Academic literature on the topic 'Sustainability-oriented incubator'

Recruitment and support processes in sustainability-profiled incubators have received little research attention. The article addresses this knowledge gap in an empirical investigation of three sustainability-oriented incubators in Sweden, Finland and Germany. The data are based on interviews with managers, stakeholders and tenants in Green Tech Park (Sweden), LADEC (Finland) and Green Garage (Germany). On average, the studied incubators had an ambition to recruit and develop sustainability-oriented start-ups, but the number of tenants must reach a critical mass if such ambitions are to become a reality. The local context influences this critical mass of start-ups and is a determining factor in generating (a) potential tenants and (b) the resources to support such firms. This suggests that incubator managers must actively seek tenants interested in sustainable entrepreneurship and that support must focus on activities in sustainability.

Spain has encouraged support to sustain entrepreneurs in the COVID-19 pandemic. In this paper, the usefulness of the functions of business incubators regarding the social benefits derived from enhancing the sustainability of the entrepreneurial ecosystem is studied in the context of the COVID-19 scenario. Due to the lack of academic literature on the subject, an analysis based on the application of structural equation models (SEMs) has been carried out using a theoretical framework built and empirically validated using a representative sample of Spanish entrepreneurs. The results show that, according to stakeholders, the functionalities of business incubators were oriented to drive entrepreneurial initiatives to have highly positive effects on society. This research evidences that business incubators are key mechanisms to make entrepreneurship, growth and economic development more sustainable in society.

Start-up accelerators, a relatively new and competitive type of business incubators, are nowadays considered to be a highly effective way of providing venture support. Start-ups who have been supported through accelerators have an approximately 23% higher survival rate than other new businesses. This positive effect can be explained by the highly selective process accelerators apply when deciding on which venture projects to support. It comes as no surprise that understanding this process and the respective selection criteria is at the core of accelerator/incubator literature within entrepreneurship research. Existing research is however limited to the investigation of commercial accelerators which provide support to start-ups having an economic purpose only. Hence those academic findings cannot be simply extrapolated to accelerators supporting ventures combining economic goals with social and ecological purpose. Given the growing meaning of sustainability entrepreneurship and hence the increasing number of sustainability-oriented accelerators, the above limitation seems to be an important research gap. This paper addresses the above gap by investigating the selection processes and criteria of so-called impact accelerators focusing on the support of start-ups expected to create not only economic outcomes but also positive social and/or environmental impact. Building on existing accelerator literature, we qualitatively investigate the selection processes and criteria of nine European impact accelerators. By comparing our findings with existing research, we identify important differences between the selection approach of commercial and impact accelerators thus contributing to sustainability entrepreneurship research and practice.

Partnerships are essential to delivering the transformational change demanded by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and essential to achieving Agenda 2030. It is therefore necessary to strengthen the partnering capacity of different types of organizations so they can collaborate in multi-stakeholder partnerships. However, partnership working can be costly in terms of time and other resources and is complex. Given the urgency and importance of sustainable development, illustrated by the recent pandemic and social unrest around inequity, we focused on the creation of a partnership that became effective quickly and was able to deliver societal impact at scale. Using a case study approach, the transformational potential and the early stages of “El día después” (in English, “The day after”) were analyzed as it represents a multi-stakeholder partnership forged to frame an SDG-oriented collaborative response to the COVID-19 crisis in Spain. El día después is defined as a partnership incubator, a space where public administrations interact under conditions of equivalence with all the other stakeholders, where private companies can link their innovation processes to other SDG-committed actors and social needs and where the academic sector can participate in a sustained dialogue oriented to the action. Our findings reveal that in order to catalyze the co-creation process and achieve systemic change through a set of connected multi-stakeholder initiatives, a very flexible collaborative arrangement is required, with all partners acting as facilitators. In this way, a solid interdisciplinary team is created, united around a shared vision, with trust-based relationships and a common identity fueling impact-oriented projects targeted to advance the SDGs.

