Development of academic entrepreneurship in a non-mature context: the role of the university as a hub-organisation

Abstract

This paper focuses on how the evolving roles of a university and its Technology Transfer Office (TTO) are stimulating academic entrepreneurship in a non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystem. A more mature entrepreneurial ecosystem was built gradually by these actors through their progressive creation of innovation intermediaries and coordination among the local players involved in the creation of start-ups. We analyse how the university became a hub organisation. We use the case of the University of Strasbourg to show that the university contributed to the development of the entrepreneurial ecosystem by acting as a boundary spanner and by building and orchestrating the network of the stakeholders in the local system of innovation. This ‘hub’ university became a leading regional organisation at the political level. The TTO played a central role in supporting academic entrepreneurship at the operational level based on its evolution from a revenue maximising model to a model that takes account of social and economic regional development. The progressive adoption of a more selective model of start-up creation requires good coordination among the local actors. Over time, the TTO’s boundary spanning function increased to encompass the development of operational network building and orchestrating functions.

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Development of academic entrepreneurship in a
non-mature context: the role of the university as a
hub-organisation
Véronique Schaeffer & Mireille Matt
To cite this article: Véronique Schaeffer & Mireille Matt (2016): Development of academic
entrepreneurship in a non-mature context: the role of the university as a hub-organisation,
Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, DOI: 10.1080/08985626.2016.1247915
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ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT, 2016
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08985626.2016.1247915
Development of academic entrepreneurship in a non-mature
context: the role of the university as a hub-organisation
Véronique Schaeera and Mireille Mattb
aBureau d’Economie Théorique et Appliquée (BETA), Université de Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France; bGrenoble
Applied Economics Lab (GAEL), Universite Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, Grenoble INP, INRA, Grenoble, France
ABSTRACT
This paper focuses on how the evolving roles of a university and
its Technology Transfer Oce (TTO) are stimulating academic
entrepreneurship in a non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystem. A more
mature entrepreneurial ecosystem was built gradually by these actors
through their progressive creation of innovation intermediaries and
coordination among the local players involved in the creation of start-
ups. We analyse how the university became a hub organisation. We
use the case of the University of Strasbourg to show that the university
contributed to the development of the entrepreneurial ecosystem
by acting as a boundary spanner and by building and orchestrating
the network of the stakeholders in the local system of innovation.
This ‘hub’ university became a leading regional organisation at the
political level. The TTO played a central role in supporting academic
entrepreneurship at the operational level based on its evolution from
a revenue maximising model to a model that takes account of social
and economic regional development. The progressive adoption of a
more selective model of start-up creation requires good coordination
among the local actors. Over time, the TTO’s boundary spanning
function increased to encompass the development of operational
network building and orchestrating functions.
Introduction
Many nations and regions have implemented policies to encourage the creation of
university-based new ventures (Grimaldi et al. 2011), leading to a global increase of the
number of spin-os created (Clarysse et al. 2005). However, criticisms have been launched
about the relevance of policies generating mostly start-ups with little growth potential
(Harrison and Leitch 2010). Among the OECD countries, recent academic entrepreneurship
policies have been aimed at the creation of high growth rms (Mason and Brown 2014) and
support for student entrepreneurship to increase the societal impacts of university activities
(Hughes and Kitson 2012; Siegel and Wright 2015).
Despite debate over the abilities of all universities to develop research based spin-os
with high growth potential (Mustar et al. 2006; Mason and Brown 2014), public authorities
and universities with high research potential have been motivated to pursue their eorts to
© 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
KEYWORDS
Academic entrepreneurship;
start-up; TTOs; universities;
boundary spanner; hub
organisation; hub university;
regional context
ARTICLE HISTORY
Received 19 March 2014
Accepted 10 October 2016
CONTACT Véronique Schaeffer Schaeffer@unistra.fr

2 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
promote academic entrepreneurship. First, universities are facing competition based on
their patenting, licensing and start-up creation activities and this is driving their strategic
orientation (Siegel and Wright 2015). Second, although entrepreneurial policies may be
costly, university-based spin-os have a positive economic impact and contribute to the
local economic dynamics (Vincett 2010). Finally, beyond the direct economic impacts, the
creation of academic spin-o induces the translation of scientic knowledge into actionable
knowledge, which benets the wider society (Fontes 2005).
The claim that policies inspired by the Bayh–Dole Act and successful models, such as
Stanford and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), have not produced the intended
eects, reveals the importance of the local context in academic entrepreneurship dynamics
(Wright et al. 2008; Harrison and Leitch 2010; Mustar and Wright 2010). The concepts of
innovation systems (Cooke, Uranga, and Etxebarria 1997), geographic clusters (Breschi and
Malerba 2001) and entrepreneurial ecosystems (Cohen 2005) all support the idea that local
economic, institutional, relational and political factors inuence the emergence and success
of new ventures. However, while geographic clusters consider the advantage of collocation
in terms of the exchange of resources among manufacturers, consumers and other economic
actors (Cohen 2005), the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach focuses on the exchange of
resources specic to the entrepreneurship process (Spigel 2015). The regional system of
innovation approach emphasises the role of the institutional framework and the multiple
links among innovative actors (Cooke, Uranga, and Etxebarria 1997; Lawton Smith et al. 2014;
Ooms et al. 2015), while the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach considers the micro-
foundations of entrepreneurial dynamics (Autio et al. 2014) and integrates cultural and social
factors in the characterization of local contexts (Harrison and Leitch 2010; Spigel 2015). A
sustainable ecosystem is based on an internal dynamics resulting from the conjunction of
a strong entrepreneurial culture, dense networks of entrepreneurs, rms and investors, and
tangible local attributes such as successful local start-ups, universities, facilities for new
ventures and eective public policies (Neck et al. 2004; Isenberg 2010).
In this paper, we adopt an entrepreneurial ecosystem approach. We consider the devel-
opment of non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystems, characterised by internal weaknesses,
and fragmented networks or sparse relations between the various actors, which do not
enable emergence of the internal dynamics necessary for the reproduction and evolution
of the ecosystem over time. In a non-mature ecosystem, a specic actor can trigger the
dynamics that leads to the densication of the relations among the elements of the ecosys-
tem (Etzkowitz 2008). Universities engaged in the promotion of science-based spin-os can
play this role (Wright et al. 2008; Fini et al. 2011).
Our objective is to characterise the role of a university and its TTO in developing a sus-
tainable entrepreneurial ecosystem. This issue has been rather under-studied in the literature,
which usually considers universities as knowledge factories that play a passive role in the
development of entrepreneurial ecosystems (Harrison and Leitch 2010). An exception is
Youtie and Shapira (2008), which shows how a university in a non-mature context contributes
to creating a local entrepreneurial dynamics by becoming a hub-organisation and develop-
ing a boundary-spanning function. We develop a longitudinal analysis of the case of the
University of Strasbourg, over a 15 years period. This unusual time length allows observation
and analysis of the original dynamics and cumulative dimensions of the process of building
a hub university and its TTO’s encouragement of academic entrepreneurship. Based on the
work of Dhanaraj and Parkhe (2006) and Youtie and Shapira (2008), we show how a hub

