Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Technological Forecasting & Social Change

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/techfore

Taking scientific inventions to market: Mapping the academic

entrepreneurship ecosystem
Camila Guindalini a, c, *, Martie-Louise Verreynne b, c, Tim Kastelle c
a
Center for Technological Development in Health (CDTS), Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
b
RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
c
UQ Business School, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The active contribution of academic institutions to the technological, social and economic development of so­
Academic entrepreneurship cieties is of increasing importance. To better understand this contribution, we present a systematic review,
Innovation together with bibliometric and network analyses of the academic entrepreneurship literature. This provides a
University
map of the main topics approached by scholars, thereby illustrating the scientific scenario of the field. Our
Commercialization
Lean startup
findings identify three highly interconnected research activity domains that characterize the multidimensional
Lean LaunchPad features of entrepreneurship in the academic setting, as well as a significant gap in the literature regarding
studies evaluating approaches to support the navigation of potential scientific discoveries to the market. We
organize our findings into a four stages framework consisting of: idea inception; the recognition of how this idea
unlocks value for customers and other stakeholders; development of an innovative business model; and a
commercialization strategy that creates real impact. We discuss the relevance of each stage for the establishment
of a more innovation-friendly environment and conclude by offering perspectives into future research oppor­
tunities and by encouraging studies that consider the academic entrepreneurship process from a systemic
perspective, to support a greater contribution of academic institutions to the economic and social development of
the nations and societies.

1. Introduction and motivation and private spending, but also the number of scientists (UNESCO Insti­
tute for Statistics). This means that improving the success rate and
Most new ideas fail. Some amount of failure is inevitable – if we impact of innovative research is of great importance. Academic entre­
could know in advance that a new idea will work, then it is by definition preneurship is one path towards this improvement.
not innovative. However, only about 20% of corporate new product Although the preferred path to market for scientific inventions
launches are successful, around ten percent of start-ups survive, and developed in universities remains licensing (AUTM 2017), the number
fewer than two percent of patents are in commercial use (Kastelle et al., of spin-offs/start-ups created by academic researchers have markedly
2018). The latter is particularly alarming, as the research laboratories increased in the
and university groups developing scientific discoveries aim to transform U.S. and other countries over the past decade (Grimaldi et al., 2011,
them into innovations with broad economic and societal impact (Fini Roberts and Eesley, 2011, Shah and Pahnke, 2014). Despite this visible
et al., 2018, Shah and Pahnke, 2014). Governments invest a consider­ progress, academic entrepreneurship remains limited both in terms of
able amount of taxpayers’ money into science, research and innovation support and occurrence, with scientists reporting several constraints for
with high expectations that such investments will drive economic engagement in entrepreneurial activities ( (Sinell et al., 2018) and new
growth, ensure competitiveness and be translated into benefits to soci­ science ventures encountering several challenges when pursuing eco­
ety. Recent data show that global spending on R&D reached a record of nomic sustainability and growth (Gredel et al., 2012, Soetanto and Jack,
nearly US$ 1.7 trillion, and as part of the Sustainable Development 2016). Nurturing diverse and resource-rich entrepreneurial ecosystems
Goals, countries have committed to increasing by 2030, not only public with adequate infrastructure and support is a meaningful way to

* Corresponding author at: National Institute of Science and Technology for Innovation on Diseases of Neglected Populations (INCT-IDPN), Center for Techno­
logical Development in Health (CDTS), Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
E-mail address: camila.guindalini@fiocruz.br (C. Guindalini).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021.121144
Received 23 November 2020; Received in revised form 11 July 2021; Accepted 18 August 2021
Available online 1 September 2021
0040-1625/Crown Copyright © 2021 Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
C. Guindalini et al. Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

