Internationalisation patterns of academic spin-offs

Abstract

The aim of this paper is twofold. Firstly, to analyse the international behaviour of academic spin-offs to explore the internationalisation patterns followed by these companies, considering precocity, scale, and scope as the key dimensions of the internationalisation process. The second objective is to discern whether academic spin-offs that follow different patterns present distinctive characteristics. To test the hypotheses, a cluster analysis, a series of ANOVA analyses of variance and post hoc tests were performed on a sample of 161 Spanish academic spin-offs. Results show that 49% of these firms do not internationalise and that three patterns of internationalisation exist in academic spin-offs: true born global, sporadic born global, and born again global. On the other hand, the results also reveal distinctive antecedent factors among the different internationalisation patterns. Thus, international industrial networks and management team functional heterogeneity are more relevant in academic spin-offs that follow the true born global and the born again global patterns, while global technological competence is significant for all three internationalisation patterns, and international academic networks present minor importance for the internationalisation process developed by academic spin-offs.