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 3
university evolves from being a boundary spanner to becoming a powerful actor that pro-
gressively builds and orchestrates the entrepreneurial ecosystem at the political level. We
examine the role of the TTO in a hub university and how it contributes, over time, to building
the entrepreneurial ecosystem at a more operational level.
In Section 2, we highlight the importance for universities of developing entrepreneurial
strategies adapted to their ecosystem as opposed to replicating existing initiatives. We iden-
tify the key entrepreneurial ecosystem actors that encourage academic entrepreneurship
throughout the whole new venture creation process. Finally, we explore the role of univer-
sities, as hub-organizations, in non-mature entrepreneurial contexts. Section 3 presents the
methodology and justies our case study choice. Section 4 presents the results of the case
study and shows how a university contributes to the successful development of an entre-
preneurial ecosystem by becoming a hub university. Section 5 outlines the contributions
made by this paper and Section 6 concludes.
The role of universities in developing entrepreneurial ecosystems: literature
review
Our review of the literature shows rst that universities cannot replicate successful mecha-
nisms, but need to adapt their strategies to the specicities of the regional context. We
underline the role played by various innovation stakeholders and introduce the concept of
hub university (Youtie and Shapira 2008) to emphasise how universities can act to build a
more mature entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Adaptation of university strategies to the specicities of the entrepreneurial
ecosystem
The literature is unanimous in arguing that universities should develop strategic approaches
adapted to the specicities of their entrepreneurial ecosystem (Wright et al. 2008; Harrison
and Leitch 2010). Learning from previous experience is dicult and assumes an understand-
ing of the idiosyncratic process and context. Experience shows that the wide adoption by
universities of the same strategies as those developed by successful US universities, such as
Stanford or MIT, does not produce the same results in a dierent context (Mustar and Wright
2010). These US universities are acting in entrepreneurial ecosystems that have developed
over time and in which high-tech ventures prosper (Mason and Brown 2014). Several char-
acteristics have been identied as critical to their success: presence of large rms and start-
ups, top-level human resources at all start-up stages, venture capital, top class universities,
extensive participation of government in shaping science and technology and an entrepre-
neurial culture (Lee et al. 2000; O’Shea et al. 2007).
Building an entrepreneurial ecosystem is a long term, complex process involving various
actors to dierent extents over time. Successful environments are dicult to replicate as the
conditions of each local context dier. Instead of transferring successful mechanisms from
elsewhere (Boston, Georgia Tech, Oxford, Taiwan, etc.), universities and other local actors in
less mature contexts should analyse their strengths and weaknesses, take a long term per-
spective and generate organizational innovations when existing solutions are not relevant
(Etzkowitz and Dzisah 2008).

4 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
According to Siegel and Wright (2015), the need for a more strategic approach leads to
a rethinking of the development of academic entrepreneurship. The focus should be at the
level of the entrepreneurial ecosystem and how the university can contribute to its devel-
opment. For instance, Clarysse et al. (2005) identify three main start-up creation strategies
developed by European universities: (i) the low selective model aims at creating many
self-employment-oriented start-ups focused on local or national markets, which follow a
low growth trajectory; (ii) the supportive model aims at generating prot-oriented start-ups
with the potential for growth; (iii) the incubator model aims at creating a smaller number of
start-ups involving high levels of innovative activity at the cutting edge of technology, and
operating in global markets. The rst two models are more suited to well-developed, local
entrepreneurial contexts; the last, high-support and more selective incubator strategy, is
appropriate for contexts with a developing entrepreneurial culture.
Entrepreneurial ecosystems are geographically bounded, but are not restricted to a spe-
cic scale (city or region). The entrepreneurial ecosystem perspective focuses on the condi-
tions to sustain entrepreneurship, and on the interactions between the framework conditions
and the local/regional context (Mason and Brown 2014, 7). For these authors, policies should
focus on four dimensions of the entrepreneurial ecosystem: business mentoring and incu-
bation programmes; access to nancial resources (venture capital, bank loans, crowd funding,
etc.); connections between the various actors; development of an entrepreneurial culture
(education programmes, attracting the creative class).
The entrepreneurial ecosystem actors
For analytical reasons, we employ the stage model proposed by Auerswald and Branscom
(2003) to identify the entrepreneurial ecosystem actors. We recognise that new venture
creation is a non-linear process characterised by backward loops between and within phases
(Vohora, Wright, and Lockett 2004). Spin-o companies devote varying amounts of time to
these stages; they develop dierent types of activities, use dierent types of resources and
follow dierent trajectories (Druilhe and Garnsey 2004).
Auerswald and Branscomb’s model includes ve stages (Figure 1) involved in the process
of new academic rm creation. We introduce into this model the actors that support
Figure 1.Involvement of the various entrepreneurial ecosystem actors.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 5
entrepreneurial activities in the dierent stages of new venture creation (Wright, Clarysse,
and Mosey 2012; Lawton Smith and Bagchi-Sen 2012). The temporal dimension of the stage
model highlights the importance of actor coordination along the process.
The rst two stages involve the scientic and technical domains. Researchers develop a
technical concept based on scientic discovery (stage 1). When the technology is mature, it
moves from the laboratory to proof of concept (stage 2). The actors involved in these early
phases include the university, the TTO and the Proof of Concept Centre (PoCC).
At the university level, a critical mass of faculty generating world-class research (Colombo,
D’Adda, and Piva 2010), the presence of star scientists (Clarysse, Valentina, and Salter 2011)
and an orientation towards the life sciences and chemistry are positive determinants of spin
o creation (O’Shea et al. 2005). Moray and Clarysse (2005) underline the positive role of
university policies for establishing structures to enable the identication of technological
opportunities, reducing the lag between their identication and the incubation phase,
improving the incubation process, establishing an Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) policy
and investing in venture capital funds. Academic entrepreneurship focuses on scientist’s
inventions but has evolved recently towards a broader vision that includes other stakeholders
such as students, alumni and post-doctoral fellows. The development of entrepreneurship
courses, entrepreneurship centres and the involvement of surrogate entrepreneurs on uni-
versity campuses are key elements that complement the TTO and science parks (Siegel and
Wright 2015).
TTOs act as boundary spanners between the scientic and industrial worlds (Siegel,
Veugelers, and Wright 2007). They provide nancial resources, technical, industrial and legal
competences, business world knowledge, and experience in spin-o creation (Markman
et al. 2005; O’Shea et al. 2005). TTOs working within the norms of an entrepreneurial culture,
having strong ties with venture capitalists, business angels, IP specialists have higher rates
of spino activity (Wright et al. 2006; O’Shea et al. 2007). The presence of surrogate entre-
preneurs with their own networks (Franklin, Wright, and Lockett 2001) is a positive determi-
nant. Small universities with weak technology transfer activities which are unable to create
TTOs with diversied competences may collaborate with other TTOs in their region, allowing
the pooling of resources to achieve critical mass, and aimed at contributing to regional
economic development rather than focusing on maximisation of only short term returns
(Matt and Schaeer 2012; Siegel, Veugelers, and Wright 2007; Litan, Mitchell, and Reedy
2007).
PoCCs are a relatively recent phenomenon. The rst two PoCCs were the Von Liebig Center
at the University of California (San Diego) founded in 2001, and the Deshpande Center at
the MIT founded in 2002 (Hayter and Link 2015). Researchers often nd it dicult to obtain
early stage funding to develop and test prototypes and conduct market research (Gulbranson
and Audretsch 2008). The role of PoCCs is to ll this gap and support the maturation of
technologies with high market potential. There is no single PoCC model, but most provide
seed funding, education programmes and networking events and some oer incubator
space (Maia and Claro 2013). Successful PoCCs benet from location in a high level research
university with a TTO, and relations with angel investors and venture capitalists (Gulbranson
and Audretsch 2008). In France, the SAT T (Society for the Acceleration of Technology Transfer)
performs this role. The rst ve SATTs were created in 2012, among which one at the
University of Strasbourg, also responsible for TTO activities.