encourage academic engagement in commercialization activities and to patenting, licensing, creating new firms, facilitating regional, economic
help universities and other organizations to increase the productivity of development and technology transfer through incubators and science
scientific and technological research (Hayter et al., 2018, Isenberg, parks. For many authors (Grimaldi et al., 2011), academic entrepre­
2010, Rothaermel et al., 2007, Wright et al., 2017). A considerable body neurship may also include additional mechanisms by which academic
of literature also points to the importance of considering academic research outputs can be transferred to the market, such as collaborative
entrepreneurship from a holistic perspective, understanding not only the and contract research, ad-hoc advice and networking with practitioners,
individual elements that characterize the ecosystem, but the inter­ joint publications with industry, personnel-related learning activities,
connectivity among them in terms of the complementary impact these and informal technology transfer via external engagement.
different factors have on self-sustaining venture creation and growth However, these definitions show a field that is still evolving, with
(Isenberg, 2010, Ratzinger et al., 2018, Rothaermel et al., 2007). disagreement on core aspects related to the characterization of the ac­
However, the systematic reviews conducted to date mainly focus on ademic entrepreneurial activities themselves, the roles of different
specific aspects of the entrepreneurial environment, such as: university- stakeholders and the nature of the research-based enterprises. The latter
industry collaborations (Mascarenhas et al., 2018, Skute et al., 2017); may include not only for-profit business foundations, but also other
university spin-offs (Almeida, 2018); university technology transfer forms of knowledge transfer and value creation through social impact.
(Miller et al., 2018); the entrepreneurial university (Mascarenhas et al., For this reason, identifying and enhancing our understanding of the
2017); psychological and motivations aspects of academic engagement interrelatedness of the various elements of innovation and commer­
in commercialization (Hmieleski and Powell, 2018, Miller et al., 2018, cialization is an important contribution to the overall knowledge of the
Perkmann et al., 2013); entrepreneurship education and training (Gal­ field. In this article, we will use the term academic entrepreneurship to
vao et al., 2018) and the link between innovation and academic entre­ refer to the involvement of academic personnel, including faculty, stu­
preneurship (Schmitz et al., 2017). Although these studies informed our dents and staff from universities and other research organizations, in
understanding of the facets of the academic entrepreneurship field, the commercialization activities to transfer scientific knowledge to the
resulting fragmentation of the literature provides an incomplete view of market in the form of patenting, licensing, start-up and spin-off creation.
the overall ecosystem and of the interdependencies between the
different elements that participate in this dynamic environment (Hayter 3. Methodology
et al., 2018). In addition, these studies tend to focus on a small number
of journals, customarily selected based on ranking or previous relevant 3.1. Data collection
publications (Hayter et al., 2018, Perkmann et al., 2013, Rothaermel
et al., 2007), or considered more recent published articles (Skute, 2019), We conducted a systematic literature review to map the academic
with potentially reduced coverage from international contexts beyond entrepreneurship research, combining bibliometric and network
U.S. and Europe. methods (Machado-Silva et al., 2019). By using transparent and repro­
Therefore, we aim to contribute to the research on academic entre­ ducible approaches, systematic reviews enhance methodological rigor,
preneurship by systematically reviewing the literature to offer a ultimately improving the quality of the review process and the reliability
comprehensive overview of the field, considering how academic entre­ of the outcome (Tranfield et al., 2003). A database search was carried
preneurship evolved and publications from a wide range of scientific out in this study using the Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science (WoS)
journals to ensure broader representativeness. Our primary research Core Collection. The WoS aggregates a comprehensive collection of
question is: What is the state of the academic entrepreneurship field, and high-impact scientific studies and is recognized as one of the most
how can it be conceptualized to guide future research? We address this extensive databases for bibliometric studies, providing in-depth
question by using bibliometric analyses and text mining tools to create coverage and comprehensive indexing of documents in the Sciences,
thematic cluster network maps to represent the scientific scenario of Social Sciences and Arts & Humanities (Clarivate Analytics 2019). Based
academic entrepreneurship and analyze the structure and dynamics of on keywords defined after an extensive evaluation of the most common
the field from a broad perspective. Finally, a conceptual framework is terms associated with entrepreneurship in the academic setting, the
developed from the network data, taking into account individual following search string was defined: ("academic* entrepreneu*") OR
researcher characteristics, organizational capabilities and external fac­ ("scientif* entrepreneu*") OR ("universit* entrepreneu*") OR
tors that not only illustrates the transdisciplinary nature of the research ("entrepreneu* universit*"). The query was directed to the article’s
on entrepreneurship activities in academia, but also establishes con­ topic, which includes title, keywords and abstract. Corrections, pro­
nections in the current literature and serves to inform future research, ceedings papers, reports of meetings, book appraisals, early access and
public policies and strategic investments in the area. data papers were not included in the analysis. The final database con­
tained only journal articles, reviews, editorials and letters written in
2. Defining academic entrepreneurship English. The search was performed on 16 January 2020 and comprised
all documents published up to 31 December 2019.
The U.S. Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 triggered universities to establish
technology transfer offices to patent and license their research results. It 3.2. Bibliometric analysis and clustering
led to a focus on academic entrepreneurship, also termed university
entrepreneurship (Grimaldi et al., 2011, Schmitz et al., 2017).Dou­ To define the structure of the academic entrepreneurship area in
triaux, (1987) and more recently, Hayter et al., (2018) define academic terms of publications by year, leading journals, frequent research areas
entrepreneurship as creating new business ventures by faculty, postdocs, (based on WoS pre-defined categories), and most scientifically produc­
students, or affiliated personnel based on university technology. Others tive countries and organizations, bibliometric analyses were conducted
present a broader definition and describe academic entrepreneurship as on the retrieved publications, using the feature "Analyze Results" in Web
any activity that occurs beyond the traditional academic roles of of Science database. The Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-
teaching and/or personal research (Klofsten and Jones-Evans, 2000), is Expanded) database of the Thomson Reuters Web of Science was used
innovative and is associated with an element of risk and direct or indi­ for the citation analysis and the identification of top-cited articles. For
rect financial rewards for the scientist or the institution (Abreu and the mapping and clustering analyses of the research themes the full re­
Grinevich, 2013). In one of the most cited literature reviews on the topic cord of the documents, containing all of the citation and bibliographical
Rothaermel et al., (2007), the authors describe university entrepre­ information, abstract and keywords was downloaded directly from WoS
neurship to include any entrepreneurial activities in which a university Core Collection. It was then imported to VOSviewer software Version
could be involved. These activities involve, but are not limited to: 1.6.5, a freely available tool for constructing and exploring bibliometric

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maps of science (van Eck and Waltman, 2010). The complete method­ 2.35 documents per year. Since then, there has been a dramatic increase,
ological approach used by the program, including calculations of the further amplified over the last five years, when almost 60% of publi­
association strength measure and the unified framework for mapping cations occurred (Fig. 1). A historic citation analysis shows a strong
and clustering of the themes, is described elsewhere (van Eck et al., correlation with the number of publications (r2=0.95; p<0.001), with
2010, Waltman et al., 2010). For this article, co-occurrence data were an exponentially increase in the total citation count per year, reaching a
used to construct a map of keywords provided by the authors and a maximum number in 2019 of 4619 citations. (Fig. 1). Overall, the arti­
second map of research terms identified in the title and abstract of the cles were cited 23,187 (16,687 times without self-citations). The
retrieved publications. Specifically, in the two-dimensional graphic average citations per item were 20.7 times and the Hirsch index, or H-
representation of the mapping results, items are positioned so that the index (Hirsch, 2005), in this database is 71.
distance between two items can be interpreted as an indication of their The top-cited articles on academic entrepreneurship are presented in
relatedness and the lines between them represent links. Generally, items Table 1. It is worth noting that five out of the ten top-cited articles were
that are co-occurring frequently in publications are automatically published between 2000 and 2005, in line with the explosion of the
positioned closer in the map, whereas weakly related terms are placed interest in the subject after that period and because it takes time for
further away. Highly related terms are then assigned to individual articles to gather citations. The most cited articles focus on topics such
clusters, which may be seen as different topics. The color of an item is as: the phenomenon of the entrepreneurial university and its role on
determined by the cluster to which the item belongs (van Eck and technological innovation, as well as on the "Triple Helix" interactions;
Waltman, 2010). In addition, the greater the number of documents in drivers and determinants for academic engagement at the individual
which a term occurs, the more prominently, in terms of size, it is dis­ level; the relevance of network capabilities, entrepreneurial orientation
played on the map (van Eck and Waltman, 2010). For the co-occurrence and other predictors on the performance of university spin-offs, start-
of keywords analyses, we used the full-counting method, while for the ups, and licenses; the impact of industry funding on research perfor­
term map creation, the binary counting method was chosen as appro­ mances and of national policies towards the commercialization of uni­
priate. In addition, the association strength measure approach for versity intellectual property, as well as the knowledge gaps in the
normalizing the strength of the links between items and the default creation and development of spin-offs in public research institutions
parameters for the attraction-repulsion parameters were used for both (Table 1).
analyses. Our data show that researchers from over 1,000 different organiza­
tions located in 81 countries contributed to advancing knowledge in the
4. Results academic entrepreneurship field. It is interesting to note that although
authors from the USA were the most frequent contributors in terms of
4.1. The academic entrepreneurship literature scenario the number of published documents (249 documents; 22.2%), followed
by England (15.9%), Italy (11.0%) and Germany (9.4%) (Fig. 2), the
The initial search retrieved a total of 1835 documents. After applying leading players in the field were from European institutions, namely
the inclusion criteria to include only journal articles, reviews, editorials Imperial College London (England), Ghent University (Belgium), and
and letters written in English, the final database used for the biblio­ the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Newcastle University (U.K.)
metric analysis included 1120 documents. Of those, 93.1% were articles; and University of Bologna (Table 2). Canada ranked ninth in the number
3.6% were editorial materials, 2.9% were reviews and 0.4% were letters. of documents published, with publications from Asia, Oceania, Africa
These documents came from journals focused on business and eco­ and South America relatively underrepresented. The most active coun­
nomics (65.1%); education/educational research (17.6%) and engi­ tries in these regions were: China (12th), Australia (14th), South Africa
neering (14.5%), and, but spanned fields as diverse as public (18th) and Brazil (21st).
administration, computer sciences, government law, sociology and According to our results, a total of 363 different journals published
psychology, among others, highlighting the multidisciplinary and het­ documents on academic entrepreneurship. Table 3 presents the top
erogeneity nature of the subject. journals for this topic, based on the number of scientific publications per
According to the WoS Core Collection, the number of publications on journal in the evaluated period, accompanied by their respective impact
academic entrepreneurship before 2005 was low, with an average of factors according to the latest Journal Citation Reports (based on 2018

