Development of university entrepreneurship ecosystems based on strengthening technological startups

Today, given the capacity of developing economies, technological startups as start-up businesses play an important and considerable role, especially in the field of entrepreneurship. However, due to the lack of suitable platforms, both from the social perspective in terms of education and culture as well as from the economic perspective, they have many risks and this causes a lot of startups to have trouble in their commercialization process and eventually fail. Using entrepreneurial ecosystems at the university level is one of the approaches to effective development of startups, especially technological startups, which can provide the possibility of their effective development by recognizing the needs of the target market and considering the level of individual and collective capabilities of entrepreneurs and creating a balance between them. Thereofre, the purpose of this research is to develop university entrepreneurship ecosystems based on strengthening startups through rough set theories.

The methodology of this research is hybrid and to perform it, Meta-analyses, delphi and Rough Set Collection have been used. The target population in the qualitative sector comprised of similar research studies and academic experts at the entrepreneurial level. But the target population in the quantitative sector comprised of 20 managers and deputies at various academic levels in the Golestan province. Considering the requirement of using Rough theory analysis, this amount of the statistical population is acceptable.

In this study, first by screening the selected studies, 9 propositions for strengthening startups and 5 components of the entrepreneurship ecosystem at the university level were determined. Due to the confirmation of the theoretical adequacy limit based on Delphi analysis, they entered the analysis phase of Rough Set Theory. The findings in this section make it clear that the most influential propositions for strengthening startups are the existence of technological needs and the formulation of appropriate strategies. For their development in terms of entrepreneurship ecosystems at the university level, two educational / research and innovative functions should be considered as a platform for the development of startups.

 The entrepreneurs operating in the form of technological startups need to obtain the reuired data for the development of their business through collecting ecological information and paying attention to social approaches so that they can meet the technological demands by selecting a codified strategy in this area. Moreover, based on Gery Vikor’s analysis it was determined that the most influentiasl role of the university as entrepreneurship ecology is strengthening the level of educational and research functions. This means that it is necessary for the university to lead the educational level and the promotion of scientific research in the direction of entrepreneurship in the form of entrepreneurial policies announced by the president’s deputy for technology and information. As a result, the university can be turned into a platform for the formation and flourishing of entrepreneurial ideas in the form of startups.  In other words, the university can be effective in creating knowledge and developing capability and specialized entrepreneurial skills and cause the individuals to obtain appropriate entrepreneurial skills in the areas of enhancing their knowledge to start their own startup business. In fact, this finding reveals that in line with its defined nature and philosophy, the university should have educational and research functions that are aimed at the formation of entrepreneurial approaches especially in higher education levels and just avoid the development of theories that are impractical.  The philosophy of the existence of entrepreneurial ecosystems at the university level means that for this purpose the students’ level of knowledge can be developed and improved so that as an entrepreneurer, they can play a considerable role in today’s unstable economic environment.