6 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
In stage 3, researchers develop the technology on which the new company will be based,
and formulate the company’s business plan. The invention is often protected; product con-
cept is dened; potential markets are identied; and the project’s viability is evaluated. This
is a particularly dicult stage (Auerswald and Branscom 2003) and requires market knowl-
edge and business skills. Incubators can provide these competences in addition to a wide
range of services to the newly created enterprises (Matt and Tang 2010). In the late 1990s
and early 2000s, many universities developed incubators – most funded by regional and
national governments – to foster the creation of new rms (Wright et al. 2007).
In this phase, the availability of venture capital is crucial, but its regional location is not a
necessary condition for success. DiGregorio and Shane (2003) nd that the availability of
university venture capital funds has no inuence on the rate of start-up creation. Powers
and McDougall (2005) consider that the availability of venture capital in the relevant geo-
graphical area has a positive impact on start-up creation. Venture capital investment often
crosses regional boundaries and, what is important, is the connection between incubators
and venture capitalists (Hansen et al. 2000), whether in the same or a dierent regional area.
In stage 4, the new venture is created and development of the product to be produced
and marketed in stage 5 begins. Technology centres and technology parks (Löfsten and
Lindelöf 2002) are structured around technologies that facilitate entrepreneurs’ access to
technological knowledge, science and innovation networks. If these structures are linked to
incubators, they foster the integration of new businesses into the local entrepreneurial eco-
system. The formation of start-ups is higher in parks located near universities, which provide
a rich research environment – particularly in the eld of biotechnology. Clusters are geo-
graphical concentrations of interconnected actors involved in a particular economic eld
(Pitelis 2012). Large and well connected clusters increase the probability of academic start-up
creation (Avnimelech and Feldman 2015) due to agglomeration, co-location, concentration
of skilled human resources, social embeddedness, reduced transaction costs and economies
of diversity eects. Regional development agencies are intended to help small businesses
to innovate and to grow their networks (Wright et al. 2008).
Universities’ support for academic entrepreneurship in non-mature contexts
In local/regional contexts with non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystems, many of the above
mentioned innovation intermediaries may not exist or may be weakly connected. The lack
of coordination among actors leads to poor circulation of knowledge through the system
and inecient use of resources.
The role of universities has evolved to include an active role in regional development and the
dynamics of local networks. The triple helix model (Etzkowitz and Leydesdor 2000) characterises
this evolution as involving recursive and cross-institutional relations among universities, industry
and government, which lead to increasingly overlapping and hybrid actor roles. In this model,
academic entrepreneurialism is a central driver of regional development. According to Cooke
(2005, 1147), this conceptual approach is ‘too macro-sociological, functionalist and consensus-
focused’ to capture the reality of the links among actors. It is suited to the example of MIT, but
not sucient to characterise the role of universities in non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystems.
It proposes a global institutional approach, which ignores the specic mechanisms needed to
limit the eects of conicting goals among organisations, to redistribute the power in the system
and to develop academic entrepreneurialism. Etzkowitz (2008) argues that collaboration among

