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University business incubators (UBIs) are born as tools of the academic world to market research results, for the transfer of technology and to promote entrepreneurial spirit. In these contexts, the exchange of knowledge among entrepreneurs can be a key variable for the development and success of their businesses. This paper aims to analyse the characteristics of entrepreneurs' resources and the institutional logic that prevails in the incubator as determinants of the exchange of knowledge, and the authors examine the results in terms of entrepreneurial commitment and the generation of innovations.

The empirical study carried out on a sample of 101 entrepreneurs in UBIs in Spain and The Netherlands.

The results reveals how complementarity, supplementarity and transferability of resources, as well as incubator predisposition towards business are fundamental for the exchange of knowledge, the development of entrepreneurial spirit and the generation of innovation.

This study makes a contribution towards an understanding of how relationships between university entrepreneurs provide access to and help create useful knowledge for the parties, with this resource constituting one possible source of sustainable competitive advantage.

Although business incubators are widely used support mechanisms for innovative entrepreneurship, the literature still lacks theoretically based explanations of how the incubation process creates value for stakeholders. This study aims to address this gap by developing a conceptual model, and related research propositions, that explains how the entrepreneurial logic in use by an incubator influences the incubation process (selection criteria and service offering) and performance.

Integrating the effectuation and entrepreneurial opportunities literature, which shares common conceptualizations about how the predictability of the future affects entrepreneurial action, the authors posit two archetypes of entrepreneurial logic that are associated with different incubation processes (causal or effectual) and two archetypes of opportunity attributes (discovery- or creation-based) that affect the incubation process needed to support their development.

Juxtaposing these archetypes, the proposed cross-level conceptual model specifies four levels of fit (ideal, surplus, deficit and mismatch) between the incubation process and the opportunity attributes of individual ventures, which directly influence venture performance (high, moderate and low). In turn, an incubator's performance is largely shaped by the overall performance of ventures in its portfolio.

This paper responds to the call for theory-building that links the antecedents and outcomes of the incubation process across levels of analysis. In addition to developing a conceptual model and research agenda at the intersection of entrepreneurship and business incubation, the proposed model also has implications for incubator directors deciding how to allocate limited resources, and for public/private sector administrators interested in leveraging investment in business incubators.

This paper aims to analyze born globals and business incubators from an empirical standpoint. Particularly, the role of business incubators in the emergence and development of born global firms is focused, thereby outlining the significance of incubator influence on rapid internationalization.

Based on extant literature on born globals, business incubators and their interrelationship that nurtures internationalization, a theoretical model is developed and empirically tested to analyze potential born globals residing in business incubators.

Due to services provided, such as infrastructure, business support and networking, business incubators create a favorable environment for rapid internationalization of their tenants. However, the initiative to go international comes from the incubatees, and the motivating role of business incubators in this process is fairly insignificant.

The incubator-incubation phenomenon is notably under-researched, with most of the literature focusing on “incubator topics.” This relationship is extremely important to understand to choose appropriate political measures and orchestrate effective management of business incubators.

The purpose of this paper is to preliminary attempt to deal with the phenomenon of business incubation from the industrial network perspective (Hakansson et al., 2009). The study draws on the Industrial Marketing and Purchasing (IMP) insights on new business formation and development in business networks as a starting point to shed light on the incubator–incubatee relationship content and development to see how this specific relationship influences the development process of a mid-stage business venture. The author believes that the IMP tradition – with its focus on interactions in business relationships – can positively contribute to implementing this neglected topic of incubation research.

The paper develops a longitudinal case study describing a mid-stage start-up venture initiating and developing a business relationship with a private business incubator. The relationship is explored through an abductive research design grounded in the IMP ARA model of analysis. The investigation focuses on how the incubation process unfolds through resources’ and actors’ interactions at different scales of analysis: the focal dyad, the incubation internal environment and the surrounding network. Particular “contextual” emphasis is put on new venture’s prior relationships. The study reveals three main findings.

Business incubation results as an emergent, and interdependent, process of interaction that develops among the incubator, the incubatee and external networked actors. In this perspective, the paper aims to re-discuss the role of the incubator in the process of forming and developing a new company considering its minor role in the wider developmental setting surrounding the incubatee.

