The efficiency of business incubators is disputed, but they have attracted significant attention from policy-makers and are a part of economic policies worldwide. To ensure their efficiency, it has been suggested that more involvement in the ventures by the incubator management would be beneficial. The purpose of this thesis was to inquire into the relationship between entrepreneurial processes and managerial practices in business incubation. Drawing upon research about entrepreneurial processes and the management of entrepreneurship and creativity in other organizational contexts, the thesis problematizes the suggestions of increased managerial interventions in entrepreneurial processes in business incubation. The purpose was achieved through an analysis of entrepreneurial narratives from two Swedish incubators with different levels of managerial involvement in their ventures. The theoretical frame of reference used for the narrative analysis was based on Mikhail Bakhtin’s concepts for studying varying possibilities and groundings for becoming in narratives. Entrepreneurship is understood as a creative process characterized by dialogue, polyphony and carnival, which has implications for our understanding of business incubation as a phenomenon. The narrative analysis generated four genres of entrepreneurial narratives and two models of incubation with different conceptualizations of entrepreneurship, the role of the incubator management and the incubation process. The result from the analysis of the incubator management from a creative process view was that the managerial approaches to coaching and clustering favored by the two incubators had different implications for entrepreneurship by providing varying possibilities for creativity due to aspects such as control, standardization and specialization. This study shows that business incubation, regardless of the model, includes a larger variety of entrepreneurial processes than previously recognized. This study contributes to our understanding of how managerial involvement in business incubation is conducted in practice and how it is understood from the entrepreneur’s perspective. The theoretical contribution of this study is a Bakhtinian framework, which allows us to observe and to understand business incubation differently. The study shows how the Bakhtinian concepts can be adapted and be made useful in studying the relationship between entrepreneurship and management in business incubation by emphasizing entrepreneurship as the product of social interaction.

Magister Economicae - MEcon / There is a general recognition and acceptance that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are important contributors to social and economic development. However, in Africa which hosts many developing economies, SMEs must endure numerous challenges that tend to repress small enterprise development. Formal cluster development programmes have been identified as one progressive way of assisting SMEs to overcome the obstacles. It involves deliberately instituting and supporting small enterprise clusters. Although this idea of formal clustering of firms is relatively new to Africa, cluster development programmes are increasingly taking the form of small business incubation. Business incubation essentially aims to provide a systematic method of rendering business support services to fledgling small businesses to help them continually rise above market challenges and thrive. Some governments in Africa have embraced the notion and are incorporating plans into their local economic development (LED) programmes to enhance small business development through incubation. Countries like South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and Nigeria have amongst the most conspicuous incubator programmes and cluster experiences on the African continent. This study interrogates the effectiveness of and hence the scope for formal business incubation or rigid clustering programmes in Africa. It assesses examples of both rigid and flexible clusters in a few African countries in order to identify their main differences and to thus establish some critical areas of business clustering needed for useful small and medium enterprise development in Africa. Upon reviewing case study literature, it is observed that formal incubation programmes are likely to be less effective in creating new SMEs compared to the more flexible clusters in Africa. Rigid clusters also tend to rely heavily on state funding, are more subjected to political interference, are prone to expansion capacity constraints, and are unlikely to sustain themselves financially in the long run. The study notes that rigid clustering mainly favours a high-tech environment. Hence, incubation programmes may be more suitable for advanced economies. For low-tech industries, on the other hand, formal business incubation may be inappropriate.

