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This chapter provides an overview of the technology commercialization process that occurs in research universities. With the assistance of technology transfer offices, inventors and licensing firms enter into collaborations to commercialize new inventions. This chapter highlights the major aspects of these relationships, including why collaborations are likely to stalemate when a party’s self-interest clashes with the overall objective of collaboration. It outlines some possible strategies for avoiding these stalemates to form effective partnerships. The chapter concludes by discussing avenues for future research.

Although interfirm collaborations between entrepreneurial firms and established partners have become ubiquitous in organizational and business life, academic research on collaborations between start-ups and large industry leaders has only received limited attention. Such collaborations are also known as “asymmetric” or “unbalanced” relationships. The purpose of this chapter is to provide a systematic literature review of the current state of research on collaborations between entrepreneurial and large firms. In particular, the chapter identifies several benefits and risks involved for entrepreneurial firms and uses the findings of the literature review as a springboard to provide a roadmap for future research on this timely topic.

Regional differences among industry clusters have long been a puzzle, especially when performance differences are significant. This chapter examines the case of venture capital investing, in which Silicon Valley differs from the rest of the world despite attempts to imitate its model. The point of entry in this chapter is the contract between venture capitalist and entrepreneur. Although such contracts have been analyzed in other research, this chapter argues that the psychological effects of different contract styles are of primary importance to innovative outcomes of entrepreneurial ventures. Thus, it argues that regulatory focus theory, which considers the psychological effects of contracting, is essential to understanding differences in practice and outcomes in venture capital clusters.

This chapter addresses the role of collaboration in the design and operation of innovative business models in the digital era. It surveys and builds on a broad range of related literatures on collaboration and innovation to examine how collaboration affects business model innovation (BMI). The chapter suggests that collaboration within and across firms’ boundaries shapes both the design and operation stages of BMI. It contributes to the extant literature by taking the first step toward explicitly examining the link between collaboration and BMI and by incorporating the ramifications of digitization for both collaboration and BMI.

Entrepreneurs are active networkers; network connections change over time, new contacts are added, and others are dropped. Entrepreneurial networking is an integral part of entrepreneurial processes and can be a strategic and goal-oriented response to resource requirements; it can also be effectual and driven by an individual and collective desire to meet and interact. This chapter examines how entrepreneurs change their network and use a variety of actions and strategies to engage with friends, family, partners, and strangers. Although entrepreneurial networking in part is driven by critical events and crises as triggers, individual differences in motivation and ability also affect the way entrepreneurs respond and use networking in an uncertain and challenging environment.

This chapter synthesizes ideas from the fields of entrepreneurship and collaboration. It builds on Joseph Schumpeter’s definition of entrepreneurship as the “making of new combinations.” This view is extended with modern concepts from the resource-based view of the firm, from organizational economics, and from industrial organization. The chapter explores three broad questions: how joint value is created in business combinations, how collaboration is governed, and how value created jointly is shared. These questions define the “remix strategy,” defined as the use of mergers, alliances, and joint ventures to create value. Suggestions for future research are noted throughout.

This article focuses on institutional obstacles to entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs carry out a highly complicated composite act. They need intelligence to collect and digest information about business opportunities. They need foresight about the possibilities new technologies and other developments create. They need judgement and leadership skills to found a company and guide its growth. They need communication skills to enthuse financiers to back their vision. The number of active entrepreneurs therefore depends on how many individuals possess these skills. But skills are not endowments. Individuals decide to develop those skills that advance their well being and to forgo developing those that do not. The prospects of a career as an entrepreneur depend on the economic environment, which can be facilitative or detrimental. A multitude of factors determine this environment: rules and regulations, the quality of government, the availability of education, and the ambient culture.

This chapter shows one of the most significant issues facing old and new businesses in the digital age – the development of new business models – and determines a wide range of business models enabled by new platforms for computing and communications over the Internet. It reviews the general impact of the Internet on firm-level strategy (how to compete in particular markets) and business models (how to generate revenues and profits), and then describes how the Internet has caused entrepreneurship and innovation. Entrepreneurs around the world believed that the Internet would develop magical scale economies as millions of users flocked to their websites. Online advertising is a ‘winner-takes-most’ market. The Internet has brought an almost unlimited ability to search the globe for the best products and services at the lowest prices.

This article first makes some clarifications regarding the terminology we use and assumptions we make, simply for expositional purposes. It then outlines the basic tenets of the concept of agglomeration and industrial districts, highlighting the mechanisms by which the spatial grouping of activities and the generation of localized economies of scale may be related. It reviews the various hypotheses which are evident in the literature concerning the relationship between the spatial organization of industrial activity and the spatial patterns of innovation. It explains the current trends in thought about these relationships, pointing out the recent popularity of the concept of a cluster. It then investigates the various notions of clusters and industrial districts from a transactions costs perspective, and provides an assessment of the insights generated from these cluster arguments.

Technology start-ups face tough odds in their journey to commercial success. A key consideration in entrepreneurial decision making is whether and when to find a collaboration partner, in the form of an acquirer. The same decision also applies to the other side of the table, as buyers have to decide whether and when to engage in technology acquisitions through collaborations with start-ups. This chapter looks at the literature that uncovered some of the factors around the key decision of the timing of a collaboration, with specific focus on technology start-ups that also possess patents. For start-ups possessing patents, the recent development of markets for technology offers more opportunities to engage in collaboration and bring their ideas to fruition. The chapter discusses directions for future research in the conclusion.