The paper introduces IMP concepts to business incubation debates, which can positively challenge and provide novel explanations about the recurring gaps of the literature. Further research should provide more detail on the role and functioning of interactive incubation in a business network context, addressing complex topics such as incubation performance and outcomes. Further research should also deepen and discuss the role of incubation relationships within the set of initial relationships of a new venture.

This analysis can be used to revise the general approach to the management and configuration of business incubators. Present insights could be helpful, in fact, to design more effective incubation offerings and models, as well as develop best managerial practices targeted at interacting with new venture especially in the resource dimension, both within and outside the incubation environment.

The incubation dyad, as a unit of analysis, has been scarcely addressed in incubation research. This is central for addressing the role of interactions, relationships and networks in incubation, all elements which have been too scarcely investigated. In addition, the paper deals with a private business incubator, a particular model which is in need for more research. Finally, the case of an established new venture which decides to enter a business incubator at a later stage of its development represents a peculiar case which does not fit classical research typically focused on new ventures “born and raised” entirely in incubation.

This study aims to outline the influence of various combinations of antecedent conditions for startups being accepted into business incubators in Italy and Romania. The degree to which these conditions affect acceptance is referred to here as the Business Ideas Acceptance Degree (BIAD). The antecedent conditions considered are business idea potential, business plan quality, entrepreneurial team features, business project progress stage, available financial resources, debts of potential incubated companies, commitment to apply for national/EU funds, business area related to incubator mission, proposed technological content level, technological transfer from university/research centres and spin-off of a partner-entity of the incubator.

The methodological toolkit used was mixed: correlation-based analysis (CBA), machine learning (ML) techniques and fsQCA. Principal component analysis enabled the selection of the most representative antecedent conditions from both business incubator samples in Italy and Romania, further used in fsQCA analyses. XGBoost algorithm has been also used. K-Means clustering, an unsupervised learning algorithm that groups unlabeled dataset into different clusters, led to the configuration of two clusters associated to each of the countries involved in this study (Romania and Italy).

The findings reveal the differences between the different antecedent conditions that can contribute to startups being accepted into business incubators in Italy and Romania. The validation of the fsQCA equifinality principle in both samples shows that the selected antecedent conditions, mixed in combinations of “causal recipes”, lead to a high BIAD by business incubators from both countries.

This study reveals the differences between different antecedent conditions, capable to contribute to the start-up acceptance within business incubators from Italy and Romania. Furthermore, the validation of fsQCA equifinality principle in both samples highlight that the selected antecedent conditions, mixed in combinations of causal recipes, lead to a high degree of business ideas' acceptance in business incubators.

This paper aims to investigate the role of university business incubator managers as drivers of the training and advice given to academic incubatees. Based on the institutional logics approach, the current paper proposes that the dominant logic, academic versus commercial, determines the degree of emphasis on personal assistance, business assistance and networking training.

To test the proposed hypotheses, data were collected from 93 incubation programmes from Spanish and Dutch universities through questionnaires addressed to their respective managers, as well as clients.

The results indicate that the greater the managers’ experience in the business and entrepreneurial world, the greater the fostering of personal and business assistance and networking activities in the incubator. Managers lacking an entrepreneurial profile weaken incubatee access to other business networks and prove less efficient in business training.

This research makes a contribution to the study of university incubatees, showing that managers can be involved in different institutional logics, whether they be academic or commercial, and that the dominant logic determines the activities promoted and, consequently, the success of the incubation process. Business and entrepreneurial experience is key to instilling business logic in incubatees together with the training and assistance they require.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the drivers of new incubators’ business model. Several researchers have agreed that incubation is related to the early phase of a venture’s life and identified the incubators as organizations that support start-ups. But only recently has a new generation of incubators emerged.

Using an Italian incubator case study, the research results are mainly ascribable to the ability of the incubator to facilitate not only internal networking, but also external networking.

As described in the findings, the business model of the service incubator is founded on value-added services among networking within incubatees as well as between start-ups and external actors. The service incubator becomes a knowledge intermediary that allows new ventures to identify innovation parties and transform them into innovation partners.

The paper investigates the new business model of incubator founded on external networking orientation. Even if some researches analyzed incubators and cooperation within incubatees, less attention has been focussed on external networking and collaboration among incubators, incubatees, and several stakeholders. Based on such collaboration, incubatees can undertake new entrepreneurial measures, explore new markets, and innovate constantly.

