Marcel Hülsbeck

Entrepreneurship Policy in Bavaria: Between Laptop and Lederhosen

This unique Handbook provides a solid foundation for essential study in the nascent field of entrepreneurship policy research. This foundation is initially developed via the exploration of two significant propositions underpinning the nature of entrepreneurship policy research. The first is that entrepreneurship has emerged as a bona fide focus of public policy, particularly with respect to economic growth and employment creation. The second is that neither scholars nor policy makers are presently equipped to understand the public policy role for entrepreneurship.

The Benefits of Family Ownership, Control and Management on Financial Performance of Firms

The benefits of family ownership and control of firms are at the center of the family firm debate. Previous studies have used either family ownership or management as proxies for control. Both indicators are off the mark, as they do not measure ‘decision control’ as intended by the theory of the firm. This is the first study investigating the direct influence of family ownership, control and management on financial firm performance, while controlling for goal heterogeneity of different stakeholders. Our results clearly show that family control is beneficial for all stakeholders, while neither family ownership nor management influences financial performance. Monitoring behavior of families is the central component and essence of family firms and can be used as a point of departure for the development of a unified theory of family firms.

Academic entrepreneurship and board formation in science-based firms

This study investigates the demand and supply of academics as board members in science-based companies. Providing academics as board members is one activity within the broad range of academic entrepreneurship activities of universities helping science-based firms to develop absorptive capacity and utilize knowledge spillovers from local universities and focal firms. Based on a hand-collected sample of all entrepreneurial and high-tech initial public offerings in Germany from 1997 until 2007, this study finds compelling evidence that the board representation of academics is shaped by firm characteristics such as specific investments in knowledge, the academic entrepreneurship orientation of the local university and regional competitiveness.

The Role of Regional Knowledge Production in University Technology Transfer: Isolating Coevolutionary Effects

The rate and magnitude of university-to-industry-technology-transfer (UITT) is a function not only of university characteristics but also of regional factors. A universitys embeddedness in an innovative regional milieu moderates UITT. This necessary balance of the supply side (technology push) and demand side (market pull) of technology transfer has so far neither been systematically addressed in the technology transfer literature nor has it been acknowledged by policy makers.We investigate UITT as a function of the interrelation of the industrial innovative milieu of a region and the characteristics of regional universities to identify the impact of the industry on UITT. Thereby we do not only aim to reduce the existing empirical gap in the academic entrepreneurship literature but also to inform policy in its attempt to foster UITT in European regions.

Die Organisation globaler Innovation

In der bis dahin grosten Firmenfusion der Geschichte schlossen sich am 1. Januar 1997 die Unternehmen Sandoz AG und Ciba AG zur Novartis AG zusammen. (Marktwert der Ciba und Sandoz zum Zeitpunkt des Zusammenschlusses: 80 Mrd. US

Regional Competitiveness, University Spillovers and Entrepreneurial Activity

, vgl. Ab-bildung 1). Novartis wurde zum grosten Pharmakonzern der Welt und zweitgrostes Unternehmen Europas. Die Fusion war uberraschend, da sowohl Sandoz als auch Ciba 1995 ihr erfolgreichstes Jahr, dem Zeitpunkt der ersten Gesprache, hatten. Sie waren erfolgreiche, gesunde und global agierende Weltklasseunternehmen, die miteinander im Wettbewerb standen. Beide hatten aussichtsreiche neue Produkte im Entwick-lungsstadium. Die Fusion war Hohepunkt des anhaltenden Konsolidierungsprozess der Branche. Konkurrenz, Kostendruck, Generika, „me-too“ Produkte und Sattigung des Marktes sind als wichtige Faktoren herauszustellen. Zudem ist als fur diese Branche essentiellster Faktor die Bedeutung der F&E hervorzuheben. Der Weg eines Medi-kaments bis zur Produktreife dauert im Durchschnitt 10-12 Jahre. Jedoch gelangen in der Regel nur 3 von anfangs 100 Wirkstoffen durch die Entwicklungs-Pipeline auf den Markt. Nimmt man die maximale Zeitdauer des Patenschutzes von 20 Jahren in den Vergleich mit auf, so hat ein Unternehmen 8-10 Jahre Zeit, mit den wenigen Endpro-dukten die enormen Kosten der gesamten F&E durch entsprechende Ruckflusse wett-zumachen und daruber hinaus Gewinn zu erwirtschaften.