Considerations on sustainability have growing attention not only for scholars and businesses, but also for almost everyone. However, accomplishing sustainable progress is complicated and cannot be completely reached by single individuals or organizations. Consequently, entrepreneurs striving for sustainable change might search for collaborations with universities to overcome their resource and technology constraints. A quantitative research method was employed to explore the value of such collaborations. Data were gathered via questionnaires, between February and March 2020, from entrepreneurs/start-ups that are spin-offs of the ten leading higher education institutions in Berlin and Brandenburg (Germany). Correlation and logistic regression disclosed that start-ups with different sustainability goals employed dissimilar formats of collaboration with universities. Ecological-oriented entrepreneurs tend to utilize all three forms of university–start-up collaboration. On the contrary, social-driven start-ups are not likely to adopt any kind of collaboration with universities. While ventures with economical SDGs are prone to employ product and prototype development along with support from professors. The study extends the knowledge about the search for collaborations of start-ups when pursuing different SDGs. In the practical domain, this research can encourage entrepreneurs to cooperate with universities in order to achieve their sustainable goals beyond incubation and acceleration. Additionally, it can also trigger universities to supply resources for supporting start-ups, especially social-driven ventures, to facilitate them to accomplish sustainability as well as to reach the third mission of universities in terms of supporting society.

<p class="p0">Bamboo craft is one of the components of the creative economy that can support the country's economic growth. It's the kind of cooperation needed between the government, academics, business people and the craftsman community so that handicrafts are not only oriented towards the domestic market but can penetrate the export market to obtain higher economic value. Therefore, small industries with innovative products will advance the regional and national economy and eventualy can contribute to the country's foreign exchange when it successfully penetratrates the export market. The product chosen to be developed, namely bamboo-batik craft, already has IPR registration. This training aims to transfer systematic and standardized production system knowledge for bamboo crafts in Yogyakarta. The training was attended by 12 participants of bamboo craftsmen in Rimpak Village, Wonosobo Sapuran Regency. This training was facilitated by Mrs. Takayuki Shimizu from Japan. Participants were taught to craft bamboo combined with batik to become an export-value art object. Based on the results of the evaluation, the participants were impressed with the ability of the facilitator to craft bamboo into a work of art. The result of the training was that the participants' abilities improved in crafting bamboo into art objects. The next stage, the craft of bamboo-batik, will be developed for sale in the domestic handicraft market and penetrate the international market through the stages of the commercialization process as follows: 1) imagination, 2) incubation, 3) demonstration, 4) promotion, and 5) sustainability.</p><p class="p0"><strong>Bahasa Indonesia Abstrak: </strong>Abstrak Kerajinan bambu merupakan salah satu komponen ekonomi kreatif yang dapat menudukung pertumbuhan perekonomian negara. Hanya saja, diperlukan kerja sama antara pemerintah, akademisi, pelaku bisnis dan komunitas pengrajin agar hasil kerajinan tidak hanya berorientasi pada pasar domestik namun bisa menembus pasar ekspor untuk mrndapatkan nilai ekonomis yang tinggai. Oleh karena itu industri kecil dengan produk yang inovatif akan memajukan perekonomian regional, nasional dan akhirnya bisa ikut menyumbang devisa negara ketika berhasil menembus pasar ekspor. Produk yang dipilih untuk dikembangkan, yaitu kriya bambu-batik sudah memiliki pendaftaran HKI. Pelatihan ini bertujuan untuk melakukan transfer pengetahuan sistem produksi yang sistematis dan terstandarisasi bagi kerajinan bambu di Yogyakarta. Pelatihan diikuti oleh 12 peserta yang berasal dari pengrajin bambu Desa Rimpak, Kecamatan Sapuran Wonosobo. Pelatihan ini didampingi oleh Mrs. Takayuki Shimuzu dari Jepang. Peserta diajarkan mengolah bambu yang digabungkan dengan batik untuk menjadi benda seni yang bernilai ekspor. Berdasarkan hasil evaluasi, peserta terkesan dengan kemampuan fasilitator mengolah bambu menjadi sebuah karya seni. Hasil dari mengikuti pelatihan, kemampuan peserta meningkat dalam hal mengolah bambu mejadi benda seni. Tahap selanjutnya, kriya bambu batik akan dikembangkan untuk dijual di pasar kerajinan domestik dan menembus pasar internasional melalui tahapan proses komersialisasisebagaiberikut: (1) imajinasi,(2) inkubasi,(3) demonstrasi,(4) promosi, dan (5) keberlanjutan.</p>