This study aims to explore key factors and specific ways for the upgrade to hybrid incubators in the context of China. A hybrid incubator means that a technology-based business incubators (TBIs) can implement various distinct value creation processes with the integration of the advantages of non-for-profit and for-profit TBIs at same time as Chinese government now requires government-sponsored non-for-profit TBIs to be profitable self-sustainability with less dependent on direct public subsidies, aiming to motivate these TBIs to provide higher quality services for their tenant new technology-based firms (NTBFs).

This study conducts a single in-depth case-study of Tuspark Incubator (located in Tsinghua Science Park [TSP]) with categorical analysis.

Three factors, i.e. incubation subdivision, intermediary platform and proactive approach, are found to be essential for a formerly government-sponsored TBI’s upgrading. Incubation subdivision enables Tuspark Incubator to create multiple incubation processes with incubator characteristic variables of both non-for-profit and for-profit incubators; with the establishment of intermediary platform, Tuspark Incubator provides specialized business support and high-quality networking from relevant specialized service organizations external to the incubator; more proactive approach with equity investment on incubating firms from Tuspark Incubator help to generate social welfare and financial profit at the same time.

For the incubators’ managers, incubation subdivision enables TBIs to operate for-profit and non-for-profit processes at the same time and provides different specific needs; more open intermediary service platforms can leverage the full potential of the actors in innovation system and help TBIs to save resource when upgrading to hybrid incubators; proactive approaches nurture learning climate and entrepreneurship environment to enhance the successful rate on NTBFs inside incubators and provide main profit source for incubators. For policy makers, using proactive approaches including creating a good milieu for incubation on technology-based start-ups and the design of public guidance funds is increasingly crucial.

This research is a pioneering study on the key factors and specific ways for the upgrade of government-sponsored non-for-profit TBIs in China to hybrid for-profit and non-for-profit incubators.

Using stakeholder theory the paper seeks to investigate how technology incubators manage and balance the expectations of stakeholders, and the effect on the shaping of technology incubators and their chances of success.

Incubator programmes have been introduced with multiple goals. A case study is conducted in order to examine stakeholders based on their power to influence, the legitimacy of the relationship and the urgency of claim, and how incubators deal with stakeholder expectations.

Incubator management involves balancing a complex set of conflicting goals. Expectations are interdependent, hierarchically organised, and involve sub‐processes related to different stakeholders. Goals are not fitted to an operational context. Consequently, suboptimal solutions are chosen to balance and fulfil expectations sufficiently to ensure survival. Three strategies to balance stakeholder expectations are identified.

The stakeholder theory approach adopted shows how incubators manage the expectations of their various stakeholders, and so may explain why studies on incubator performance produce diverse results.

The effectiveness of incubators is difficult to assess due to multiple, and often moving, targets. There is a great risk that incubators aim for the goals that are easiest to measure and focus on short‐term results. Social returns of incubators can be reduced if incubator managers choose suboptimal solutions to balance the demands of different stakeholders.

Rather than accepting normative assumptions, the paper contributes to the critical analysis of the technology incubator ideal. Through stakeholder analysis the paper demonstrates how incubators are shaped by the struggle to balance conflicting goals.

Following recommendations by scholars for further research on the business incubation process, the purpose of this paper is to build new theory on incubation using the social mechanisms approach – a well-developed body of theory on social processes.

A critical review of dominant theoretical approaches in the area highlighted that researchers in the past have not studied incubation as a social “process.” In order to study a social process such as incubation, a case is made for the value of social mechanisms theory. In order to study incubation as a social mechanism, an inductive-qualitative research design based on ethnography was used. Data were collected over six months each at two Dublin-Ireland-based business incubators.

Results highlight the significant role of a positive relational bond between the incubator manager and client entrepreneurs. Incubation is triggered in a sophisticated normative environment under the prevalence of ground rules, subtle signals and the interplay of personal histories. These contribute to the incubation mechanism's non-linearity, thereby, making the prediction of outcomes difficult.

A contribution of this research comes in the form of a new conceptualization of incubation based in mechanisms reasoning. The mechanisms approach was found to be versatile and helped in extending the work of previous researchers who proposed advancements in the area based on dyadic theory, social capital theory and social network theory. Further, a new, and it is argued, more fruitful direction for incubation process-related research is also highlighted; one which takes on board the often glossed over idiosyncrasies of incubation as a social mechanism for promoting early stage entrepreneurship.