The topic of business incubation has been the subject of considerable academic research, and a focal point in entrepreneurship support ecosystems. Business incubators provide entrepreneurs and start-up businesses with a shared space (either physical or virtual). The incubator offers a systematic shared support structure that enhances businesses' chances of succeeding and growing into entities that eventually graduate to a location beyond the ‘safety net' of the incubator. Academic research in the field of incubation has predominantly focused on (i) understanding business incubation models that are most effective within particular operating environments; and (ii) understanding support services that are most useful to incubatees of the incubator. This research instead explores the influence that funding sources have on business incubators, with a focus on understanding how incubators in turn assist their incubatees in accessing finance. Research focusing on funder influence on incubators, and support provided to incubatees to assist with access to finance, is at a nascent stage within the South African business incubation landscape. The research was undertaken utilising a multiple case study approach, with individual business incubators constituting a case. Incubators were classified into three case typologies, depending on their predominant funding source: mixed; private; or public funded. From the population of business incubators in South Africa, a sample of 8 incubators within the Western Cape Province were selected. Semi-structured interviews with participants were undertaken over a three month period and involved undertaking interviews with 8 incubator managers, and 10 current or former incubatees. Qualitative data from participant interviews were analysed using a combination of NVivo12 and MS Excel, in order to determine responses relevant to the research question and subquestions. The information collected was categorised into themes of relevance using initial and pattern coding methodologies. The research suggests that funders influence the work of incubators through driving their own objectives, utilising the incubator as a tool. Public sector funders set objectives for incubators that were linked to achieving socioeconomic goals (poverty alleviation and economic redress). Public sector funders were found to be strongly focused on achieving their own performance indicator goals, even if these did not align to the work of the incubators. Private sector funders set objectives for incubators that were linked to achieving the goals of their organisation or fund mandate. Private sector funders were found to lack long-term commitment to funding incubators. Communication between public and private sector funders was found to be, in general, poorly co-ordinated. Lack of co-ordination between funders negatively affected the impact of incubators. The cross-case multiple case study methodology revealed that in the Western Cape, similarities exist in the channels of support provided by incubators to assist their incubatees in accessing funding, regardless of the funding structure of the business incubator. However, heterogeneous priorities exist in funding support services provided to incubatees. Bias was identified in the process of sourcing of funding for incubatees. Incubators pursued a blend of proactive and reactive approaches to accessing funding for their incubatees, depending on their relationship with funder(s). The researcher recommends a strengthening of efforts to co-ordinate objectives across the two broad spheres of incubator funding sources (public and private) in order to build effective and sustainable business incubators in South Africa. Financiers of incubators should review stakeholders and other financiers involved in the incubator to clarify policy, commitments and performance metrics. Emphasis must be placed on ensuring alignment (i) between incubator financiers; (ii) between the objectives of the financier(s) and the incubator. The current study is well suited to being expanded in future, both in terms of: (i) widening the interview participant base to include incubator financiers; (ii) a geographic expansion to focus on South Africa as a whole.

There are many existing programs and initiatives in Uganda supporting small businesses, but tend to suffer from a number of weaknesses. In particular typically small businesses find it difficult to do research and development; commercialize their results in markets (innovation) as fast as they should. For micro, small & medium enterprises to be dully competitive in a competitive economic environment requires that they develop internal capabilities to effectively assimilate, use and adapt product and process technologies for their businesses to survive on an ongoing basis. To overcome this drawback, the concept of Business Incubation has been proposed. This concept has gained large interest in the research community. The key idea is to create and nurture new businesses for growth by providing services and infrastructure required by utilizing the external knowledge sources (open innovation) and triple-helix model which assist formation of business and industrial clusters. A business incubator is an organization that supports the creation and growth of new businesses by providing services and infrastructure that is required by the targeted clients. Given that most firms in developing countries start too small to compete especially in international markets, a pre-requisite to industrial development, governments and policy makers should give particular attention to the constraints and needs of MSMEs. This can be done by adopting a mix of policies and framework conditions to reduce on the obstacles that hamper technological innovation, collaboration and business growth. In particular is access to finance and enhancing technology and business capacity development through training, linkages and networks. This Licentiate thesis discusses and reviews the initiatives and programs aimed at supporting the development of MSMEs with a view to stimulate industrial development in Uganda. The main aim of this research is to examine the process of business incubation and explain the contribution of open innovation business incubators to entrepreneurs/ start-up firms within the broader context of developing entrepreneurship, promoting science, technology and innovation and creating employment. This research focuses on the roles and relationships of government, university and research institutions and the private sector as sources of knowledge for technological innovations. Literature review, theory understanding, and participatory methods including group discussions with questionnaires, meetings and interviews, were used to achieve the objectives. From the findings, it was revealed among MSMEs that due to their sizes, limited managerial and technological skills, and inadequate functional business support services have had adverse effects on their upgrading and growth. There was little linkage and follow up between industry and other public research sectors i.e. government agencies and higher institutions although there are quite a number of support institutions with poor coordination. The research analyzed a wide range of issues that are related to the desired structural transformation of the Ugandan economy towards industrialization process. Finally it will propose strategies for the most appropriate model for Uganda.