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 7
the actors involved in the triple helix is a key factor in successful knowledge-based regional
development. He characterises regional consensus spaces in which the actors work together to
promote regional development, analyse opportunities and gaps, and elaborate common regional
strategies. The regional triple helix emerges from three spaces: a consensus space, a knowledge
space consisting of R&D activities, and an innovation space creating organisational mechanisms,
which ll the regional innovation gap identied by the consensus space. These spaces generally
are coordinated and managed by a regional innovation organizer, a role that can be fullled by
the university which contributes to the progressive development of regional networks.
To capture the mechanisms that underpin the role of the university in a non-mature
context, we introduce the notion of hub organization. Youtie and Shapira (2008, 1189)
describe universities that encourage economic and social development, as ‘knowledge hubs’:
universities become even more deeply embedded in innovation systems, seeking to actively
foster interactions and spillovers to link research with application and commercialization, and
taking on roles of catalyzing and animating economic and social development. Process of the
creation, acquisition, diusion, and deployment of knowledge are at the core of these functions
hence the terminology of knowledge hub.
Hub universities are promoting intermediaries, whose economic function is to be a bound-
ary spanner and to foster interaction among academic, business and nancial actors, regional
development agencies and public authorities (Wright et al. 2008) and facilitate the exchange
of high added value knowledge. Building on the work of Amin and Cohendet (2000), Youtie
and Shapira (2008) underline that the transformation of academic knowledge into business
projects relies on the transmission of both codied and tacit knowledge from science to
market. The diusion of tacit knowledge requires the development of multidirectional inter-
actions among the actors in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Youtie and Shapira study the
case of Georgia Tech and show how a hub-university, based in a catching up region and
supported by the local authorities, can contribute to building a powerful entrepreneurial
ecosystem, through a long term boundary spanning role, leadership and mediating capa-
bilities. Universities that do not correspond to the successful entrepreneurial university
model need to develop new capabilities to form links with local actors able to support new
venture creation.
In the management literature, a hub organisation is usually a rm (not a university), which
manages the innovation system (Van Lente et al. 2003) and plays a central role in innovation
networks. It ‘possesses prominence … and power … gained through individual attributes
and a central position in the network, and … uses its prominence and power to perform a
leadership role in pulling together the dispersed resources and capabilities of network mem-
bers’ (Dhanaraj and Parkhe 2006, 659). For these authors, the hub rm has two main functions:
network building and network orchestration.
While an increasing number of universities is making the transition to a hub university
model in order to have a greater impact on regional development, they all evolve in dierent
contexts. Although the hub university model emphasises the ability to create mediator
organisations, it provides little guidance about how the university should interact with other
stakeholders to contribute to building an entrepreneurial ecosystem. It also overlooks the
role of the TTO as an operational actor in the system. The present paper contributes by
focusing on the transformation, in a non-mature region, of a university into a hub university.
We show how, over time, the university and its TTO built three main functions to develop a
sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystem: boundary spanning, network building and network
orchestration.

8 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
Research method
In this part we justify our choice of a case study methodology and describe data collection
and analysis.
Design and data collection
Our research question is how does the role of the university and its TTO change over time
to support academic start-up creation in a non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystem? A qual-
itative case study approach appears appropriate (Eisenhardt 1989) to identify, characterise
and dene the practices developed by the TTO and the university to progressively improve
regional environment. Our case is the University of Strasbourg, which we use to identify the
practices linked to the development, over time, of the dierent functions of a hub university
in a non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystem. Since studying change in organisations requires
rich and reliable data, we decided to study our own university (Gioia 2004), which is a multi-
disciplinary university and one of the biggest in France (ranked 3rd with around 47,000
students in 2016). In 1987, it was one of the rst French universities to create a TTO. We follow
our case from the early phases of the development of technology transfer activities and
academic entrepreneurship.
The University of Strasbourg has been keen to develop academic entrepreneurship since
2000 and exhibits many features mentioned in the literature as determining successful uni-
versity start-up creation: high quality science (Colombo, D’Adda, and Piva 2010); a critical
mass of faculty generating world-class research; the presence of star scientists (Clarysse,
Valentina, and Salter 2011); a large proportion of industry funding (Powers and McDougall
2005); and an orientation towards the life sciences and chemistry (O’Shea et al. 2005).
However, the university has some weaknesses in the areas of entrepreneurial cultural norms
and spin out companies.
At the end of the 1990s, the Alsatian innovation context was immature and suering from
lack of key actors (cf. Figure 2) such as venture capital funds, a regional incubator, competitive
clusters and a regional TTO (see the case study for details of their creation). In 2012, a strategic
analysis revealed a complete and operational knowledge transfer and diusion system (SAT T,
regional incubator, technical centres and platforms). However, it identied also some under-
lying weaknesses including a low share of private R&D concentrated in larger companies, a
shortage of venture capital and high-tech services, and lack of political guidance, transpar-
ency and coordination in the innovation system.
The cases of Georgia Tech (developed by Youtie and Shapira 2008), and the University of
Strasbourg present many dierences related to their histories, institutional contexts, organ-
isation, governance and research elds. However, they have some similarities, which justify
the adaptation of some elements of the hub model to the University of Strasbourg case.
Over time, both universities have implemented policies to develop academic entrepreneur-
ship in a non-mature local context. In both cases, the contribution to the development of
an entrepreneurial ecosystem through their continuous development of boundary spanning
roles, has been driven by a strategic willingness.
Our research involves two types of data collection. First, over a period of 12 years, we
interviewed the various actors involved in academic entrepreneurship, at the university and
regional levels. We conducted semi-structured interviews to characterise the role,

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 9
organisation and strategy of the University of Strasbourg, its TTO, and the links with other
regional actors. We interviewed stakeholders from the dierent players identied in the
literature: the university’s Rector and Vice-Rector, the TTO, nancial intermediaries, innova-
tion intermediaries, development agencies, the incubator director and academic entrepre-
neurs (see Table 1). The timing of our interviews corresponded to critical changes in the
national or regional innovation systems, which induced new practices and actions at the
TTO and university levels. All the interviews were recorded and transcribed.
The second, complementary, form of data collection consisted of crosschecking the infor-
mation obtained from the interviews, using university archive material, nancial documents
and the websites of the various actors. One of the authors of the present paper was Vice-
Rector of International Aairs at the University of Strasbourg between 2007 and 2008 and
a member of the university board between 2009 and 2011. The other author has been a
member of the university’s Scientic Council since 2009. This allowed privileged access to
interviewees and data related to nancial, strategic and political issues linked to entrepre-
neurship at the university level.
Figure 2.Players involved in the creation of start-ups in Alsace.
Table 1.Interviews conducted.
Players interviewed Number of Interviews Years
TTO director 4 2000, 2006, 2009, 2012
Incubator director 2 2006, 2012
Academic entrepreneurs 6 2004, 2012
Innovation intermediaries (cluster, venture capital) 3 2012
Development agencies 2 2012
Academic players (Rector, Vice-Rector) 4 2000, 2006, 2009, 2012