Fig. 1. Total citation counts and total numbers of documents on academic entrepreneurship, according to Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science (WoS) Core Collection
and Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-Expanded) database, respectively, during 1969–2019.

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Table 1 Table 2
The ten top-cited articles on academic entrepreneurship, according to the Sci­ Most productive organizations in terms of the number of published documents
ence Citation Index Expanded (SCI-Expanded) database, from 1969 to 2019. during 1969–2019, according to Web of Science database.
Title Author(s) Publication Total Ranking Institution Country Records
Year Citations
1 Imperial College London England 30
The future of the university (Etzkowitz et al.)( 2000 923 2 Ghent University Belgium 24
and the university of the Etzkowitz et al., 2000) 3 Autonomous University of Barcelona Spain 20
future: evolution of ivory University of London England
tower to entrepreneurial 4 University of Cambridge England 19
paradigm 5 Newcastle University UK England 18
Academic engagement and (Perkmann, Tartari, 2013 604 State University of New York Suny System USA
commercialization: A McKelvey, Autio, University of Bologna Italy
review of the literature on Brostrom, et al.)( 6 Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Belgium 17
university-industry Perkmann et al., University of Bergamo Italy
relations 2013) University of Nottingham England
Research groups as ’quasi- (Etzkowitz)( 2003 603 7 Nord University Norway 16
firms’: the invention of Etzkowitz, 2003b) University of Toronto Canada
the entrepreneurial 8 Lund University Sweden 15
university Universitat Politecnica De Valencia Spain
Innovation in innovation: (Etzkowitz)( 2003 438 9 Consejo Superior De Investigaciones Spain 14
the Triple Helix of Etzkowitz, 2003a) Cientificas Csic
university-industry- Indiana University System USA
government relations Northumbria University England
The impact of network (Walter et al.)(Walter 2006 435 University of Augsburg Germany
capabilities and et al., 2006) University of Twente Netherlands
entrepreneurial 10 Linkoping University Sweden 13
orientation on university University of California System USA
spin-off University of Deusto Spain
performance University of Oslo Norway
Academic entrepreneurs: (Bercovitz & 2008 336 University System of Georgia USA
Organizational change at Feldman)(Bercovitz
the individual level and Feldman, 2008)
Industry funding and (Gulbrandsen & 2005 324
university professors’ Smeby)(Gulbrandsen Table 3
research and Smeby, 2005) Overview of the top journals that published most research on academic entre­
performance preneurship, based on the number of scientific publications per journal between
Why do academics engage (D’Este & Perkmann)( 2011 297 1989 and 2018, together with the respective impact factors, according to the
with industry? The D’Este and latest Journal Citation Reports (Clarivate Analytics 2019).
entrepreneurial university Perkmann, 2011)
and individual Rank Journal Records % Impact Factor
motivations (2019)
30 years after Bayh-Dole: (Grimaldi et al.)( 2011 287
1 Journal of Technology Transfer 99 8.839 4.15
Reassessing academic Grimaldi et al., 2011)
2 Research Policy 60 5.357 5.35
entrepreneurship
3 Industry and Higher Education 57 5.089 -
University start-up (Powers & 2005 287
4 Technological Forecasting and 25 2.232 5.85
formation and technology McDougall)(Powers
Social Change
licensing with firms that and McDougall, 2005)
5 Small Business Economics 23 2.054 4.80
go public: a resource-
6 Technovation 21 1.875 5.73
based
7 International Journal of 18 1.607 1.35
view of academic
Technology Management
entrepreneurship
Science and Public Policy 18 1.607 1.73
8 Higher Education 16 1.429 2.86
9 Management Decision 13 1.161 2.72
10 Journal of Business Venturing 12 1.071 7.59

data) (Clarivate Analytics 2019). The JCR compiles and releases infor­
mation about scientific research published in over 11,000 total journals
across 234 disciplines. The impact factor determines the relative
importance of journals within their subject categories and represents the
average citation count of the articles published in the evaluated journal.

