The concept of the “entrepreneurial university” first emerged in the US around the year 2000 and spread quickly to the UK and the rest of Europe. Today this idea has attained an almost mantra-like status among administrators and policy-makers. It espouses the view that one of the main roles of universities is to contribute to national and regional economic development through increased spin-out activities.
Surprisingly, there are very few studies which have examined the survival and performance of university spin-offs over prolonged periods of time. Helen Lawton-Smith, Professor of Entrepreneurship at Birkbeck, London University considers this an important omission in measuring universities’ spin-out performance. Existing studies in her view are either too focused on particular sectors (i.e. biotechnology) or do not take the appropriate long term perspective. Available studies, in her view, mostly focus on those companies that have been formed since knowledge or tech-transfer institutions were instituted underestimating the longer term contribution of university spin-off activity to regional economic development.

Based on earlier work focusing on technology spin-outs in the Oxfordshire region she currently contributes to filling this identified gap through a study which analyses spin-out activity in Oxfordshire and London based institutions since 1965. Highlighting that data collection is problematic, often due to underreporting, she comes to the conclusion that the London region is similar to Oxfordshire in terms of spin-off numbers. However, Oxfordshire spin-outs employ more people and turnover is far higher (£1bn +). This raises important questions regarding the implications such long-term studies might have on government policies for the development of business ecologies. Does the London region provide an adequately supportive and networked environment to nurture university-related companies? It also remains to be seen what long-term effects business schools and other business support schemes have on the entrepreneurial “spirit” and the development of a particular region.

For further information please consult:
H. Lawton-Smith, K. Ho, Measuring the performance of Oxford University, Oxford Brookes University and the government laboratories’ spin-off companies in: Research Policy 35 (2006), pp.1554-1568

For Helen Lawton-Smith’s homepage, please click here.