10 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
Data analysis
To capture the dynamics of a hub university, we conducted processual analysis (Pettigrew
1997). We conducted an abductive analysis of our ndings (Van Maanen, Sørensen, and
Mitchell 2007), based on the boundary spanning and hub university model presented above.
Our aim was not to generate new theory or to test existing theory, but rather to explore new
dimensions, new practices and new types of relationships.
We used the interview data to create a timeline for the sequence of events, focusing on
how boundary spanning activities were built over time – by the TTO and by the university.
On this timeline, we noted how the links among the various actors in the innovation system
evolved. We used the original boundary spanning and hub university framework presented
in the literature review, to analyse the various elements of the timeline, the interview tran-
scripts and associated documentation. The analysis conrmed the value of studying bound
-
ary spanning activities at both the university and the TTO levels. Although our results are
mostly in line with the literature, we uncovered some unanticipated empirical ndings
related to: (i) coordination of the various actors in the regional system; and (ii) the university’s
increased political power at the regional level. Comparison between our emerging ndings
and the results in the innovation intermediaries and entrepreneurial ecosystem literature
introduces new concepts to our analysis of a hub university. Specically, we rened our
analysis based on the hub organisation concept developed by Dhanaraj and Parkhe (2006).
Going back and forth between our empirical observations and the theory allowed us to
extend the hub university model and to consider the three functions of boundary-spanning,
network building and orchestrating. The case reveals the dynamics of a hub organisation’s
function-building process.
Case study
We present our results, distinguishing between the political role of the university and the
operational role of the TTO. The university denes an entrepreneurial strategy in interaction
with triple helix actors. In order to identify the mechanisms activated over time at an oper-
ational level, we observed the contribution of the TTO to the implementation of the univer-
sity’s strategy. The rst part of this section discusses the political role of the university, and
the second part focuses on the operational role of the TTO.
Evolution of the university’s entrepreneurship strategy
A hub university has two essential functions: of mediator and network developer through
links with the local innovation stakeholders. We explore these interrelated mechanisms
underpinning the development of a sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Creating innovation intermediaries
Like several other countries (Mustar and Wright 2010; Grimaldi et al. 2011), at the end of the
1990s, France implemented a series of programmes to facilitate the development of aca-
demic entrepreneurship. These policies drove the development of TTOs, incubators and
PoCCs. In 1999, the law on innovation allowed greater involvement of researchers in business
and encouraged the creation of incubators. In 2004, being granted the status of a young

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 11
innovative company was accompanied by nancial support for the business development
phases. In 2005, the National Research Agency (ANR) launched a call for proposal to encour-
age universities to pool the resources of their TTOs at the regional level. In 2007, the new
law related to university autonomy allowed universities to implement their own entrepre-
neurship strategies. In 2010 the ‘Future Investment’ project supported the creation of the
rst SATTs, which were established in 2012. The University of Strasbourg was responsive to
these initiatives and was successful in the various calls for proposals.
The University of Strasbourg created its rst innovation intermediary in 1987 in the form
of a TTO, which was a pioneering initiative for France. It started as a small department, aimed
primarily at regulating the management of research contracts and protecting the university’s
interests in contract arrangements between researchers and their industry partners. In 1998,
the university’s Rector created the function of Vice-Rector, responsible for commercialisation
activities and partnerships with companies, and formulated a policy to develop technology
transfer activities. Prior to 2000, there was no formal policy related to the creation of spin-
os. In 2000, the university established an incubator in collaboration with regional stake-
holders (Table 2), and in 2005, the Universities of Strasbourg and Haute Alsace, two
engineering schools, the University Hospital of Strasbourg, CNRS (National Centre for
Scientic Research) and INSERM (National Institute for Medical Research) established
Conectus, a collaborative structure, based on the pooling of the resources of their TTOs. The
aim was to initiate a regional PoCC function through the setting up of a common maturation
fund. In 2012, Conectus was transformed by its founders into a SAT T involving all the organ-
isations involved as shareholders, to provide support for spin-o projects.
The university’s role in building networks and an entrepreneurial ecosystem
The national programmes promoted continuous involvement of the University of Strasbourg
in the creation of innovation intermediaries. Each step in the process involved formalised
and reinforced links with the other public research actors, regional development agencies,
nancial intermediaries and political and socio-economic actors. Table 3 shows how the
university helped to coordinate the elements of the entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Table 2.Stages in the development of the boundary spanner role.
Date Evolution found
Role in promoting entrepre-
neurship Trigger
1987 Creation of the TTO No entrepreneurship support
policy
Internal initiative
1998 Creation of the position of
Vice-Rector of Corporate
Relations
Creation of a research valorisation
strategy
Internal initiative
2000 Creation of the incubator Assisting regional entrepreneurs
with developing their projects
National tender
2001 Development of the TTO Developing skills by hiring
professionals
Government incentive
2005 Creation of a maturation fund Financial help for researchers to
move from laboratory tests to
proofs of concept
Government incentives to create
networks of TTOs and set up
joint projects
2012 Creating the SATT Development of maturation
support
SATT adopts a private status and
integrates the function of PoCC
Development of competences
Creating a PoCC within the SATT