This study explored the possible connection between organizational culture and worldview and the narratives professional associations use to sell these perspectives to external audiences. Burke's pentad and ratio analysis were utilized to identify the dominant terms in nineteen narratives featured in a promotional booklet published by the National Business Incubation Association. In eleven of the stories, the "agent" elements were most prevalent in these stories, signaling an idealistic worldview. The remaining eight narratives were agency-dominant and provided an underlying pragmatism to the highly idealistic outlook of the agent-focused stories. In addition to providing a philosophical label for the narrative messages, analyzing the pentad elements gave clues as to this association's value system toward incubation clients and the business incubation industry in general. The implications of this professional association's influence on an emerging industry were also discussed. / Department of Communication Studies

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Made available in DSpace on 2014-10-09T12:55:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 / Made available in DSpace on 2014-10-09T14:05:57Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 / Diante da crescente importância que as empresas de base tecnológica assumem na geração de riqueza e promoção do desenvolvimento econômico sustentável, destaca-se o papel das incubadoras de empresas na promoção da inovação. Imersas em ambientes tradicionalmente geradores de conhecimento, como institutos de pesquisa e universidades, propiciam não só recursos materiais como também os recursos humanos necessários à transformação de idéias em produtos em escala empresarial. No entanto, faz-se necessário adotar um conjunto de ações para dinamizar as oportunidades de sucesso de novos empreendimentos. O modelo de incentivo à inovação e ao desenvolvimento de negócios posto em prática pelas incubadoras de empresas de base tecnológica permite ao empreendedor a obtenção de competências determinísticas de êxito que resultem em aumento do ciclo de vida da empresa. As incubadoras fornecem a estrutura necessária para o desenvolvimento da idéia até a consolidação do negócio. Utilizando como parâmetro de aferição a Pesquisa Global com empresas de sucesso, realizamos estudo com os empreendedores residentes no Centro Incubador de Empresas Tecnológicas. Este estudo visa identificar o potencial uso de ferramentas de gestão que permitam influenciar os fatores críticos de sucesso do empreendedorismo de base tecnológica. A Pesquisa Global, referência deste estudo, é realizada há mais de catorze anos e conta com um banco de dados de 8.504 empresas que sobreviveram ao teste do tempo. Em 2007, a pesquisa foca em 25 ferramentas e a amostra foi de 1221 gestores em todo o mundo, dos quais 101 no Brasil, na busca de identificar quais ferramentas de gestão eles utilizam e quais resultados elas têm gerado. Para fazer parte da Pesquisa Global, as ferramentas precisam ser consideradas importantes pelos gestores, ter aplicação específica e resultados mensuráveis. Neste trabalho, baseado na hierarquia entre inovação e valor, ao monitorar quais ferramentas os gestores das empresas incubadas de base tecnológica utilizam, em quais circunstâncias e com que intensidade e compará-las com as utilizadas pelas empresas da pesquisa global, busca-se identificar os fatores críticos de sucesso para o crescimento sustentável. / Tese (Doutoramento) / IPEN/T / Instituto de Pesquisas Energeticas e Nucleares - IPEN-CNEN/SP

