Microfoundations of Academics' Networks: Initiation, Evolution and Context

The world over, universities are increasingly challenged to make economic contributions to their host cities. Universities are particularly the target of this challenge because of the belief that knowledge intensive institutions are critical to the building of a knowledge-based economy and thus increasing regional competitiveness. Subsequently, the weight placed on universities has resulted in a stretch in universities’ traditional missions of research and teaching to include a third mission. This so-called third mission is operationalised in universities’ engagement with their communities as characterised by collaborations with industry partners, among others. It is understood that by establishing close ties with industry for instance, both entities could together improve the fortunes of their communities through problem solving and creativity that contribute to innovation. Simply, University-Industry Collaborations (UICs) play a key in the regional innovation process. This thesis takes a determined stance. Where collaborations between universities and industry is concerned, individuals are the critical conduits for the process of knowledge exchange. Additionally, knowledge collaborations are embedded within networks stemming from both university and industry entities. Indeed, individuals who are critical to the competiveness of their regions do not act in isolation – they network. Interestingly however, existing research on UICs is mainly focused on the organisational level. Also, while networking forms a critical aspect of the theories on regional innovation, networks are rarely the focus in studies on regional innovation. To that effect, this thesis focuses on the networks of individuals especially in university and industry collaborations. The interest of this work is to explore foundational aspects of networks by placing the spotlight on individual academic scientists and their network ties. Consequently, the aim of this thesis is to investigate how individual contacts of a given academic could shape his knowledge exchange network. To achieve this aim, the study assumes a tripartite nature in which I explore the initiation, evolution and context of academics’ networks. The analysis presented in this work draws upon 100 semi-structured interviews with academic scientists and other relevant stakeholders in the knowledge exchange process where an attempt is made to obtain insight into networking as embedded in academic engagement. Overall, this thesis has yielded insight into i) how the personal networks of individual academics are built, especially from a geographic perspective where motivations are linked to regional and extra-regional incentives; ii) how the networks of individual academic scientists evolve over time and what factors influence this process and, iii) not least, the effect of the institutional and regional contexts on knowledge exchange processes as exemplified in academics’ networks. The insights emerging from this thesis have interesting implications for policy making

Doctoral graduates’ transition to industry: networks as a mechanism?:Cases from Norway, Sweden and the UK

Increased public investment in PhD education to drive innovation has led to a recent rapid growth in the number of PhD graduates. Academic labour markets have not developed at the same pace. An ever-larger share of the graduates is finding employment in industry. The transition from academia to industry is not always easy. The present study aims to provide insights into the role played by PhDs networks in the job search after graduation. Our data comprise interviews with industry-employed doctoral graduates in STEM disciplines from Sweden, Norway and the UK. Our findings show that PhDs autonomously built personal networks can help match their specific scientific expertise with labour market demands. We distinguish country-specific patterns and characteristics of the transition, in which regional career paths are more (Scandinavia) or less (the UK) noticeable. The study has practical implications, in particular for PhD students and graduates, related to their career orientation.Funding Agencies|European UnionEuropean Union (EU) [722295]</p

On Overcoming the Barriers to Regional Development: Reflections from the University of Lincoln

The University of Lincoln, UK, poses a rather compelling case for studying the role of universities in regional development, having developed from a branch campus to a full-range university during its 20 years of existence, and with an aim of responding to regional economic needs by collaborating locally and internationally. We set a two-fold aim to examine the role of the university in fostering regional development and explore the barriers faced. Data from a combination of policy documents, reports and websites were utilised alongside focused interviews undertaken with internal and external stakeholders including staff members, industry partners, a County Council employee and graduates of the university. It is clear that the university actively contributes to regional development through various collaborations including a local business incubator, Sparkhouse. A collaboration with Siemens has created a ‘win-win’ scenario where the university has helped to embed the company through a supply of local graduates whilst also developing research collaboration. Various barriers that hinder the university’s engagement were identified which call for strategizing and a concerted effort from all stakeholders, especially those relating to graduate retention and development of local infrastructur

Together and yet apart: Probing non-cooperation in the Herøya Industrial Park

Cluster theory reveals that, there exist benefits to be gained from inter-firm cooperation. This is suggestive that cluster-related benefits supersede mere co-location, and that firms must actually cooperate to reap these benefits. The aim of this research was to explore factors that must be in place for firms to benefit from co-location, attention paid to benefits derived from inter-firm cooperation rather than the sharing of public goods and infrastructure. This was done employing the case of the Herøya Industrial Park, Porsgrunn-Norway, where firms are reportedly focused on public-goods benefits, to explore inter-firm relations in the Industrial park, regarding the progression of collaboration in the park. Concurrently, Herøya is compared to the Eyde Cluster – Southern Norway, which having recently attained a cluster status, can be described as a step ahead of Herøya regarding cooperation, and is constitute of similar industries. Assessment of Eyde is done in six areas namely; inter-firm linkages, dealing with security, presence of commons, support and cluster constitution, from which three levels of cluster cooperation arise. Results reveal that, while certain factors moderate working together in the Herøya Industrial park, there yet exist features that could serve as a leverage for cooperation. However, considering the need for cooperation at all, it is a finding that with similar features in place that foster cooperation in other places, Herøya may be ‘unique’ and not presently disposed to establishing the level of inter-firm linkages characteristic of ‘working’ clusters given that certain factors that justify the need to collaborate must be in place

