A Quantitative Analysis of Technology-based Startups

  • Typ:Masterarbeit
  • Datum:immediately
  • Betreuer:

    Sarah Manthey

  • Objective: Getting an overview of the development process of IP-based university spin-offs with a focus on the ideation process and the contribution to sustainable development. 

    Startups that emerge from the direction of technology push are mostly based on the patents developed by researchers who ultimately decide to found a company. This process is a) connected with many hurdles and b) is not often followed, which is why many patents remain untouched in the databases. Few companies ultimately result from research (university) based on IP. Companies based on technology push offer an enormous risk, but also uncanny potential, which can also be of great importance for sustainable development. Patents are not sustainable per se - but it gets exciting when you examine the fields of application that are opened up for them.

    Therefore the question needs to be investigated: How do patent-based (sustainable) business models develop?

    The starting point here would be an analysis of the idea generation process in patent-based business models - how do you get from the patent to the final business model and the (successful) founding of the startup? How often is a sustainable product / concept focused here?

    Here a large-scale quantitative analysis needs to be conducted that extensively examines:

    • What is the process of generating ideas behind the IP spin-offs?

    • Who is founding it? What is the intention of the founders?

    • Are the business models of the startups rated as sustainable? If yes how?

    These results can help to understand how a) the technology push process can be further supported and b) to what extent IP-based spin-offs make a contribution to sustainable development (and will do so in the future).

    Supervisor: Sarah Manthey Sarah.Manthey@kit.edu

Master Thesis

Description
  • Title: Ideation process for tech-based Innovation (Quantitative)
  • Subject: Identify and analyse the ideation process for new/ existing technologies to find new applications
  • Type: Masterthesis
  • Date: Starting now (October 2021)
  • Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Orestis Terzidis
  • Person in Charge: Sarah Manthey, PhD Candidate

Technology push can be characterised as a process triggered by internal or external research, with the objective to commercialise the use of new know-how or specific new technology. The approach is based on the assumption that "more R&D in" results in "more successful new products out" [Rothwell, (1994), p.8]. The description of this phenomenon from Berkhout et al. (2010, p.481) is often reflected in the view of many companies: "If we invest enough in science and technology, the rest will work out right".

To make it short: Finding new applications/ application areas for existing or new technologies.

Goal of this theses is to define, collect and analyse existing literature (also grey literature) to identify ideation techniques/ tools/ methods/ processes currently used to tackle this issue.

The data may be collected by a survey, but also other forms are possible. We will discuss this in person.

Literature

Aslani, A., H. Eftekhari, M. Hamidi, and B. Nabavi. 2015. commercialization Methods of a New Product/Service in ICT Industry: Case of a Science & Technology Park. Organizacija 48 (2): 131-138.

Danneels, E. and Frattini, F. (2018). Finding applications for technologies beyond the core business. MIT Sloan Management Review, 59(3):73-78.

Jolly, V. K. (1997). Commercializing new technologies: getting from mind to market. Harvard Business Press.

Souder, W. E. (1989). Improving productivity through technology push. Research-Technology Management, 32(2):19-24.

Terzidis, O. and Vogel, L. (2018). A unified model of the technology push process and its application in a workshop setting. In Technology Entrepreneurship: 111-135. Springer.