Essays on technology entrepreneurship

Abstract

This dissertation attempts to contribute to extant discussions on how one utilizes knowledge for economic gain. The first essay is a response to the controversy on whether the interactions divert academic scientists research agenda toward industry interests at the expense of fundamental science. This essay considers how an academic scientist chooses the level of difficulty of a research project and its level of relevance to industry interests. A simple game-theoretic model between research sponsors, a government agency and a firm, and an academic scientist is constructed. The shows that the funding decisions of research sponsors are strategic substitutes. It also shows that the academic scientists choices of project characteristics are strategic complements. The second essay provides insights on scientific entrepreneurs. It is argued that the nature of scientists research, specifically the level of its commercial applicability, is an important predictor of entrepreneurial actions of academic scientists. Using data from 395 academic scientists at five top US research universities, it is observed that there is a non-linear relationship between the nature of research and entrepreneurial actions. The third essay offers insights on entrepreneurial teams. This essay investigates mechanisms that give rise to entrepreneurial teams. The model shows that an entrepreneur obtains less expected value from a project if the entrepreneur chooses to work solo at latter stage than working in a team. It is also explained how asymmetry of importance between tasks in a commercialization project influences the decision of team formation and its optimal size. An extended model is constructed to analyze two benefits of team work: specialization and diversity.