International Journal of Innovation - IJI completes 7 yearsInternational Journal of Innovation - IJI has now 7 years old! In this editorial comment, we not only want to talk about our evolution but get even closer to the IJI community. It is our first editorial comment, a new IJI's communication channel. Some of the changes are already described on our website.IJI is an innovation-focused journal that was created to support scientific research and thereby contribute to practice. Also, IJI was born internationally, receiving and supporting research from around the world. We welcome articles in Portuguese, English, and Spanish.We have published eight volumes in IJI since 2013, totaling 131 articles. Our journal is indexed in: Dialnet and Red Iberoamericana de Innovación y Conocimiento Científico; Ebsco Host; Erih Plus; Gale - Cengage Learning; Latindex; Proquest; Redalyc; Web of Science Core Collection (Emerging Sources Citation Index), among others. We provide free access “open access” to all its content. Articles can be read, downloaded, copied, distributed, printed and / or searched.We want to emphasize that none of this would be possible without the authors that recognized in IJI a relevant journal to publicize their work. Nor can we fail to mention the tireless and voluntary action of the reviewers, always contributing to the articles' improvement and skilling up our journal, more and more.All editors who passed through IJI have a fundamental role in this trajectory. And, none of this would be possible without the editorial team of Uninove. Everyone who passed and the current team. We want to express that our work as current editors of IJI would not be possible without you. Changes in the Intenational Journal of Innovation – IJIAs we mentioned earlier, IJI was born in 2013. And, over time, we are improving its structure always to improve it. In this section, we want to show some changes we made. We intend that editorial comments become a communication channel and that they can help our readers, authors, and reviewers to keep up with these changes.Although IJI is a comprehensive Innovation journal, one of the changes we want to inform you is that now, at the time of submission, the author will choose one of the available topics that best suit your article. The themes are: Innovative Entrepreneurship; Innovation and Learning; Innovation and Sustainability; Internationalization of Innovation; Innovation Systems; Emerging Innovation Themes and; Digital Transformation. Below, we present each theme so that everyone can get to know them:Innovative Entrepreneurship: emerging markets provided dynamic advantages for small businesses and their entrepreneurs to exploit the supply flows of resources, capacities, and knowledge-based on strategies oriented to the management of innovation. Topics covered in this theme include, for example: resources and capabilities that support innovative entrepreneurship; innovation habitats (Universities, Science and Technology Parks, Incubators and Accelerators) and their influences on the development of knowledge-intensive spin-offs and start-ups; open innovation, triple/quadruple helix, knowledge transfer, effectuation, bricolage and co-creation of value in knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship ecosystems; and adequate public policies to support innovative entrepreneurship.Innovation and Learning: discussions on this topic focus on the relationship between learning and innovation as topics with the potential to improve teaching and learning. They also focus on ways in which we acquire knowledge through innovation and how knowledge encourages new forms of innovation. Topics covered in this theme include, for example: innovative projects for learning; innovation-oriented learning; absorptive capacity; innovation in organizational learning and knowledge creation; unlearning and learning for technological innovation; new learning models; dynamics of innovation and learning; skills and innovation.Innovation and Sustainability: discussions on this topic seek to promote the development of innovation with a focus on sustainability, encouraging new ways of thinking about sustainable development issues. Topics covered in this theme include, for example: development of new sustainable products; circular economy; reverse logistic; smart cities; technological changes for sustainable development; innovation and health in the scope of sustainability; sustainable innovation and policies; innovation and education in sustainability and social innovation.Internationalization of Innovation: the rise of developing countries as an innovation center and their new nomenclature for emerging markets have occupied an important place in the international research agenda on global innovation and Research and Development (RD) strategies. Topics covered in this theme include, for example: resources and capabilities that support the internationalization of innovation and RD; global and local innovation and RD strategies; reverse innovation; internationalization of start-ups and digital companies; development of low-cost products, processes and services with a high-value offer internationalized