Boundary spanning in a for-profit research lab: An exploration of the interface between commerce and academe

In innovative industries, private-sector companies increasingly are participants in open communities of science and technology. To participate in the system of exchange in such communities, firms often publicly disclose what would otherwise remain private discoveries. In a quantitative case study of one firm in the biopharmaceutical sector, we explore the consequences of scientific publication-an instance of public disclosure-for a core set of activities within the firm. Specifically, we link publications to human capital management practices, showing that scientists' bonuses and the allocation of managerial attention are tied to individuals' publications. Using a unique electronic mail dataset, we find that researchers within the firm who author publications are much better connected to external (to the company) members of the scientific community. This result directly links publishing to current understandings of absorptive capacity. In an unanticipated finding, however, our analysis raises the possibility that the company's most prolific publishers begin to migrate to the periphery of the intra-firm social network, which may occur because these individuals' strong external relationships induce them to reorient their focus to a community of scientists beyond the firm's boundary.

The Role of CEO's prior experience on Innovation - A contingency perspective

Master'sMASTER OF SCIENCE (BUSINESS

The Internationalization of Science and its Influence on Academic Entrepreneurship

We conjecture that the mobility of academic scientists increases the propensity of such agents to engage in academic entrepreneurship. Our empirical analysis is based on a survey of researchers at the Max Planck Society in Germany. We find that mobile scientists are more likely to become nascent entrepreneurs. Thus, it appears that citizenship and foreign-education are important determinants of the early stages of academic entrepreneurship.Academic Entrepreneurship, Human Capital, Scientific Mobility, Knowledge Transfer, Immigrant Entrepreneurship

Startup ventures and equity finance: how do business accelerators and business angels’ assess the human capital of socio-environmental mission led entrepreneurs?

We investigate the role of entrepreneurs’ human capital on the potential of newly created ventures to receive equity funding from Accelerators and Business Angels using a resource-based approach to entrepreneurship theory. Using data from 10,563 for-profit innovative ventures, we find significant differences between those two groups. More specifically, formal education and founding experience of the entrepreneurial team is positively associated with the likelihood of the team to receive equity from Angels but negatively associated with the likelihood of the team to receive equity from Accelerators. Overall, our results are in line with the theoretical argument that human capital signals are important in reducing the information asymmetries faced by angels and ultimately driving entrepreneurs’ success in securing angel funding, but our results also suggest that some aspects of human capital signals do not contribute to the entrepreneur’s success in receiving accelerator funding. Our findings have important repercussions for the quality of design and operation of both private and state supported programmes and accelerator manager

Influence of Financial and Policy Environments on the Business Strategy of Biotechnology Companies in India

The biotechnology industry thrives on innovation and new knowledge creation, but is also capital intensive with a complex regulatory environment (Hine and Kapeleris 2007). It is seen as a sunrise industry by the Indian government (Natesh and Bhan 2009). Current literature on the business strategy of Indian biotechnology companies and the influence from external factors is very limited. The objective of this research was to qualitatively test the applicability of the Miles and Snow (1978) theory of organizational behavior which describes four strategy choices: prospector, analyzer, defender and reactor, in the context of the Indian biotechnology sector. Research on Western biotechnology companies (Wiesenfeld-Schenk 1994) indicates these companies are likely to follow prospector strategies since they operate in a rapidly changing business environment (Hynes and Mollenkopf 2006). India has also undergone many policy changes starting with trade liberalization in the early 1990’s (Kumar 2006), the formalization of a venture capital industry in 1988 (Mitra 2000), and a patent regime change in 2005 (Mueller 2008). This research looked at the impact of the financial and policy environments in India on the business strategy of small-to-medium sized, privately held, indigenous biotechnology companies. These companies were classified within the M-S framework based on the following parameters: innovativeness of their product offering, value proposition, marketing strategy, extent of professional networking, financing strategy, and intellectual property creation. Based on a series of semistructured interviews conducted in India and the United States, this research found firms pursuing the analyzer strategy comprised the largest group (45%) in the survey sample of 20 firms. There were only six prospectors (30%) and four defenders (20%). Although this was contrary to general expectations that most biotechnology companies should be prospectors, research showed the Miles and Snow theoretical framework was applicable in the case of the Indian biotechnology sector. The implications of this research are to provide a structural framework for managers in biotechnology or other emerging industries to analyze product development and marketing decisions. The researcher has attempted to formulate policy recommendations, including a qualitative model for interorganizational collaboration, for the promotion of this sector in India or other developing countries

Startup firms' growth, management control systems adoption and performance

Startup firms face a significant managerial challenge when they grow beyond the boundaries of informal interactions. This transition point has often been identified with a significant crisis in the growth path of these firms. An important aspect of this transition is the adoption of management control systems that leverage top management attention and provide the infrastructure to scale up the business model. Using a multi-method, multi-case field research design in a sample of 78 startup firms, we examine the relevance of the adoption of financial systems vis-à-vis other management control systems. We find that financial planning-including cash budget, operating budget and sales projections-are the earliest set of systems adopted. We also look at the association between the adoption of management control systems and startup firm growth. We model this association using a simultaneous equation specification to capture the theoretical arguments that posit the endogeneity of these variables. We find a positive and significant association in both equations among these variables. We further examine whether the often argued CEO replacement at this transition point is associated with the level of adoption of management control systems. We find that CEOs that have adopted fewer systems have shorter tenures. Taking advantage of the intimate knowledge that venture capital investors have about the management processes (and management systems in particular) of the firms they invest in, we examine the association between company valuation and the adoption of management control systems. We find evidence consistent with this association. Finally, we examine the association between the adoption of financial planning systems and the adoption of strategic and human resource planning systems.management control systems; formal systems; professionalization; CEO tenure; startups;