in strength (Lambert, 2003;Swamidass & Vulasa, 2008;Harrison & Leitch, 2010;Markman et al, 2008;Gianiodis et al, 2016;Lindholm Dahlstrand et al, 2016), emphasizing the evident need for a more holistic approach to researching the topic. Specifically, little is known whether a more developed UEE composed of most of these actors, i.e.…”