to foreign markets; innovations at the base of the pyramid, disruptive and/or frugal developed and adopted in emerging markets and replicated in international markets; institutional factors that affect firms' innovation efforts in emerging markets.Innovation Systems: regulation and public policies define the institutional environment to drive innovation. Topics include industrial policy, technological trends and macroeconomic performance; investment ecosystem for the development and commercialization of new products, based on government and private investments; investment strategies related to new companies based on science or technology; Technology transfer to, from and between developing countries; technological innovation in all forms of business, political and economic systems. Topics such as triple helix, incubators, and other structures for cooperation, fostering and mobilizing innovation are expected in this section.Emerging Themes: from the applied themes, many emerging problems have a significant impact on management, such as industry 4.0, the internet of things, artificial intelligence or social innovations, or non-economic benefits. Intellectual property is treated as a cognitive database and can be understood as a technological library with the registration of the product of human creativity and invention. Social network analysis reveals the relationships between transforming agents and other elements; therefore, encouraged to be used in research and submitted in this section. The theoretical field not fully developed is not a barrier to explore any theme or question in this section.Digital Transformation: this interdisciplinary theme covers all the antecedents, intervening, and consequent effects of digital transformation in the field of technology-based companies and technology-based business ventures. The technological innovator (human side of innovation) as an entrepreneur, team member, manager, or employee is considered an object of study either as an agent of innovation or an element of the innovation process. Digital change or transformation is considered as a process that moves from the initial status to the new digital status, anchored in the theories of innovation, such as adoption, diffusion, push / pull of technology, innovation management, service innovation, disruptive innovation, innovation frugal innovation economy, organizational behavior, context of innovation, capabilities and transaction costs. Authors who submit to IJI will realize that they now need to make a structured summary at the time of submission. The summary must include the following information:(maximum of 250 words + title + keywords = Portuguese, English and Spanish).Title.Objective of the study (mandatory): Indicate the objective of the work, that is, what you want to demonstrate or describe.Methodology / approach (mandatory): Indicate the scientific method used in carrying out the study. In the case of theoretical essays, it is recommended that the authors indicate the theoretical approach adopted.Originality / Relevance (mandatory): Indicate the theoretical gap in which the study is inserted, also presenting the academic relevance of the discipline.Main results (mandatory): briefly indicate the main results achieved.Theoretical-methodological contributions (mandatory): Indicate the main theoretical and / or methodological implications that have been achieved with the results of the study.Social / managerial contributions (mandatory): Indicate the main managerial and / or social implications obtained through the results of the study.Keywords: between three and five keywords that characterize the work. Another change regarding the organization of the IJI concerns the types of work. In addition to the Editorial Comment and Articles, the journal will include Technological Articles, Perspectives, and Reviews. Thus, when submitting a study, authors will be able to choose from the available options for types of work. Throughout the next issues of the IJI, in the editorial comments, we will pass on pertinent information about every kind of work, to assist the authors in their submissions.Currently, the IJI is available to readers with new works three times a year (January-April; May-August; September-December) with publications in English, Portuguese and Spanish. From what comes next, we will have some changes in the periodicity. Next stepsAs editors, we want the IJI to continue with a national and international impact and increase its relevance in the indexing bases. For this, we will work together with the entire editorial team, reviewers, and authors to improve the work. We will do our best to give full support to the evaluators who are so dedicated to making constructive evaluations to the authors. We will also support authors with all the necessary information.With editorial comments, we intend to pass on knowledge to readers, authors, and reviewers to improve the articles gradually. We also aim to support classroom activities and content.Even with the changes reported here, we continue to accept all types of work, as long