12 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
The university network is based on strong links, established in 2000, between the incu-
bator and the other regional stakeholders involved in the various stages of business creation.
In 2005, it grew based on the formal creation of Conectus, involving the TTOs of the various
stakeholders in academic research (universities, hospitals, CNRS, INSERM, engineering
schools). This intensication of the network continued to 2012 with the creation of a SATT,
which received an initial injection of €1 million of capital, and a current account allowance
over 10 years of €36 million. The SATT has enabled the university to strengthen its ties with
innovation actors and local and national politicians. In January 2012, a Regional Innovation
Steering Committee was established as a unied governance structure in the Alsace eco-
system. It involves the University of Strasbourg, the Regional Council, representatives of
national government in the region and the Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
It denes and validates the strategic regional innovation orientation, including an entrepre-
neurial oriented strategy, and ensures strategic coordination among joint programmes
implemented by the various innovation intermediaries. The involvement of the university
in this governance structure has given the university an increased political role in the inno-
vation system (Goldstein and Glaser 2012). In addition, the various stakeholders are con-
nected through involvement on the boards of various innovation intermediaries (SATT,
incubator, regional development agencies) (Figure 3).
Based on the national programmes implemented since 2000 (Mustar and Wright 2010)
and the university’s proactiveness and success in responding to calls for tenders, in 2012, it
became a central organisation in the academic entrepreneurship support network:
We have managed to simplify the political landscape with four stakeholders who are the
decision-makers and who will give the guidelines for the Alsace innovation policy …). This is
Table 3.Building the network within the entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Date Event Actors involved Link type Benets for entrepreneurship
2000 Creation of the
regional
incubator
Universities, research organisa-
tions, engineering schools,
regional agencies, local
representatives of the national
level, investors in innovation,
industrialists
TTO sits on the
incubator's
board of
directors
Existence of an incubator
Coordination of actors at
different stages of the
creation process
2005 Creation of the
Conectus
network
The Alsatian TTOs, 2 engineering
schools, hospitals of Strasbourg,
CNRS, INSERM
Members pool
resources
Rationalisation of the regional
innovation system on the
academic side: creation of a
single portal
Creation of a maturation fund
45 projects funded with 5.3 m€
between 2006 and 2011
2012 Creation of the
SATT Conectus
Universities, public research
organisations, engineering
schools, Alsace region, local
representatives of national
government, deposits fund, BPI
France, Ministry of Research
University sits on
the SATT's
board of
directors
Creation of a large investment
fund for maturation projects
(PoCC)
In June 2013, 2,75 M€ for
maturing 14 projects, 11
licenses have been granted
upon which 4 to start-ups
Some are
shareholders
Reinforced partnerships with
funding agencies and national
and regional political partners
2012 Creation of the
Regional
Innovation
Steering
Committee
University of Strasbourg, State,
Region, Businesses
Unified
governance
structure of the
Alsatian
ecosystem
Reduces the boundaries
between academic and
economic worlds
Gives the SATT a central role in
the development of academic
entrepreneurship

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 13
one of the indirect consequences of the arrival of the SATT. This is a structuring agent within
the territory. (Vice-President for Corporate Relations in 2012)
The university gained legitimacy and leadership:
With the ‘Investment for the Future’ programme, there was a strengthening of the university,
which led to the perception of a shift in power. If I exaggerate a bit, ve years ago the university
was asking local political authorities to help it. Today the university can somehow impose some
projects to the region and ask it to contribute to the university. It changes the dynamics of the
relationship. (Chairman of the SATT)
Its legitimacy is based on its ability to be a major political player in the system. Participation
in this committee allows the university to orchestrate its network (Dhanaraj and Parkhe
2006). It has strengthened the links between the university and political and socio-economic
stakeholders, stabilising relations enabling development of its strategy. This orchestration
triggered the development of a regional strategy for the management of IP and regional
innovation issues in general. The committee provides greater transparency, consistency and
coordination of the various innovation intermediaries’ missions. Two start-up creators
stressed the importance of coordination (Mason and Brown 2014) among the dierent actors
in the entrepreneurial ecosystem as a factor contributing to the successful establishment
of their businesses:
A very small company may need support to export or to innovate. The Alsace region has under-
stood this well. This is what the Region has set up with the SATT on the one side and on the
other, Alsace Innovation, with competitiveness clusters between the two. (Creator of an aca-
demic start-up)
The university has gradually evolved to t the hub university model by assuming a boundary
spanner and network orchestrator role. These changes have had an impact also on the TTO’s
role in the innovation system.
The changing role of the TTO
Studying the university TTO and its academic entrepreneurship support activities over a
period of 15 years reveals strong growth of the TTO structure and its role as a boundary
spanner, the evolution of its objectives, and the development of collaborations with other
regional actors.
Figure 3.The university as a network builder.

14 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
Developing the role of boundary spanner
Since the process began in 1987, the TTO has been at the heart of research valorisation and
support for the development of academic entrepreneurship at the university. It is consistent
with the role described in the literature: it builds internal expertise in order to full its role
of boundary spanner. It is growing rapidly and becoming more professional. The number of
its employees increased from 2 in 1987 to 14 in 2005 including the director, his assistant,
6 administrators, 5 technology transfer managers with science and business expertise, and
an IPR expert. In 2005, Conectus recruited three people to conduct common projects such
as mapping research competences. In 2012, the SATT employed 30 people, covering all the
competences necessary to develop its activities, and included all the resources needed to
support business creation – administration and nancial, legal, business development and
projects and investments centres, etc.
The creation of the SATT enabled the TTO to increase its expertise and include PoCC
functions. The SAT T manages the entire value chain, from identication of a potential inven-
tion in the laboratory, to maturation and proof of concept. Regional innovation stakeholders
emphasised the importance of developing the SATT:
Conectus had only one processing activity. Today the SATT, with a relatively comfortable sta-
ing level, helps create start-ups and provides know-how, patents and transfers knowledge to
businesses. The fact that there is such a structure with a clearly dened role is a great thing for
an innovation ecosystem. (Director of Alsace Innovation)
The move towards the hub university model does not undermine the importance of the
TTO, which remains an essential intermediary in the regional system.
Changing goals
The nature of the TTO’s objectives has changed with the restructuring of the system and the
networking of stakeholders. During the 2000s, the TTO, as a university department, has
developed in line with a logic of revenue maximisation in order to contribute to diversica-
tion of sources of university funding. When the SATT was created and received signicant
government funding, government set it two, not necessarily compatible, goals. These were
that the SATT must be protable after 10 years (i.e. maximise its prots) and that it should
stimulate regional economic and social development through eective academic entrepre-
neurship support:
If I want to maximise my income, I’ll sell all of my technologies to large foreign groups. The result
is that I will make money, but the impact of the Alsatian academic research on the regional
ecosystem will be zero. (...) Of course, we must consider the projects in terms of protability, but
we must also look at the impact on the ecosystem. (Chairman of the SATT)
These objectives were supported and elaborated by the Regional Innovation Steering
Committee. This strategy is having an impact on both the value of the university’s patent
portfolio and its support for academic entrepreneurship. Rather than oering support to
entrepreneurship projects with no growth prospects, the SATT prefers to transfer technol-
ogies to existing small businesses to strengthen them and help them grow. Technology
transfer generates development opportunities for these small businesses generally, and
benets the local economic dynamics more generally.
This broadening of the TTO’s objectives to the development of socio-economic impact
(Siegel and Wright 2015) has been accompanied by a shift in the academic entrepreneurship
support policy. The TTO has adopted a more selective support strategy (Clarysse et al. 2005)

