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Although many studies have been conducted on the drivers of and barriers to research collaborations, current literature provides limited insights into the ways in which individual researchers choose to engage in different collaborative projects. Using a choice experiment, we studied the factors that drive this choice using a representative sample of 3145 researchers from Western Europe and North America who publish in English. We find that for most researchers, the expected publication of research in scientific journals deriving from a project is the most decisive factor driving their collaboration choices. Moreover, most respondents prefer to collaborate with other partners than industry. However, different factors' influence varies across groups of researchers. These groups are characterised as going for the 'puzzle' (60% of the sample), the 'ribbon' (33%) or the 'gold' (8%), i.e., primarily oriented toward intellectual goals, recognition or money, respectively. This heterogeneity shows that a combination of interventions will be required for governments aiming to promote university–industry collaborations.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agreed by the United Nations are a call to action for policy-makers around the globe to tackle grand societal challenges. Sustainability start-ups can help meet some of the most pressing challenges. Regions of start-up activity are commonly referred to as entrepreneurial ecosystems (EEs), although the share of sustainability start-ups varies markedly from one EE to another. While literature on EEs is abundant, scholarly work on sustainability-oriented EEs, i.e. those with a high share of sustainability start-ups, is still relatively scarce. In particular, there is limited understanding of the reasons why some EEs have a higher share of sustainability start-ups than others. The present paper considers this gap in the literature by contrasting the EEs of Berlin and Lagos, which have very different shares of sustainability start-ups. Forty interviews conducted with founders, investors, hubs and government representatives in both EEs showed that particularly successful start-ups in an EE, so-called lighthouses, play an important role in shaping the cultural, social and material attributes of an EE. This means that the sustainability orientation of these lighthouses is instrumental in creating environments in which sustainability start-ups can flourish. Moreover, lighthouses can attract new talent and resources to a region, which further underlines their role as accelerators of an EE towards sustainability. Overall, the lighthouses are a critical factor in explaining the share of sustainability start-ups. Policy-makers can strengthen this effect by giving access to extra resources and opportunities to promising start-ups and by showcasing their success.

AbstractThe scholarly literature has so far paid limited attention to responsibility by commercial entrepreneurs. This paper compares responsible entrepreneurship (RE) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) scholarship in order to identify future fields of research. For this purpose, we assess the strengths and weaknesses of extant RE scholarship through the lens of CSR. We have reviewed 11,260 papers via latent Dirichlet allocation for our work. We find that existing RE literature places disproportionate emphasis on how firms can benefit society instead of on how contributions to sustainable development can benefit a firm. Furthermore, the RE literature pays limited attention to employee well‐being, customer preference, and civil society as a stakeholder. Also, environmental issues and their balancing with financial and social issues remain relatively under‐researched. Overall, we hope that scholarly works inspired by this study may ultimately help to ensure responsible behaviour of start‐ups.

This article qualitatively identifies and explains the barriers that foreign cleantech start-ups can encounter when attempting to enter the Chinese market, as well as the possible strategies that can help overcome these barriers. We base our analysis on interviews with Chinese and foreign entrepreneurs and facilitators. To structure the analysis of such barriers, we use the components of the entrepreneurial ecosystem. We then explain the barriers using institutional theory. We demonstrate that they are caused either by the regulations in China or by the difference between Chinese and Western logics. We further recommend that cleantech entrepreneurs come prepared to China, remain flexible, associate themselves with reputable partners and take advice from those familiar with business in China. Cultural-cognitive barriers might be overcome by integrating the communities of foreign and Chinese start-ups. Regulative barriers can be removed by the Chinese Government, but this conflicts with the logic of state control.

In this age of information, firms are losing control of their image. Perhaps this is one reason that Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become a buzzword among packaged food industry leaders - firms seem determined to show stakeholders that they have values and behave responsibly, and are driven by more than the prospect of financial gain. They produce elaborate annual sustainability reports in which they meticulously account for their CSR efforts. Nevertheless, according to the literature, it is unlikely that CSR is actually intrinsically motivated by the values of firms. This paper aims to uncover how self-reported motivations for different dimensions of CSR can be explained by distinct aspects of the organizational environment. We take a qualitative approach to accomplish this aim. First, we classify self-reported motivations for CSR according to the Triple Bottom Line (3BL). We then classify the same motivations according to the stakeholders and institutional pillars that comprise the organizational environment of the firms. We use a combination of Institutional Theory (IT) and Stakeholder Management (SM) to investigate how and to what extent different types of stakeholders and institutional pressures influence specific packaged food firm motivations. Our findings show that motivations that are framed as intrinsic or values-based can be explained by external pressures. We also conclude that in addition to legislation and normative obligations, social pressure is an effective driver for CSR. Overall, this paper shows that different types of institutions and stakeholders motivate different types of CSR, and that these motivators can be used to drive policy.

Abstract Technological diversity is important to achieve long-term technological progress as diversity fosters recombinant innovation and renders undesirable lock-ins less likely. Many government policies influence the diversity of a technology, in particular by subsidizing collaborative innovation projects. This study investigates the influence of network position and the composition of innovation projects on the creation diversity of an emerging technology at a system level. We first conceptualize technological diversity and formulate hypotheses using a combination of innovation system and social network arguments. Empirically, we study the Dutch innovation system in relation to biogas energy technology. Our results show that the more projects are related to each other through shared actors, the less likely they are to contribute to technological diversity. This supports the arguments that diffusion of knowledge and sharing knowledge bases lead to less diversity. With regard to composition, we found that including more partners in a project is negatively related to diversity, while a greater diversity of actors in a project contributes to technological diversity. Overall, we conclude that a combination of innovation system and social network arguments provides a credible micro-level explanation for how the diversity of an emerging technology is created within an innovation system. These insights can be used to design "smart" innovation policy instruments that influence the level of technological diversity.