as they have an appropriate methodology. We also maintain our scope and continue to publish all topics involving innovation. We want to support academic events on fast tracks increasingly. About the articles in this edition of IJIThis issue is the first we consider the new organization of the International Journal of Innovation - IJI. We started with this editorial comment talking about the changes and improvements that we are making at IJI—as an example, showing the reader, reviewer, and author that the scope remains the same. However, at the time of submission, the author has to choose one of the proposed themes and have a mandatory abstract structured in three languages (English, Portuguese, and Spanish).In this issue, we have a section of perspectives that addresses the “Fake Agile” phenomenon. This phenomenon is related to the difficulties that companies face throughout the agile transformation, causing companies not to reach full agility and not return to their previous management model.Next, we publish the traditional section with scientific articles. The article “Critical success factors of the incubation network of enterprises of the IFES” brings critical success factors as the determining variables to keep business incubators competitive, improving their organizational processes, and ensuring their survival. Another published article, “The sharing economy dilemma: the response of incumbent firms to the rise of the sharing economy”, addresses the sharing economy in terms of innovation. The results of the study suggest that the current response to the sharing economy so far is moderate and limited. The article “Analysis of the provision for implementation of reverse logistics in the supermarket retail” made it possible to observe that through the variables that define retail characteristics, it is not possible to say whether a supermarket will implement the reverse logistics process. And the article “Capability building in fuzzy front end management in a high technology services company”, whose main objective was to assess the adherence among Fuzzy Front End (FFE) facilitators, was reported in the literature its application in the innovation process of a company, an innovative multinational high-tech services company.We also published the article “The evolution of triple helix movement: an analysis of scientific communications through bibliometric technique”. The study is a bibliometric review that brings essential contributions to the area. This issue also includes a literature review entitled “Service innovation tools: a literature review” that aimed to systematically review the frameworks proposed and applied by the literature on service innovation.The technological article “A model to adopt Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and Business Intelligence (BI) among Saudi SMEs”, in a new IJI publication section, addresses the main issues related to the intention to use ERPBI in the Saudi private sector.As we mentioned earlier in this editorial, IJI has a slightly different organization. With the new format, we intend to contribute to the promotion of knowledge in innovation. Also, we aim to increasingly present researchers and students with possibilities of themes and gaps for their research and bring insights to professionals in the field.Again, we thank the reviewers who dedicate their time and knowledge in the evaluations, always helping the authors. We wish you, readers, to enjoy the articles in this issue and feel encouraged to send your studies in innovation to the International Journal of Innovation - IJI.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is three-fold. The first objective is to contextualize and clarify the concepts of regional innovation systems and entrepreneurship, addressing their differences and complementarities and suggesting an analytical filter to enhance their understanding. The second aim is to question and analyse the challenges this renewed approach brings to the domain of territorial policy, namely, the role it may bring to local and regional development strategies, opening up the way for a set of public policy interventions on the fields of entrepreneurship and innovation promotion. Finally, the paper presents and analyses the example of Coimbra, a medium-sized city in Portugal, underlining both the role of academia and the Instituto Pedro Nunes-Incubator have had on these domains. Design/methodology/approach The paper is based on a case study approach, with an in-depth descriptive and exploratory analysis of the Coimbra entrepreneurial ecosystem. Findings The paper acknowledged the role entrepreneurial stakeholders have on the fertilization of the innovation and entrepreneurial Coimbra ecosystem. The Instituto Pedro Nunes-Incubator, with a new generation of startups, mostly born on its infrastructure as university spin-offs, gradually introduced a more business-oriented perspective on the local innovation system which, alongside the creation of a thicker networking and more profound cooperation culture, with the growing involvement of other local stakeholders