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 15
to increase the viability of projects. Rather than supporting all projects, the TTO now identies
the most viable and suggests alternative development strategies for those that are consid-
ered less viable:
We created companies based on so narrow technologies that they are genetically programmed
to be small. And rather than consolidating the existing SME’s [Small and Medium Sized Enterprise]
IP portfolio by providing them the means to develop, we create non-viable businesses, because
we must reach a certain business volume. … We need to create fewer, but better quality start-
ups with real capacity for development. (Chairman of the SATT)
Academic entrepreneurship includes not only the creation of spin-os but also support
to strengthen existing SMEs. It is about providing more selective support to creative
projects and expanding the system of research valorisation to existing SMEs. This cannot
be achieved without coordination among all regional stakeholders. The development of
these objectives has been accompanied by closer relationships within the entrepreneurial
support network, and greater cooperation among innovation intermediaries in the entre-
preneurial ecosystem.
Increased cooperation with local innovation intermediaries
Networking intensity among innovation intermediaries has increased gradually, with links
becoming stronger over time, in line with the hub university model proposed by Youtie and
Shapira (2008). In 2012, the SATT signed a set of formal agreements with network members,
which formalised the network’s construction through better orchestration of roles. Some of
the intermediaries created had formerly overlapping roles which could be rationalized via
better coordination. An agreement was signed with the incubator, aimed at improving the
quality of the projects from new businesses and accelerating the creation process. The objec-
tive was greater selectivity based on more stringent assessment of the viability and growth
potential of projects, through cooperation between the TTO and the incubator.
Agreements have been signed with BPI France1 and the competitiveness clusters to help
the SATT identify companies likely to acquire science-based technologies. The SATT is respon-
sible for identifying research results that might have application to industry, helped by BPI
France and the competitiveness clusters:
BPI France has very good knowledge of innovative companies. They help us identify companies
that may enhance existing technologies … We have signed agreements with the competitive-
ness clusters and have a common roadmap, shared objectives in terms of Alsatian companies
to be prospected and visited by the clusters. For some start-up projects we turn to clusters and
ask them to help us put these projects in contact with potential partners. (Chairman of the SATT)
The agreements signed among the regional players allow them to coordinate their activities,
work towards common goals and increase knowledge exchange in the system. They provide
support for the most promising venture creation projects. In a system where information
can diuse rapidly, new ventures can be integrated in the entrepreneurial ecosystem and
potential links (i.e. with rms, academic researchers, nancial intermediaries) can be identi-
ed to enable innovation.
The entrepreneurs we interviewed stressed the excellent public support for entrepre-
neurship, and recognised the competence of the stakeholders and their coordination
throughout the process, including the SATT’s early intervention to protect inventions and
nance maturation of the technology, nancial support from BPI, and availability of incuba-
tion and support services. However, a medical testing company said that it was dicult to
obtain sucient funding to develop a product fully. In the pharmaceutical eld, in particular,

16 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
maturation can take as long as 18 months and require 24 months incubation, and still may
not result in a marketable product. There is no long term public support, and it is dicult to
obtain long-term nancing from private banks.
Discussion
The discussion focuses on the three main contributions of this paper: the sequential devel-
opment of the functions of a hub university, the operational role of TTOs as the network
orchestrator, and adaptation of the TTO’s role to the university strategy.
The university as a hub organisation
One of the contributions of our paper is to show, through a longitudinal study, the sequential
development of the functions of a hub university – gaining power and becoming a leading
actor in a non-mature entrepreneurial ecosystem. The entrepreneurial ecosystem matured
progressively under the inuence of the hub university and based on political support at
the national level. We combined the hub organization model proposed by Youtie and Shapira
(2008) with the model of hub rms developed by Dhanaraj and Parkhe (2006) for large
powerful companies managing innovation networks, to characterise the evolving functions
of a hub university. Our hub model is conceived as a triple helix encompassing university-
industry-government interactions. The hub university generates tri-lateral networks and
hybrid organizations such as incubators and the TTO (Etzkowitz 2002). The triple helix context
underlines how national innovation policies increasingly encourage and empower univer-
sities to build networks involving all the major actors in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Our
study shows that micro analysis of a hub university (development of its functions) needs to
be conducted from a triple helix perspective.
Using the case of the University of Strasbourg, we highlighted how the hub university
developed the functions of boundary spanning, network building and orchestrating. The
members of the network orchestrated by the university are innovation intermediaries, local
political and institutional players and innovative companies. The network is aimed at pro-
viding greater transparency and creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem conducive to aca-
demic start-up creation with growth potential. As a hub organisation, the university was
able to become a strategic player and inuence the regional innovation system (Etzkowitz
2008). Its inuence involves much more than creating a set of mediating activities. Thanks
to major investments from the French Government in poles of excellence, and increased
autonomy, the University of Strasbourg has moved from a low bargaining power position
vis-à-vis the local political actors, to having high bargaining and political power. This is exem-
plied by its participation in the Regional Committee for Innovation Management, a unique
regional political governance structure established to set the political orientation for inno-
vation and entrepreneurship at the regional level.
The case shows that, as the entrepreneurial ecosystem matures, the role of the players
stabilises (i.e. there are fewer overlaps in their agenda, and their objectives are clearer) and
the network becomes more structured. This better structuring is enabled by the emergence
of a powerful player able progressively to coordinate the various intermediaries throughout
the process of new venture creation. The hub university accumulates not only mediating
but also network coordination abilities. It becomes an orchestrator at the political level.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 17
Network building and orchestration at the operational level: the role of the TTO
We showed that the TTO developed competences to become an ecient boundary spanner
in line with the literature on the internal characteristics of TTOs (Siegel, Veugelers, and Wright
2007). Our second contribution consists of demonstrating that the TTO in a hub university
developed the functions of network building and network orchestrating (cf. Table 4), at an
operational level.
In contrast to much of the work on network orchestration (Batterink et al. 2010; Van Lente
et al. 2003; Klerkx and Leeuwis 2008), we contribute by highlighting the sequential building
of the three main functions of a TTO (cf. Table 4). The longitudinal nature of our case study
allowed us to study the development of a network orchestrator in a dynamic way, in contrast
to previous studies which use a static analytical framework. We have shown that each func-
tion is built over time and is the result of a learning process. In our case, the boundary-
spanning function took some 25 years to develop, from the simple activity of contract
management, to the establishment of a professional TTO with a comprehensive set of skills
and a critical mass of resources. The network building function started with the implemen-
tation of an incubator, a key regional player in the process of new venture creation. It was
Table 4.The process of building a TTO as an operational network orchestrator.
1987 2000 2005 2012
Creation of the TTO Creation of the incubator Pooling of regional TTOs:
Conectus
The TTO becomes a public
company: Conectus Alsace
Development of the TTO
Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3 Phase 4
1987–2000 2000–2005 2005–2012 2012–…
First function: boundary spanning
First intellectual
property (IP)
management rules
Development of IP skills,
marketing, TT manage-
ment and support for
start-up creation by
implementing a regional
incubator
Unique entry point Recruitment of business
developers
Pooling of patents Strengthening of IP skills and
business developmentJoint communication and
marketing of
technologies
Skill mapping
Maturation fund
Second function: network building
Involvement of the TTO in
the incubator’s board of
directors and operational
committee: coordination
with other intermediaries
First agreements with
clusters, chambers of
commerce
Reinforced agreements with the
BPI France, the incubator,
clusters
Involvement of Conectus
on the board of directors
of several intermediaries
Third function: network orchestrating
Cooperation, distribution of
roles, knowledge exchange
between the intermediaries
Collective actions to reach a
more selective model
Monitoring of intermediaries’
activities