4.2. Profile of research themes

To identify the most representative research themes in the academic

entrepreneurship domain, a keyword co-occurrence analysis in the VOS
viewer software was used. Out of 2418 of the original keywords pro­
Fig. 2. Top ten countries of author affiliation at the time of publication in the vided by the authors and identified in the database, a total of 38 that
number of documents published during 1969–2019, according to Web of Sci­ occurred in at least ten documents were selected. The keyword co-
ence database. occurrence network is presented in Fig. 3 and consists of 38 items and
299 links. Each item represents one keyword defined by the author. The
occurrence frequency of each keyword is proportional to the size of the
item in the network. The color of a term is defined by the cluster to
which the term belongs. Lines between items represent links, in a

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Fig. 3. Keyword co-occurrence network from publications related to academic entrepreneurship.

manner that the distance between any two items reflects the similarity research institutions may have to stimulate commercialization of
between them. The stronger their relatedness, the smaller the distance research results, such as “commercialization”, “patenting”, “licensing”,
between the items. The most frequent keywords were: "academic “spin-off”, “ventures” and “technology transfer offices”, “commercial
entrepreneurship" (282 occurrences); followed by "entrepreneurial activity” and “commercialization”, among others. Interestingly, in this
university" (246 occurrences) and "technology transfer" (126 occur­ cluster, the core element is the unique term “academic entrepreneur”,
rences). In addition, "entrepreneurship", “university” and “innovation” highlighting that the articles belonging to this group discuss a different
appeared further down the list, with a frequency of 107, 87 and 55 oc­ stage of the academic entrepreneurship process. The green cluster core
currences, respectively. elements are “entrepreneurial university”, “government”, “economy”,
To identify the major topics approached by the researchers in the “system” and “society”. This cluster seems to aggregate terms more
field of academic entrepreneurship and comprehend the structure of the associated with the system-level environment, including “stakeholders”,
bibliometric network, a term map was constructed using the title and “market”, “funding”, and the “triple-helix” model of innovation (“higher
abstract of all retrieved publications in the dataset. Out of the 17,977 education”, “government” and “private sector”) to foster “economic and
terms identified, the VOS viewer software identified 146 most relevant regional development”.
terms that occurred in at least 20 publications in the corpus and iden­
tified three primary clusters (Fig. 4). Similar to the co-occurrence 5. Discussion
network, the diameter and the size of the circle label characterize the
weight of the item and the color represents the cluster to which it be­ 5.1. Bibliometric analysis
longs. Although the network is relatively dense with connections across
all clusters, overall, the blue cluster contains terms related to individual Academic entrepreneurship is a critical component in the process of
determinants of academic engagement towards an entrepreneur’s atti­ research, scientific development, and commercialization of economi­
tude, such as entrepreneurial intention, skills, attitude, behavior, ante­ cally viable products (Shah and Pahnke, 2014, Siegel and Wright, 2015).
cedents, propensity, gender, and human capital. This cluster also This study focused on bibliometric measures to illustrate the status of
aggregates terms such as entrepreneurship education and entrepre­ academic entrepreneurship research in the last 50 years and map the
neurial process and has student and entrepreneur, configuring as two themes that are commonly explored by scholars during this period. In
separate core elements. The red cluster aggregates terms more related to addition, we aimed to capture the diverse elements of the entrepre­
the organizational setting of the academic entrepreneurship ecosystem, neurial ecosystem and to offer a conceptual framework that holistically
in terms of structure and support mechanisms that universities or accounts for the multidimensional features of entrepreneurship in the

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Fig. 4. Term map of title and abstract terms in publications related to academic entrepreneurship. Colors indicate clusters of related terms.

academic setting. Bibliometric approaches are increasingly used to dynamic, of the entrepreneurship research. Although the USA was the
evaluate the quantitative and qualitative aspects of the research efforts country with the highest number of scientific publications on academic
and performance, achieved in a specific area of interest (Ellegaard and entrepreneurship, the European institutions play a more prominent role,
Wallin, 2015, Machado-Silva et al., 2019). The method assesses the especially those based in England and Belgium. (Schmitz et al., 2017),
scientific literature and provides useful resources to assist scientists, who published a comprehensive review and content analysis on the
policymakers, institutions and funding agencies in identifying research connection between innovation and entrepreneurship in the academic
priorities and directing financial investments. In this study, the sys­ setting and found the English and Belgium Universities to be the main
tematic methodology to conduct the present review facilitated a actors in the field, described the same trend. Indeed, our results also
comprehensive outline of the relevant literature by combining scientific demonstrate that these institutions produce some of the most relevant
publications and network analyses. works in terms of citations (D’Este and Perkmann, 2011, Grimaldi et al.,
Despite the time span, we demonstrated that the vast majority of 2011, Perkmann et al., 2013). It is also worth noting that, as described
documents were published in more recent years, highlighting the rela­ by (Hayter et al., 2018), the literature tends not to focus on international
tively embryonic stage of academic entrepreneurship research. More­ contexts, especially on emergent trends and models in the developing
over, this study reflects that the exploration of academic world. This is because the vast majority of the articles were published by
entrepreneurship topic is highly fragmented. This is especially evident scholars located primarily in the U.S. and Europe, mainly U.K. For this
when we observe that the knowledge production came from an reason, the present systematic review conducted on all peer-reviewed
impressive number of institutions around the globe, over 1000 in total, documents published independently of the journal and the date of
and was spread across 363 different journals from a very diverse range of publication is timely in acknowledging and providing visibility to the
disciplines, including business and economics, strategy, psychology, studies conducted by scholars from all around the globe.
sociology, economics, international business, and policy and develop­
ment studies. These results are in agreement with recent bibliometric
studies on similar topics published by (Chandra, 2018, Rothaermel et al., 5.2. Network and term map analysis
2007, Schmitz et al., 2017, Skute et al., 2017) that evidenced a very
interdisciplinary engagement and nonlinear progression, rather Far from being a unique event, academic entrepreneurship has a
systemic character with the participation of a comprehensive set of