such as science parks (Coimbra iParque), has had a decisive role on upgrading urban competitiveness. These new knowledge-based startups also have important spill-over effects that are beneficial to the growth of other firms in the same locality. There is evidence that they also provide an important Schumpeterian stimulus within economies by increasing competition, promoting innovation and augmenting the efficient allocation of resources within economies. Besides the more traditional transactional forms of support (tax incentives, grants, etc.), there is now the recognition that relational forms of support such as network building, developing connections between entrepreneurial actors, institutional alignment of priorities, fostering peer-based interactions have been strategic to improve both the efficiency and the effectiveness of the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Research limitations/implications There is, thus, a need for more profound theorization and empirical research that can produce additional comprehension into this domain of the cause-effect relationships between entrepreneurship, innovation and local and regional dynamics. Some authors suggest, in particular, that the existing work on entrepreneurial ecosystems within popular business literature and academic research still has a deficit of a solid theoretical foundation, making the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach somehow both ambiguous and immature concept and, thus, reducing its generalizability and policy applicability. Research that evaluates the relationship between entrepreneurial performance and the level of government participation as part of governance systems will also be of great significance over the near future as it will help researchers and policymakers to realize better where the different stakeholders can enhance entrepreneurship and where their intervention will possibly diminish positive outcomes. Practical implications The main practical implications of this paper are associated with the need that urban and regional policymakers to formulate more business-led strategies to promote territorial innovation and entrepreneurship. The paper also offers conceptual tools that point out the need that innovation stakeholders, namely, universities, incubators and firms, have to assume more protagonism in promoting competitiveness and sustainability. Social implications The entrepreneurial ecosystem approach constitutes both a theoretical and analytical useful tool to define competitive strategies for urban and regional economies. Urban and regional-innovation ecosystem construction is a representative method of realizing territorial development and competition enhancement, through sustainable job and wealth creation. Originality/value This paper analysis summarizes and integrates the increasing and scattered literature of both the regional innovation systems and of the entrepreneurial ecosystems and delivers new insights for the future development of this field, namely, in terms of renewal of policy formulation and implementation. The singularity of the case study is associated with the fact that Coimbra entrepreneurial ecosystem is still largely embryonic, having its roots on a paradigm strategic shift the University adopted towards a more proactive role in terms of city aand regional development.

Background: Environmental problems are a worrying phenomenon, and there is a call for action. One way to face these problems lies in sustainable entrepreneurship. There is an increase in sustainability-oriented incubators supporting these sustainable entrepreneurs on their entrepreneurial journey, using various support systems. However, there is little research available about the support systems sustainability-oriented incubators offer, the importance of these support systems, and the influence of entrepreneurial stages. Purpose: With our study, we provide sustainability-oriented incubator managers with insights into the importance of different support systems, the frequency in which they are offered and the role of different entrepreneurial stages. This allows sustainability-oriented incubators to support their tenants better and, therefore, positively influence sustainable entrepreneurship.  Method: A single case study method has been applied by using a mixed-method approach of qualitative semi-structured interviews and a quantitative questionnaire which was filled in prior to the interviews by the participants. In total, nine participants were interviewed, consisting of seven incubator tenants and two incubator managers. Conclusion: This research has found a high level of importance and frequency of business model support and market research support, irrespective of the different entrepreneurial stages. This implies a constant reiteration process from sustainable entrepreneurs, demanding a strong-intervention role from the sustainability-oriented incubator. Furthermore, this research has found the shortcomings in using the effectuation model for analysing entrepreneurial stages and suggests a different application.