An entrepreneurial venture’s growth within Thai university

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to investigate growth stage of an entrepreneurial venture born within Thai university and also to explore the future growth strategy which is formulated by the departmental team and at the same time is influenced by the school’s administrators.

Design/methodology/approach

Single case study approach was used to explore the growth of dental school’s internal venture aimed to produce low-cost pharmaceutical supplies. The interview data were matched with relevant entrepreneurship literatures to build theory from case study.

Findings

There is a clash in terms of growth strategy preferred by the parental organization and department-level team who found the venture. The dental school’s administrators expect their internal venture to be fully commercialized as spin-off according to typical academic entrepreneurship scheme. Differently, the entrepreneurial team prefers keeping the departmental venture inside to serve its socially entrepreneurial motivation with modest growth.

Originality/value

The case evidence implies different schools of thought that could influence the growth of university-based entrepreneurial venture. The university’s entrepreneurial development scheme thus is to incorporate such differences to move its departmental venture forward for sustainable growth.

Citation

Sooampon, S. (2020), "An entrepreneurial venture’s growth within Thai university", International Journal of Innovation Science, Vol. 10 No. 2, pp. 207-219. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJIS-09-2017-0091