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actors and variables at the system, organizational, and individual levels, the one developed by Steve Blank, which is at the heart of the lean start-
which all have to come together to support commercialization (Gri­ up process (Blank, 2013). It consists of four steps: customer discovery,
maldi et al., 2011, Hayter et al., 2018, Isenberg, 2010, Rothaermel et al., customer validation, customer creation, and company building. Rather
2007). The results of our mapping and clustering of the terms presented than being a linear process, there are feedback loops built into the first
in the title and abstracts of the retrieved publications identified three and second pairs of steps. In particular, the first two steps of customer
research areas in the dynamic ecosystem that surrounds academic discovery and customer validation are cycled through iteratively, until
entrepreneurship: i) academic’s characteristics; ii) institutional organiza­ there is a good match between an identified initial customer set and a
tion and resources, and iii) external environmental factors. We argue that business model that will create value for them. This is referred to as
stakeholders in all three levels play an essential role in the commer­ finding product-market fit. In a large, ongoing set of studies investi­
cialization process of research knowledge and are also interdependent gating the causes of entrepreneurial failure called the Startup Genome
and interact in a sophisticated manner to allow the academic entrepre­ Project,
neurship capabilities to be created, evolve, and ultimately, be sustain­ Marmer et al., (2011) use a modified version of this process: dis­
able over time. Addressing one or two elements may promote covery, validation, efficiency and scale. In the first iteration of the sur­
entrepreneurial activities at some level. However, when addressed vey, the most significant cause of failure that they discover is premature
together into one holistic arrangement, the potential of the ecosystem is scaling. Premature scaling happens when entrepreneurs skip the vali­
boosted, increasing innovation performance (Isenberg, 2010). dation step, and start trying to grow without first finding
Although using different approaches to recover scientific publica­ product-market fit.
tions, our findings agree with a recent work published (Chandra, 2018). The academic models also tend to have similar sets of steps. A recent
By utilizing topic mapping, co-citation, and overlay visualization ana­ version from Dowling and Devinney (2020) is typical: discovery,
lyses, the author identified five topics that were frequently present in the translation, application, commercialization. This has some curious fea­
entrepreneurship literature field across the 24 years of research, which, tures when compared to the standard entrepreneurship models. First,
according to the author, formed the building blocks of entrepreneurship, the first three steps in the academic model are roughly equivalent to just
namely: institutions and institutional entrepreneurship; innovation and the first step in the commercial ones. This makes some sense, as tech­
technology management; policy and development; entrepreneurial nical risk is often higher for deep tech research than it is for a standard
process and opportunity; and new ventures. (Rothaermel et al., 2007) software start-up (Werwath, 2019). However, this model implies that
comprehensively evaluated articles on university entrepreneurship. once the new discovery is passed on to a technology transfer office or a
They derived a conceptual framework composed of four major research corporate partner, the hard work has already been done and the rest is
streams that emerged between 1981 and 2005: entrepreneurial research trivial – just the final step of commercialization. This suggests that
university, the productivity of technology transfer offices, new firm nearly every academic entrepreneurial effort is subject to premature
creation, and environmental context. The authors argue that the inte­ scaling, as the market discovery and customer validation steps are
gration and interaction between the components of this framework re­ skipped. This idea is supported by our bibliometric and network ana­
flects the dynamic and evolutionary process of the university innovation lyses of the literature on academic entrepreneurship. Based on these,
system. More recently, Wright et al., (2017) presented a framework for Fig. 5 highlights the proposed conceptual framework for the academic
stimulating the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the University that also entrepreneurship process in practice. The presented process is
included several elements, such as institutional environment, resources non-linear and includes feedback loops, which may happen “out of
and capabilities; the involvement of different types of entrepreneurs order,” co-evolving and influencing each other (Almudi and Fatas-Vil­
(faculty, postdocs, students and alumni), internal and external support lafranca, 2021). The relevance of the individual steps and the impact of
actors and a variety of potential investors. Besides, the authors argued the feedback loops on the maturation of the process are described in
that the nature of the university environment and the external context, more detail in the following sections.
from local to national government policies and objectives towards uni­
versity entrepreneurship, potentially influence how the entrepreneurial
ecosystems arise in the first place and how they evolve.
Interesting to note is that among the previous studies conducted to
date, less focus was placed on the individual entrepreneur’s character­
istics, who is likely to play a central role in many of the pathways for the
commercialization of research results and the creation of technology-
based companies (Grimaldi et al., 2011). Our framework considers
that academic entrepreneurship’s success depends not on institutional
and environmental factors, but also on the personal antecedents and
attributes of the future entrepreneur, such as motivations, intentions,
and orientation towards entrepreneurship. For this reason, broadening
our empirical knowledge about the determinants of academic engage­
ment is extremely relevant in fostering an entrepreneurial culture in
research organizations and designing programs that encourage re­
searchers to participate more deliberately in the commercialization of
their results.

5.3. Developing a conceptual framework

Much of the literature on academic entrepreneurship produces

feature lists of factors that are important rather than a schema of how it
works as a process. Using some of the emerging process models of
commercial entrepreneurship allows us to build a better model of how
academic entrepreneurship works, which reveals some important gaps
in our knowledge.
A model of commercial entrepreneurship in widespread use now is Fig. 5. The academic entrepreneurship process in practice

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C. Guindalini et al. Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