Building of Academics’ Networks—An analysis based on Causation and Effectuation theory

Individual academic scientists engage in various collaborations through their involvement in both regional and extra-regional networks. However, little is known about how these networks are actually formed. Focusing on university and industry networks, we take the view that the process of building new networks is an entrepreneurial activity that involves unpredictability and often goal ambiguity. This paper thus employs the theories of causation and effectuation to explore how the personal networks of academics are initiated. With evidence from the networks of 12 academics based at the University of Stavanger, Norway we show that both causation and effectuation are employed by academics when building their networks. The usage of causation was found to be more consistent with building industry networks whereas effectuation was employed when building networks in academia. Consequently, effectuation was characteristic of the international networks which were found to be mostly constituted by other academics. On the regional level, a mixture of both approaches of causation and effectuation was observed, with more industry linkages suggesting a tendency to be more causal than effectual. Furthermore, while causation was employed for project level networking, effectuation was employed for establishing more individual level tie

Doctoral graduates’ transition to industry: networks as a mechanism? Cases from Norway, Sweden and the UK

Increased public investment in PhD education to drive innovation has led to a recent rapid growth in the number of PhD graduates. Academic labour markets have not developed at the same pace. An ever-larger share of the graduates is finding employment in industry. The transition from academia to industry is not always easy. The present study aims to provide insights into the role played by PhDs’ networks in the job search after graduation. Our data comprise interviews with industry-employed doctoral graduates in STEM disciplines from Sweden, Norway and the UK. Our findings show that PhDs’ autonomously built personal networks can help match their specific scientific expertise with labour market demands. We distinguish country-specific patterns and characteristics of the transition, in which regional career paths are more (Scandinavia) or less (the UK) noticeable. The study has practical implications, in particular for PhD students and graduates, related to their career orientation.publishedVersio

The Role of Solvent Polarity on Low-Temperature Methanol Synthesis Catalyzed by Cu Nanoparticles

Methanol syntheses at low temperature in a liquid medium present an opportunity for full syngas conversion per pass. The aim of this work was to study the role of solvents polarity on low-temperature methanol synthesis reaction using eight different aprotic polar solvents. A “once through” catalytic system, which is composed of Cu nanoparticles and sodium methoxide, was used for methanol synthesis at 100°C and 20 bar syngas pressure. Solvent polarity rather than the 7–10 nm Cu (and 30 nm Cu on SiO2) catalyst used dictated trend of syngas conversion. Diglyme with a dielectric constant (ɛ) = 7.2 gave the highest syngas conversion among the eight different solvents used. Methanol formation decreased with either increasing or decreasing solvent ɛ value of diglyme (ɛ = 7.2). To probe the observed trend, possible side reactions of methyl formate (MF), the main intermediate in the process, were studied. MF was observed to undergo two main reactions; (i) decarbonylation to form CO and MeOH and (ii) a nucleophilic substitution to form dimethyl ether and sodium formate. Decreasing polarity favored the decarbonylation side reaction while increasing polarity favored the nucleophilic substitution reaction. In conclusion, our results show that moderate polarity solvents, e.g., diglyme, favor MF hydrogenolysis and, hence, methanol formation, by retarding the other two possible side reactions

Low temperature methanol synthesis catalyzed by copper nanoparticles

A one pot catalytic system which involves Cu and an alkoxide co-catalyst has been used for methanol (MeOH) synthesis at low temperature. Up to about 92% syngas conversion per pass and more than 90% selectivity to MeOH (the rest is methyl formate) was obtained depending on the amount of catalyst employed at 100 °C and 20 bar syngas pressure. Low temperature methanol synthesis presents a good alternative to current technology for methanol production since the former is thermodynamically favored and gives a high yield per pass. Cu particles sized around 10 ± 5 nm were found to be involved in the catalytic process. Cu nanoparticles of increasing size was synthesized by varying temperature. However, methanol production decreased with increasing Cu nanoparticle size. Moreover, the maximum conversion at the end of each successive batch declined as a function of the number of cycles performed. Decrease in catalyst activity corresponded to Cu nanoparticle densification, suggesting agglomeration to be a major catalyst deactivation pathway