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the facilitating factors that lead towards innovation through the management of corporate incubation process. Design/methodology/approach: This research was conducted through utilising the multiple case study research design. The interviews were semi structured (Skype and in person) with multinational companies having corporate incubators. Number of interviews conducted were 13 in 6 companies out of 12 companies contacted. Theoretical framework: The theoretical framework firstly encompasses corporate incubation process literature that relates it to innovation, followed by the description of the business incubation process and corporate incubation process and comparison between both. Lastly, the facilitating factors that are identified from theory related to general business incubation process by (Patton et al. 2009) are identified for investigation on corporate incubation process. Afterwards the proposed drivers related to each facilitating factor and literature associated with themare elaborated in order to thoroughly explain the identified facilitating factors’ impact on corporate incubation process. Findings: From the findings, innovation can be considered as the outcome of corporate incubation process. The results showed that the factors: a quality ‘pipeline’, picking the winners, developing commercialisation skills in new tenant/client companies’ team, monitoring and evaluating progress, creating synergies within the internal support network, building and maintaining an effective external support network, access to appropriate funding streams and managed exit are the facilitating factors for the management of corporate incubation process. The drivers proposed in the existing study are proven to be useful in order to explain the impact of these facilitating factors on corporate incubation process. Furthermore, it is found that out of these eight facilitating factors, having a quality pipeline is the most important factor that should be developed and improved, in order to make the corporate incubation process more efficient. Managerial implications: For managers of multinational firms, it is recommended that they should utilise the corporate incubation process in order to contribute towards organisational innovation. However, the purpose of bringing innovation should be aligned with the long term objectives of the firm. Furthermore, they should concentrate on developing a quality pipeline of ideas in the initial phase of the process, since it will reduce the chances of failure of projects at a later stage of the corporate incubation process. Limitations: Small sample size without adequately diverse geographical spread. Since,the study is conducted on the basis of interviews of 6 multinational firms having corporate incubators, and out of which majority were from Northern European countries. Originality/value: This paper is one of the first to analyse the facilitating factors leading towards innovation exclusively for corporate incubation process by interviewing those multinational firms which are currently following the process.

Over the past three decades, interest in the topic of Business Incubation and more specifically University Business Incubation, has increased, due to its potential to encourage entrepreneurial activities, which initiate innovation and economic development. The literature on entrepreneurship devotes significant attention to BI as a tool for supporting entrepreneurs in overcoming difficulties associated with starting a business. Meanwhile, the fact that incubators themselves are vulnerable to different challenges needs to be sufficiently highlighted in the research currently in publication. By adopting an incubator’s perspective on developing entrepreneurs and, therefore, its dynamics that form new ventures, this qualitative study has focused on difficulties adjacent to the administration of the incubator. By building on the Black Box model of incubation, the Triad model, as well as Institutionalized entrepreneurship, the researchers have contributed to the phenomena of UBIs, and the many challenges they encounter when incubating business tenants. The thesis has successfully confirmed the inherent value of ensuring the financial viability of publicly financed incubators while shedding light on the challenges involved in achieving self-sufficiency. This examination has delved into the acquisition of government funds by incubators and explored the opportunities and constraints accompanying such support. Building on existing literature, which identifies sustainability and growth as key indicators, this study has provided empirical evidence and analysis that underscores the detrimental impact on the incubator's core mission when these criteria are not maintained.

abstract: With various gaps remaining in business incubation literature, developing scales that capture the multi-dimensional constructs of the incubation process remains a necessity. While living and traveling within Brazil, this author journeyed within Brazil's well-developed incubation ecosystem in order to investigate the reproducibility and validity of scales whose authors propose measure the constructs that capture the process of business incubation which were defined in their options-driven theory of business incubation as "selection performance", "monitoring and business assistance intensity", and "resource munificence". Regression analysis resulted in the data suggesting that there is no statistically significant predictive ability of the Hackett and Dilts scales when used to predict incubatee outcomes from this study's sample of incubators. The results of the analysis between total score in each of the three constructs and incubatee outcomes suggested that when the total score within the construct of selection performance increases, there tends to be a decrease in incubatee outcomes where the incubatee was surviving and growing profitably at the time of its exit from the incubator. Also, there tends to be a decrease in incubatee outcomes where the incubatee was surviving and growing on a path toward profitability at the time of the incubator exit. The results show no predictive ability of the remaining two constructs of "monitoring and business assistance intensity" and "resource munificence" to capture business incubation performance. The item specific analysis of all correlating and inter-correlating variables for each of the dependent variables, resulting in several significant relationships, however, many demonstrate negative relationships which also run contrary to the relationships proposed by Hackett and Dilts. These results have challenged both the validity of the Hackett and Dilts scale as a tool for investigating the constructs of the incubation process, and the ability of the options-driven theory to explain and predict business incubation outcomes. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.S.Tech Technology 2012