5.3.1. Research Insight (Discovery) 5.3.2. Unlocking Value (Validation)

Understanding how academic entrepreneurship emerges, what mo­ The critical question in this model is: what tools and methods help
tivators and obstacles researchers encounter in moving from the em­ academic entrepreneurs with unlocking value? While some numerous
bryonic stage of idea inception to the commercialization of viable traits and methods support the other three steps in the academic
products have important implications for the recognition of the skills entrepreneurship process, our bibliometric and network analyses do not
and competencies that must be adequately developed (Boh et al., 2016, include any findings that help here. In his book on open innovation,
Grimaldi et al., 2011, Rothaermel et al., 2007). As mentioned by Siegel (Chesbrough, 2003) claims “technologies acquire economic value when
et al. (2003), academics who decide to engage in entrepreneurship have taken to market with an effective business model. When research dis­
traditional scientific norms, standards and values, in addition to chal­ coveries are driven by scientific inquiry and are not connected to any
lenges beyond those encountered by typical new high-technology ven­ business purpose, the commercial value of the resulting discoveries will
tures. Our network analyses captured the increasing literature that be serendipitous and unforeseeable. Unsurprisingly, most of these dis­
demonstrates how scientists’ individual antecedents, such as family coveries will be worth very little, although a few may be worth a great
background, age, and race/citizenship, may affect the propensity of deal-once they are connected to the market through some viable busi­
academic scientists to engage in entrepreneurial activities (Hayter et al., ness model.” More recently, Kastelle and Steen, (2011) add that
2018). Another extremely relevant topic approached by authors is the although every innovation starts with a great idea, the idea generation
significant gender gap that exists in the success of commercialization of phase is the most natural part of innovation. In fact, successfully
research knowledge, with women scientists showing to be less likely to implementing new ideas and working out how they create value is when
disclose their inventions, to patent, to license and to create spin-offs the innovation is occurring.
based on their research results (Goel et al., 2015, Haeussler and Coly­ As described by Meyer et al. (2011), to reach the commercial
vas, 2011). Explanations for the disparity include a variety of possible marketplace, university-developed technologies must navigate and
factors, such as lack of industry experience, lower levels of seniority and overcome three gaps: The technology discovery gap, which separates
visibility, network exclusion, the research area of work, higher reliance cutting-edge scientific discoveries and their commercial feasibility; the
on institutional support, among others (Abreu and Grinevich, 2017). commercialization gap, which involves transforming a potentially
Although initiatives to ensure that female researchers’ unique perspec­ feasible commercial opportunity into a validated business model
tives and skills are supported and adequately stimulated are a global capable of attracting investment, and the venture launch gap, which is
priority (Donald et al., 2011, Huang et al., 2020), women academic related to venture formation and funding and includes IP security, a
entrepreneurs continue to face several challenges and constraints during committed management team and seed funding previously to venture’s
the commercialization process of their research. launch.
Another common focus of individual-level factors studies evaluate is From this perspective, traditional entrepreneurship courses may help
the importance of entrepreneurial behavior and attitude in shaping to bridge the first gap by increasing scientist’s awareness of the com­
scientists’ engagement in commercial activities (Hayter et al., 2018). mercial opportunities for their research outcomes, and by offering them
Self-efficacy, which refers to an individual’s self-perception of their the possibility to develop relevant entrepreneurial competencies and
ability to undertake entrepreneurship endeavors effectively, is shown to self-efficacy (Boh et al., 2016). However, successfully navigating the
play a role in determining the level of interest in pursuing an entre­ three gaps in the commercialization of university technology pathway
preneurial career (Bullough et al., 2014, Guerrero and Urbano, 2014). requires a methodological approach that also helps researchers to un­
An additional relevant topic captured by our network analysis was derstand how their technology creates value to potential customers,
entrepreneurial intentions, which is a process antecedent to entrepre­ regardless of it being social, cultural economic or environmental, and to
neurial action that allows the academic to understand the value of the develop a sustainable and scalable business model that addresses a
knowledge, recognize opportunities, and make a decision on them significant target market.
through entrepreneurial actions (Guerrero and Urbano, 2014, Shahab Steve Blank created a methodology to address the validation stage, or
et al., 2019). Frequently positively related, entrepreneurial self-efficacy the commercialization stage, called Lean LaunchPad (LLP), based on
and entrepreneurial intentions are mediated by entrepreneurship edu­ experiential learning during which budding entrepreneurs test hypoth­
cation, also identified in the same cluster by our analyses (Shahab et al., eses around their business models through a customer discovery process
2019). Evidence suggests that individuals equipped with entrepreneur­ (Blank, 2013, Blank and Dorf, 2012). The purpose is to reduce market
ship knowledge and skills will have more intentions to pursue innova­ and economic viability risks and accelerate the commercialization of
tive projects, as well as demonstrate higher self-efficacy towards venture new products and services based on scientific research. This process
creation (Shahab et al., 2019). Interestingly, a survey of Nature Journal adapted the lean start-up methodology (Blank, 2013) to facilitate the
readers demonstrated that although 47 percent of the interviewees commercialization of high-tech scientific discoveries. Its first use was in
expressed interest in commercializing their research, merely six percent the National Science Foundation Innovation Corps (I-Corps™) program,
of the 1403 respondents reported having started a company. The most launched in 2012. To date, this is considered one of the most successful
significant perceived barriers cited were financial risk and insecurity initiatives to increase the impact of academic research and the standard
(cited by 72% of respondents) and lack of business skills (53%) (Brody, for commercializing science in America (Nnakwe et al., 2018). Data
2017). from 2012-2018 summarize the staggering impact of the I-Corps pro­
As expected in a field still at the exploratory stages of development, gram: 1,315 teams, 3,745 individuals and 271 universities have been
there is an active debate on the literature regarding the real effectiveness involved; $301M raised and 644 start-ups created (NSF 2019).
of entrepreneurship education in promoting entrepreneurial movements In Australia, modeled after I-Corps™, the ON Program initiative
(Fayolle, 2013, Martin et al., 2013, Nabi et al., 2017). Although some started as a small pilot in 2014 by researchers of members of
contradictory results have been reported, in general, the literature Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO)
suggests that entrepreneurship education is positively related to entre­ and the University of Queensland Business School (UQBS). It rapidly
preneurial self-efficacy and intentions (Bae et al., 2014, Maresch et al., became a national science and technology accelerator (Kastelle et al.,
2016, Sanchez, 2013, Wilson et al., 2007), as wells as to 2018). By adopting the LLP approach, the Australian initiative has been
entrepreneurship-related knowledge, skills and competencies (Martin extremely successful not only in supporting the development of business
et al., 2013, Sanchez, 2013). In addition, entrepreneurship education skills scientists typically lack, but also in guiding principal investigators
also favors the creation of new ventures in the academic setting (Lamine through a process of identifying and exploiting potential business op­
et al., 2018, Sansone et al., 2019). portunities (Kastelle et al., 2018). Between 2014 and 2020, the CSIRO
Lean LaunchPad and ON accelerator programs ran more than 80

