Supporting University Ventures in Nanotechnology, Biomaterials and Magnetic Sensing Applications

In the turbulent environment of constant changes and influences, economic, technologically-technical and social and international factors, we can say that at the beginning of the 21st century we live in the age of entrepreneurship, i.e. in the time of small and medium-sized enterprises, which are readier and more capable of reacting faster to market changes. The theories on enterprise and entrepreneurship define the enterprise and entrepreneurship as immanent phenomena, as two inseparable entities of one body. In that, entrepreneurship implies the directing of resources in the area of their optimal use, while entrepreneur implies the person who acts, who gives concrete forms to jobs, who anticipates risk, create new forms of jobs, expands employment, and enables better and more efficient organization of enterprises capable of meeting all the challenges put in front of it. The role of entrepreneurship is universal. It includes almost all aspects of human life. Every society uses entrepreneurs’ experience in management, support and success encouragement, resource activation, motivation and risk awarding, business efficiency, stability and growth, taking responsibility and business risk. Entrepreneurs see their chances where others see confusion and chaos. Key players enabling such changes are free entrepreneurs, young entrepreneurial managers, persistent innovators, and creators of a new business world. Entrepreneurs make decisions to form new enterprises on the basis of their personal, subjective motives. Regardless of what motivates them, entrepreneurs assume an obligation towards a business idea, i.e. a project, and, by means of that, they also dictate the future success of an enterprise. Empirical research shows that there is potential among students of engineering disciplines, that is only necessary to be adequately mainstreamed through the educational programs for entrepreneurship.

The paper presents the general characteristics of entrepreneurial infrastructure. One of the modern ways to support small newly established enterprises, which are in a developmental life phase, and entrepreneurs is the system of technological infrastructure comprising: entrepreneurial incubators, technology centres, science parks and business zones. Those are the different organizations that help entrepreneurs to develop their business ideas and to overcome more easily the initial problems in business, for which, in a wider context, the term business incubators is used, and also the clusters related to entrepreneurs who are in an advanced phase of entrepreneurship. An incubator is extremely suitable for newly founded small enterprises, which do not have their own business premises, sufficient funds and experience, on one hand, but, on the other hand, they have entrepreneurial ideas, goals and determination to do business. The opportunity to give local and regional support to newly founded and small enterprises by means of business incubators in Bosnia and Herzegovina is significant because it delivers the key elements for the development of incubators, such as unused spaces in all municipalities, that can be easily transformed into a workspace and adapt to the needs of new entrepreneurs. Incubators can function independently or they can be, for example, a part of a science park. In this paper, we present in the tables existing organizational forms of business infrastructure (clusters and entrepreneurs—business centers: free zones, industrial and business zones, science and technology parks, business incubators), their activities, and numerical strength in the territory of the Republic of Srpska.

This paper seeks to validate the models of support programmes for setting up spin-offs found in the literature analysing the differentiating characteristics of the various types of programmes existing in Spanish universities. To do this, a survey was conducted among managers of these programmes to obtain the necessary information. Secondly, the variables characterising these programmes were established by performing a factorial analysis. Thirdly, based on these variables, several different types of programme were identified in Spanish universities using cluster analysis. Finally, the differentiating characteristics of each of the types found were identified by means of Anova and logistic regression analysis. Four types of programme were found with differences in terms of human resources, experience, commitment, proactivity, selectivity, type and number of spin-offs created and the involvement in their management. Two successful models were identified from among the four types of programmes found. This study confirms the importance of R&D activity as a determinant of the results of support programmes for setting up spin-offs in universities. However, the suggestion in the literature that programmes usually begin with a policy of low selectivity was not confirmed.

One of the main tasks of institutional framework creators is cultivating adequate productive enviroment for university ventures development. The university ventures should be specifically fertile for research and development commercialization and support and for positioning universities as profitable units within the educational system. The idea is to create supportive programs where research activities can migrate to the actual business environment, produce desirable products and/or services, compete on the market and generate profit.

Using information technologies can contribute significantly to the successful start of a company and its later progress. However, successful implementation is connected to certain expenses, which smaller companies (such as university spin-off companies) usually cannot afford. The analysis of existing approaches to implementation of IT and information systems will be performed in this chapter, along with the study of applicability of their use in university spin-off companies. As a conclusion, we will propose the best way to choose and use IT systems.

This article explores the factors that govern the process of innovation adoption by companies. We have studied the factors that promote the willingness or resistance of companies to adopt new research results or novelty, in general. As one case study, we will elaborate factors that influence a website adoption by smaller companies that mainly do not have their own ICT departments. The study investigated the attitudes of managers towards Internet-mediated business development and promotion, comprising a case study of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Serbia. Special focus was placed on low income micro-SMEs. The results showed that, in the case of larger organisations, the models proposed by Flanagin (Hum Commun Res 26(4):618–646, 2000) and Davis (MIS Q 13(3):319–339, 1989) can be effectively used as guidance for website adoption. However, in the case of very small companies, with limited budgets and locally oriented markets, a few of those factors are more prominent, while some have very little influence on the adoption process. Education background of the owners essentially determines decision making and the adoption process, and competitive pressures have no significant influence. The annual income of the company has a certain influence, but, even with the available budget, micro-SMEs will not consider introduction of a website if they cannot perceive any benefits, often due to a lack of awareness of innovations in ICT and marketing. If the owners can perceive website benefits, the cost of introduction and maintenance has little influence. Specific cultural aspects of the region should be considered as the significant factor influencing innovation introduction.

We review some of the skills that scientists who have become scientific entrepreneurs share. We advocate that it is possible to include technology transfer as a part of the scientific investigation not only as a collateral funding source but also as a way to reinforce the scientific advances and resulting communication. Traditionally, the technology-transfer process of scientific results has been mediated mainly by patents, even before the first prototype testing has been performed. Instead, we discuss the critical benefits of fast prototyping and develop strategies how to adequately monetize and establish the price of the products even at the prototype level. We also list several common failures of a technology-transfer project and some preventive actions to avoid them.