18 V. SCHAEFFER AND M. MATT
reinforced by the creation of Conectus and the SAT T, and the agreements signed with these
and other actors. The network orchestrating function was established with the signing of
new agreements and the setting of a common goal of creating a selective environment. The
case study revealed that these functions are interdependent in the sense that the rst func-
tion needs to be suciently well developed to allow for the next function to start. An
enlarged boundary-spanning function allowed the TTO to initiate a network of innovation
intermediaries and, gradually, to develop network-orchestrating activities.
This dynamic local process was enabled by national initiatives (Lawton Smith and Bagchi-
Sen 2012). In our case, the main organisational changes faced by the TTO were pushed by
national calls for proposals. However, the various projects built by the TTO were always
intended to create a more structured regional system. This stepwise process was eased by
familiarity among the leaders of the main institutions. Over time, relationships developed
based on trust, and the individuals involved learned how to work collaboratively. Almost all
our interviewees emphasised that the success of a coordination process is due primarily to
people, not structures.
Towards a selective model of start-up creation
Our case study has highlighted that the university’s stronger leadership at the regional level,
combined with professionalisation of the TTO had an important impact on the start-up model.
Initially, the university adopted a non-selective model, in line with the model of successful entre-
preneurial universities. The objective was to create as many start-ups as possible, regardless of
their growth prospects, to maximise the TTO’s revenue. However, as underlined by Siegel and
Wright (2015), universities are heterogeneous and their strategic choices regarding academic
entrepreneurship must be adapted to their own resources constraints and scientic potential.
Institutions may need local collaboration. In our case, the denition of an IP strategy at the
regional political level, and coordination of the innovation intermediaries, brought about a shift
from a non-selective start-up creation model to a more selective one. The change involved trans-
ferring IP to fewer, but higher growth potential start-ups, and to existing small companies to
support their development. The objective was to generate a population of well-established SMEs
with high growth potential. This new policy is aimed at achieving a greater economic impact at
the local level. This requires stronger ties between the TTO and the nancial community outside
the Alsace region in order to consolidate funding to support this strategy (Huggins 2008). The
continuation of this process could be hindered by the French innovation system. There are numer-
ous policy initiatives to support start-up creation, but few resources to support new rm growth.
The main barrier is lack of nancial funding for the development phase. This might be due to the
absence in France of a secondary stock market, reluctance of large French corporations to make
strategic investments and the unfavourable scal climate related to investing in mature
companies.
Conclusion
Our longitudinal analysis has highlighted the role played by the University of Strasbourg
and its TTO in the maturation of the Alsatian entrepreneurial ecosystem. By introducing the
concept of hub organisation in the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach, we contribute to
the literature in two ways. First, we show how a university contributes progressively to the
transformation of a non mature entrepreneurial ecosystem to a more sustainable model, by

ENTREPRENEURSHIP & REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT 19
shifting to a hub university model, through the sequential development of boundary span-
ner, network builder and orchestrator functions. In our analysis of the case of the University
of Strasbourg, we underline the creation of specic mechanisms (the merger of local TTOs),
adaptation of mechanisms experienced elsewhere (the creation of an incubator and a PoCC),
and the organisation of a consensus space (Etzkowitz 2008).
Second, our study underlines that a TTO in a hub university develops its mediating func-
tion over time to reach critical mass and achieve the diversity of skills required for the role
of boundary spanner. To respond to a more selective model of entrepreneurship, the TTO
gradually builds and organises the network at the operational level, by coordinating the
dierent stakeholders. For each function (boundary spanner, network building and orches-
tration), we present the underlying mechanisms, i.e. the sequence of activities and organi-
zational innovations (cf. Table 4), implemented by the TTO to foster academic entrepreneurship
in its specic context. By revealing the dynamic aspects of the construction of these three
functions, we contribute to work on the concept of network orchestrator proposed in
Dhanaraj and Parkhe (2006).
The ability of a university to become a hub depends on certain conditions: rst, local
support mechanisms to complement the university’s support mechanisms (Fini et al. 2011);
and second, the ability to dene and implement a proactive strategy. In many countries,
universities have been encouraged by government to assume more active academic entre-
preneurship roles. The eectiveness of the hub role depends also on the university’s
resources, such as the quality and the nature of its research (O’Shea et al. 2005). For Wright
et al. (2008), to develop academic entrepreneurship, and universities need to conduct high
level research and have a critical mass in their domains of excellence. In less research intensive
universities, the development of academic entrepreneurship may rely on alternative models
such as the creation of start-ups by students (Siegel and Wright 2015).
This paper oers some new analytical perspectives on the role of TTOs and universities in
fostering start-up creation and shaping entrepreneurial ecosystems. However, it is a rst analysis
to understand the current evolution of universities and TTOs. Further work involving other cases
would enable a deeper understanding of the dynamics and mechanisms underlying the devel-
opment of boundary spanning and networking functions. More empirical work would highlight
best practice, which could be adopted and adapted by practitioners.
Note
1. BPI France is a public investment bank supporting the creation and development of SMEs.
Disclosure statement
No potential conict of interest was reported by the authors.
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