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C. Guindalini et al. Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

cohorts, with an average of 10 research projects per cohort. To date, market, as well as enables technology transfer, via different forms of
over 60 research-based spin-outs have been created from these projects. commercialization, including patenting, licensing and spin-off/start-up
Within the CSIRO, this represents an eight-fold increase in the annual creation. Recently, research organizations and entrepreneurship edu­
spin-out rate, with substantial increases in the rate and size of venture cators have, in addition to teaching, adopted a central role in inspiring
capital investments as well (Faff et al., 2021). and supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs. They do this by
Other successful international initiatives based on the Lean promoting training in the various phases of the commercialization
LaunchPad methodology include: FDays® accelerator at Germany’s process and conditions for their high-tech start-ups to prosper in a well
Fraunhofer Venture Lab (Bauer et al., 2016); PolyU Lean Launchpad networked and healthy innovation community (Engel, 2015, Engel
Programme at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University - Institute for et al., 2016). In this context, specialized and flexible structures, such as
Entrepreneurship (Poly U., (Poly, 2020)) and 101 Programme at the liaison and technology transfer offices, incubators, accelerators, and
Flemish Institute for Technological Research (Schuurman et al., 2017), science parks that provide access to mentoring, shared facilities, services
among others. and connections, while maintaining proximity with research centers,
The LLP approach to supporting academic entrepreneurship is still help high-tech startups to overcome some of the constraints faced in the
relatively new and evolving. However, research that describes this early stages of the venture’s development. Legal and supportive internal
approach is beginning to appear (Bauer et al., 2016, Faff et al., 2021, policies, including protection of proprietary ideas and innovations and
Huang-Saad et al., 2018, Huang-Saad et al., 2017, Kastelle et al., 2018, the promotion of an entrepreneurial culture within the university, can
Nnakwe et al., 2018, Schuurman et al., 2017). This creates an important bridge the gap between academic and industrial context and increase
opportunity to begin an investigation of the range of the LLP approachs’ awareness in the community of the possibilities of commercializing
outcomes in impact studies and the implications for the acceleration of research inventions (Grimaldi et al., 2011).
the technology transfer pathway. This research gap is clear from the Moreover, the effective articulation between research organizations,
network analyses, which did not capture any terms related to the LLP industry, and the public sector is essential to improve productivity
process. We thus encourage more studies that describe the impact, through innovation and drive economic growth Isenberg, (2010). For
achieved outcomes and challenges of implementing LLP programs in this reason, not only flexible internal structures, but also governance
different contexts, as well as how it compares to other methodological arrangements where all stakeholders are represented and develop a
approaches that aim to increase the commercialization outputs of sci­ shared vision of the process, is required for creating a more dynamic and
entific research. innovation-friendly environment (Kirby et al., 2011). By seeding
In addition, despite the ongoing debate on whether entrepreneurship entrepreneurial ecosystems through structure programs and adequate
can be taught (Nabi et al., 2017), there is growing consensus that spe­ support, research organizations may increase the economic productivity
cific entrepreneurial competencies, such as learning agility, creativity, of their scientific and technological research, thereby boosting results
low fear of failure, willingness to accept risk, and problem-solving in a and increasing the odds of success of the new ventures.
complex environment, are teachable (Engel et al., 2016, Gümüsay and
Bohné, 2018). More specifically, the literature emphasizes that entre­ 5.3.4. Creating Impact (Scale/Company Building)
preneurial learning should mostly be experiential in nature through In addition to having academics with favorable attitudes towards
practically oriented teaching models, action-based learning, and entrepreneurship, internal structures and effective mechanisms to sup­
real-world entrepreneurial experiences (Nabi et al., 2017, Rasmussen port commercialization in the scientific setting, universities and
and Sorheim, 2006). In this sense, pitch, business idea and, startup research organizations may only draw advantage from entrepreneurial
competitions where potential entrepreneurs can be adequately moti­ activities when the legal frameworks and local- context opportunities in
vated, and test and validate their assumptions in a supportive environ­ which they are surrounded allows them to acquire the adequate re­
ment, have increasingly become more common. They are proven to be sources, while providing infrastructure and financial incentives (Fischer
rich learning settings that are appropriate to shape and improve entre­ et al., 2019, Grimaldi et al., 2011). Our network mapping results show
preneurs’ competencies (Passaro et al., 2017). that the external environmental cluster has an entrepreneurial univer­
sity, government, higher education/education and challenge as core
5.3.3. Commercialization (Efficiency/Customer Creation) elements and also aggregates action terms, such as transformation, di­
Commercialization opportunity perception depends not only on rection, evolution, economic development and the triple-helix model of
scientists’ individual characteristics in terms of motivations and per­ innovation. As stated by Etzkowitz (2003), to effectively promote
sonal attitudes, but also on the internal environmental conditions innovation and economic development, the triple helix model of aca­
conducive for entrepreneurship (Guerrero and Urbano, 2014). Nelson, demia–industry–government strategic interactions requires policies
(2014) demonstrates that organizational context not only shapes the intending to strengthen university-industry links and to stimulate
decision to engage in entrepreneurship but influences how individuals commercialization of university-generated technologies. The entrepre­
identify and act upon an entrepreneurial challenge. Previous studies neurial university needs the government not only to perform its tradi­
show that the organizational context is important in providing a fertile tional regulatory role, but dynamically acting as a public entrepreneur
entrepreneurial atmosphere for scientists/students to feel more and venture capitalist (Etzkowitz, 2003a). In this sense, governments
encouraged and competent to engage in commercial activities (Grimaldi should encourage this academic transformation as an economic devel­
et al., 2011, Guerrero and Urbano, 2014). The environmental de­ opment strategy, reflecting changes in the relationship between
terminants that condition the development of entrepreneurial univer­ knowledge producers and users (Etzkowitz et al., 2000, Guerrero and
sities include: more formal factors, such as entrepreneurial organization; Urbano, 2017, Ranga and Etzkowitz, 2013).
flexible support and governance structure; links with industry; entre­ To improve productivity through innovation and drive economic
preneurship education and support programs for academics and stu­ growth, several countries have introduced new legislation or imple­
dents; and informal factors, such as attitudes towards entrepreneurship, mented policies and reforms in national research systems with the clear
adequate culture values, teaching methodologies, role models and objective of encouraging academic entrepreneurship at different levels
reward system (Guerrero and Urbano, 2012, Hayter et al., 2018, Kirby (Sandstrom et al., 2018). In collaboration with civil organizations,
et al., 2011). government programs play a role in providing the national, top- down
Our network results suggest that entrepreneurial organizations work policies and supporting bottom-up initiatives at the local level (Etzko­
to transform students and staff into academic entrepreneurs by witz, 2003a, Kastelle et al., 2018). In his article “How to Start an
providing internal structure and support mechanisms that motivates Entrepreneurial Revolution”, (Isenberg, 2010) stated, "To ignite venture
academic engagement, fosters links with industry and venture capital creation and growth, governments need to create an ecosystem that

