Incubating the Future Piero Formica Piero Professor of
Incubating the Future Piero Formica Piero Professor of Knowledge Economics and Entrepreneurship, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, University of Tartu formica@cofimp. it Skype: aryatre
Incubator as Particle Accelerator Entrepreneurial Energy Formula 3 E = MC Source: Piero Formica and Elias Carayannis, “Intellectual Venture Capitalists: An Emerging Breed of Knowledge Entrepreneurs”, Industry and Higher Education (forthcoming)
3 E = MC E stands for Ken-Energy KEN (verb) : to have understanding KEN (noun) : a range of vision The entrepreneurial energy performs a function that corresponds to that of the knowledge energy
3 E = MC M stands for entrepreneurial mass made up of attributes and motivations
Attributes and Motivations Attributes • Clarity of leadership • Openness and inquisitiveness that stimulates innovation and learning • Creation of new value or organisational capability • Flexibility to change • Relationship building skills • Ability to convince others (employees, individual investors, suppliers, and landlords) to share start-up risks Motivations • • Capacity to think for oneself Self-confidence: having optimism and personal drive Sense of autonomy, independence and risk-taking Intense emotions
3 E = MC Akio Morita’s (Sony’s founder) Cs: • Creativity in technology (creation) • Creativity in planning (conversion) • Creativity in marketing (commercialization) CT x CP x CM
3 E = MC CT x CP x CM • Interactive conversation • Markets are conversation • Links in human networks: affinity groups - small pieces loosely joined
In the Incubator markets are conversation • Conversation = cum versare: – To turn or – To dance together • Products, inventions and services, great and small, are created through talking: – Watson and Crick vs Linus Pauling – Lunar Society: “The best preceptor is the conversation of eminent men”
The Incubator is a low context community… • • Member participation is wide open Participants are on equal footing Strength of weak ties Non face-to-face interactions in online based community • Exchange of cognitive elements of tacit knowledge • Self-supporting people that think forward and outward looking • Unconventional effects
… A café-type community A life form whose behaviour is organised from the bottom up It was in coffee-houses that commerce and new technology first became intertwined Blogs (blogger. com) as tools for reflection and interaction Knowledge pools
Knowledge Pools at the Incubator - A super collider for the entrepreneurial reaction ……bringing them together the reaction starts Researchers Different disciplines Different backgrounds Technologists Market and sale forces Knowledge value chain reaction KNOWLEDGE POOL Business lawyers (IPR, contracts, . . ) MKGT experts Business strategists “The symbiosis is the building upon one another's strength… one another's competencies…adding value and passing it on” Different theoretical conditions
The Emergence of Knowledge Innovation Zones • A gravitation-sensitive context – In a setting of interrelated conditions, knowledge-driven firms accelerate toward each other (‘knowledge cluster’ effect) so as – to close the gap between different business entities – to go above the critical threshold (exponential growth) • A geographical or a conceptual (virtual) space where knowledge flows from the point of origin to the point of need or opportunity • The epicenter of three forces that empower the innovation process: – creativity – science – advanced infra and info structures
The Incubator in the Knowledge Innovation Zones International Academy of Entrepreneurship • Faculty • Incubation knowledge creation conversion knowledge commercialization INCUBATOR – NEW VENTURE CREATION Source: http: //www. inthekzone. com/principles. htm
The International Academy of Entrepreneurship: Education Alliance • A Thinking Society – A cradle to career continuum • An integrated, multi-level, commercial model of private education based on best practices in teaching and learning • The Alliance forges strategic partnerships with selected education providers to achieve the optimal education environment • The Alliance applies innovative learning delivery modalities (virtual and physical) to achieve the optimal business environment
The International Academy of Entrepreneurship New Venture Creation Innovative versus replicative entrepreneurs Originality and heterodox thinking Cross-border, international start-ups Start-ups Corporate ventures Spin-offs Academics practice-oriented scholars Competence setters International Academy Competence block for Corporate entrepreneurial education Europe Asia ICT Media Utilities/ North America Resources Latin America Competence setters Middle East Competence block for application and experimentation INCUBATOR WITHOUT BORDERS professors: theory-oriented practitioners Intel IBM Gartner Nokia …. .
International Academy of Entrepreneurship Incubator Pre. Incubation Concept Process • Experiences in new venture creation • Portfolio of idea generation Business Plans • Screening & supply of would-be entrepreneurs • Hands-on guidance • Zero & seed funds
World Business Incubator Cross-border, international start-ups High-growth businesses by young entrepreneurs • 100 young people aged 18 to 30 on an annual basis to reside in the Incubator Environment • The would-be entrepreneurs come from a cross section of society, and represent all continents of the World • Participants split into Business Action Groups (BAGs) to pool their resources, backgrounds, and ideas, to develop common Business Projects Source : Mr Bernt Chr. BJAANES, Mr Ragnar SIIL, Mr Fredrick LEE-OHLSSON, Ms Olya SMYRNOVA
World Business Incubator Cross-border, international start-ups High-growth businesses by young entrepreneurs IMPLEMENTATION & ACTION to get knowledge how to implement business ideas PARTNERSHIP & CO-OPERATION to get tools to and understanding how to involve partners in collaboration and financing PROJECT MANAGEMENT to get knowledge on how to develop a manage a business project TEAMBUILDING to form a tight group CREATIVITY to form a creative spirit BUSINESS ACTION GROUP 10 incubator participants with complementary background GROUPING to create a structure BRAINSTORMING to generate ideas FACTS to get the maximum of knowledge and information
7 small European Countries (< 10 m population): Ireland, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden) Tear down manmade barriers (cultural, institutional, geographic) Emerge from a network of complementary ideas and people Cultural Integration, Creative Employment and Propensity to Entrepreneurship Best performer 28. 7 27. 5 27. 0 28. 8 Cultural Integration 25. 0 EU average: Proportion of respondents who have thought about or who are thinking about setting up a business – 2003 Eurobarometer survey 24. 4 24. 3 Boundary-less Knowledge Markets ØKnow & Info Systems ØCustomer Knowledge & Support ØKnowledge Arbitrage ØE-Learning Exchange ØEconomic and Business Intelligence Worst performer Low EU big 4: Germany, France, UK, Italy Incubator TRENDSETTER Creative High Employment UK & Eire Central Europe (Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Switzerland) Med Europe (France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Greece) Scandinavia Eastern Europe (Croatia, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania)
The opportunity of a lifetime must be seized in the lifetime opportunity Martin Curley, Director Innovation and IT Research, Intel
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