9
C. Guindalini et al. Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

sustains entrepreneurs". The author presented key principles on which entrepreneurship is highly interdisciplinary and still in its infancy. Our
government leaders should focus, including: private sector engagement systematic review was conducted using terms such as academic/uni­
from the start; entrepreneurship cultural value promotion; adequate versity/scientific entrepreneurship, rather than focusing on specific el­
legal, bureaucratic, and regulatory frameworks; reinforcement of ements of the entrepreneurial environment, as the majority of the
existing entrepreneurial clusters, instead of creating new ones; alloca­ reviews available to date. It also included all peer-reviewed documents
tion of resources to support high-potential entrepreneurs, especially if published independently of the journal and the date of publication. This
resources are limited; funding programs subjected to market rigors. approach was important to provide visibility to the studies conducted by
Above all, the author highlights that if governments want to promote scholars from all around the globe and to potentially include a variety of
economic growth by stimulating self- sustaining venture creation, they ecosystem components, facilitating the identification of the tension in
need to approach the entrepreneurship ecosystem as a whole (Isenberg, the literature and the elaboration of a framework that consolidates the
2010, Kirby et al., 2011). Importantly, Engel, (2014) also discusses key components of the research commercialization process: research
government contributions in safeguarding the rule of law. These include insight, unlock value, commercialize and create impact. We believe that
adherence to contracts and intellectual property rights, principles of the manuscript also validates the utility of the network analysis tool and
transparency and impartially, fair and ethical practices, mechanisms to encourages researchers to use this methodology to gain insights and
avoid bribery and corruption creates a stable setting and context, more visibility of different scenarios. The proposed framework model
encouraging entrepreneurs and investors to engage in technology highlights the relevance of navigating through the process of market
commercialization activities. discovery and validation and developing a sustainable and scalable
Other than the central role of the government in enhancing the business model to avoid premature scaling and increase the commer­
innovation potential of their communities, additional ecosystem en­ cialization success rate. We argue that future research seeking to identify
ablers of the creation and progress of technology-based ventures have strategies and concrete approaches to strengthen the innovation
been identified. The author highlights that, in an innovation-centered ecosystem and to enable scientists with the necessary skills and infra­
cluster, factors such as professional entrepreneurs who understand the structure to translate the research results into enterprises with high so­
relevance of raising outside equity capital; serial new ventures coupled cietal impact is hugely relevant to help researchers to focus their work
with established firms that pull new firms into supply chains; a sup­ beyond their laboratories and to conduct their projects and academic
portive venture capital community; and a skilled workforce contribute agenda with commercial outcome aims. In addition, further studies
to fostering win–win scenarios among stakeholders, driving value cre­ evaluating success drivers and barriers associated with the multi-level
ation and accelerating the spin-out of technology into novel businesses aspects of the innovation commercialization process are essential to
(Engel, 2014, Engel, 2015, Engel and del-Palacio, 2009). the implementation of policies to support and foster entrepreneurship,
Our framework acknowledges the critical role of the environment in especially in intensely dynamic environments such as scientific research
which the research institution is embedded in supporting and leveraging and development. More specifically, to support female academics to
academic entrepreneurship. We posit that differences and particularities commercialize their research and to help close the existent gender gap in
in these environments have contributed to the differences in the out­ this context, studies that attempt to comprehend the specific constraints
comes of the various LLP programs that have run to date. The outcomes and challenges women encounter during the entrepreneurial process are
of the present study will hopefully assist decision-makers in reviewing an urgent topic to be explored. Although highly disseminated in uni­
public policies and programs and identifying the main weaknesses and versities across the world, there is also an urgent need for studies that
bottlenecks of the current system to create new mechanisms for creating critically evaluate the impact of Lean LaunchPad programs in the aca­
a more dynamic and innovation-friendly environment. The establish­ demic setting, and how it compares to other methodological approaches
ment of adequate strategies, processes, and practices that allow the that aim to increase the commercialization outputs of scientific research.
recognition of commercialization opportunities from academic research Finally, our study suggests that the academic entrepreneurship
will help broaden the articulation between academia-government- ecosystem is highly interconnected, with several factors moderating the
business and unlock the value of research outputs, ultimately permit­ effect of others and the multi-levels interacting in a complex and dy­
ting a direct contribution of academic institutions to academic in­ namic manner. For this reason, studies that consider not only individual
stitutions the economic and social development of the countries. elements of the innovation chain, but instead evaluate the process from
Of course, in practice, this process is non-linear. There are feedback a systemic perspective and account for the many influences on academic
loops all the way through, steps happen “out of order,” and the different entrepreneurship are greatly encouraged.
parts co-evolve as they influence each other (Almudi and Fatas-Villa­
franca, 2021). This is why the ‘Unlock Value’ step is so critical. It acts as Declarations
the hinge between developing a research insight and creating value and
impact with this discovery. Faff et al., (2021) demonstrate that, for the Conflicts of interest/Competing interests: The authors have no con­
research teams participating in the ON program in Australia, attending flicts of interest to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.
to this commonly missing step, substantially increased the impact of The manuscript has not been published previously and is not under
research, documenting an eight-fold increase in the annual rate of consideration for publication elsewhere. The manuscript has been
spin-outs and 200 percent increase–both in the percentage of spin-outs approved by all authors and, if accepted, it will not be published else­
receiving venture capital funding and in average funding amount. where in the same form, in English or in any other language, including
It is ironic, but perhaps unsurprising, that the gap in the research electronically without the written consent of the copyright-holder.
literature mirrors the gap that both academic and more traditional en­ Availability of data and material (data transparency): The datasets
trepreneurs create by neglecting idea validation activities. The success generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available
of Innovation Corps, in the US, ON in Australia, and other LLP-based from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
programs suggests that this is a crucial step in academic entrepre­
neurial practice. To realise the full benefit of the substantial amounts of CRediT authorship contribution statement
money invested in academic research globally, it is also critical that we
address this area as a research topic as well, to better inform practice. Camila Guindalini: Conceptualization, Methodology, Validation,
Formal analysis, Writing – original draft. Martie-Louise Verreynne:
6. Conclusion Conceptualization, Methodology, Validation, Writing – review & edit­
ing, Supervision. Tim Kastelle: Conceptualization, Methodology, Vali­
In summary, our results suggest that the literature on academic dation, Writing – review & editing.

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C. Guindalini et al. Technological Forecasting & Social Change 173 (2021) 121144

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and entrepreneurship in the academic setting: a systematic literature review

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