Construction of theoretical model of academic entrepreneurship behavior map: based on grounded theory analysis

2.1 Academic entrepreneurship process

There are many research results on the entrepreneurial process, but the research on the academic entrepreneurial process is relatively few. The entrepreneurial process usually includes the process of a business opportunity with market value from the initial conception to the formation of a new venture, as well as the growth management process of the new venture [7].

The entrepreneurial process is complex and dynamic, and its research evolution is from side repetition and complexity to focusing on dynamics, and then to the integration of dynamics and complexity. The research idea of lateral repeatability is mainly to explore the entrepreneurial elements of the entrepreneurial process and the internal relationship. For example, Cartner’s theoretical model includes four elements: individual, environment, organization and founding process, and the four elements interact with each other. The total number of sub variables under the four elements has reached more than 50, which shows the complexity of the model, but the interpretation of the relationship between the elements is not clear enough [8].

The research focusing on dynamics mainly focuses on the division of entrepreneurial stages. Holt divides the entrepreneurial process into pre start-up stage, start-up stage, early growth stage and late growth stage from the perspective of enterprise life cycle, and points out the content and focus of activities in each stage [9]. At the end of the 20th century, the theorists gradually realized that the dynamic and complex characteristics of entrepreneurial process were the fundamental reason why entrepreneurial research was different from general management research, and some dynamic and complex entrepreneurial process theoretical models gradually emerged. For example, Bhave believes that the entrepreneurial process is a rational, non-linear and repeatedly revised practical process, including initial opportunity identification, product line construction, organization creation, market transactions and customer feedback [10].

The research on the process of academic entrepreneurship also follows this research paradigm, taking into account the dynamics and complexity. For example, Rasmussena et al. Based on the social network theory, studied the strategic realization process of academic entrepreneurship, including opportunity identification, resource utilization and team building. This study constructs the theoretical framework of academic entrepreneurial behavior map, which consists of four stages [11]. Duanqi et al. constructed an academic entrepreneurship process model covering 9 key elements, including technology ownership, entrepreneurial fire line, opportunity identification and acquisition [12]; Yao Fei built an entrepreneurial process model including role identification, network construction, team building and entrepreneurial marketing [13]. However, the above research is at the level of organizational process, which does not clearly show the decision logic of individuals at each stage.

In addition, in terms of influencing factors, it has confirmed the influence of many factors, such as system, entrepreneurial system, entrepreneurial subject itself and so on. However, the current research perspectives of influencing factors are mostly focused, so there is still a lack of factor network integrated in the “academic entrepreneurial behavior map”.

2.2 Academic entrepreneurship behavior map

The concept of academic entrepreneurship behavior map is not mature, but that of behavioral mapping and entrepreneurship map is relatively mature. Behavioral mapping, mainly used in industrial design, was proposed and developed by Ittlelson et al. in 1970. It is a method of systematically observing and studying behavior from the perspective of time and space [14], which is used to record the behavior occurring in the designed building so as to help the designers to connect the design characteristics with the behavior in time and space. It can transform abstract user data into explicit connections of user behavior in time and space, as shown in Fig. 1.

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Fig. 1

Working principle of behavioral mapping.

In the process of product design and research, behavioral mapping takes the population and place as the observation units to obtain the behavioral characteristics of different users using a certain product, so as to mine and contact the relevant behavioral data of users, and find the user needs in the key behavior analysis.

Behavioral mapping can also be applied to academic entrepreneurship, because it arises from the job inventions of researchers, and then produces a series of entrepreneurial derivative behaviors, which is similar to the concept of behavioral mapping in terms of occurring in the system (building). If you want to better promote the success of academic entrepreneurship, you need to identify the key behaviors of researchers in entrepreneurship and optimize the element system in which the key behaviors are located.

The concept of “map” is widely used in business fields. However, most concepts about “entrepreneurship map” refer to business plans. For example, Han Shujie proposed that entrepreneurship map is a dynamic map that needs continuous iteration [15].

The academic entrepreneurship behavior map defined in this study is a key node and element system describing the commercialization process of technology by researchers when facing the uncertainty of resources, market and environment from the beginning of holding job inventions. Despite rapid and in-depth advances in the research of academic entrepreneurship, it lacks an overall description. What does the backbone path of academic entrepreneurship look like? What factors affect the final direction?

The significance of this study is as follows. (1) At the social level, due to the lack of mature theoretical framework and the lack of understanding of the objective laws of academic entrepreneurship behavior and the existing key nodes, the policy support means of local governments and universities are prone to deviation. (2) At the individual level, we provide theoretical reference. In the process of entrepreneurship, researchers can judge their own academic entrepreneurial activities stage as well as the possible risks and opportunities.

3.1 Research methods

At present, China’s academic entrepreneurship has obvious local characteristics, such as differences in entrepreneurial atmosphere, policy, academic entrepreneurs’ ambition, mentality, cultural background [16, 17]. Therefore, there is a lack of an overall framework for academic entrepreneurship in the Chinese context. Moreover, since there is no mature theory for academic entrepreneurship behavior map, new theoretical views are still constructed through qualitative research.

Through the systematic analysis and induction of original data by grounded theory, the relevant concepts and categories of constructing theories were gradually summarized and refined, and the connections were determined [18]. The specific process is as Fig. 2: use open coding, axial coding and selective coding to construct the theory of technology entrepreneurship process of university researchers, and then use constant comparison to constantly revise the theory structure until the theory is saturated.

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Fig. 2

Research process of grounded theory.

This study builds a theoretical model of academic entrepreneurship behavior map based on multi-source interview data and Nvivo11 software, and summarizes the key characteristics of academic entrepreneurship behavior and the main influencing factors of its evolution.

According to Yin’s theoretical sampling principle, academic entrepreneurial enterprises in different entrepreneurial stages, types and industries were investigated, including 2 teachers who hold patented technology but do not start a business, 1 ordinary university enterprise, 3 research institute-local government cooperative enterprises, and 2“985” university enterprises.

The data of this study came from multiple channels such as field interviews, project tracking, secondary data collection and other methods, so as to build an evidence triangle chain, avoid a single data source problem, and improve the reliability and validity of the research results.

The specific respondent data is shown in Table 1:

This study collected data from 2015 to January 2022, during which the researchers conducted an average of 3-5 in-depth interviews with these enterprises, a total of 25 in-depth interviews. The interview text amounted to 394,000 words. And the public information and related reports of these enterprises were collected online, totaling 48,000 words.

Some interview topics are shown as follows:

What is the transformation form of scientific and technological achievements in the current project? What other forms of transformation of scientific and technological achievements do you know? Why choose this form?

4.1 Open coding

Open coding is the primary link of constructing theoretical models, It is a process of classifying, comparing and integrating the original data, and refining a strong generalized concept.

Following the principle of grounded theory, the original data were deeply decomposed in this study. And Nvivo11 software was used to number the selected texts and make the labels simple. In the process of coding, the conceptual categories were extracted and the core categories were refined through expert opinion consultation, repeated thinking and comparison. Finally, the theoretical model was constructed from the bottom up based on the connection between the categories. A total of 57 labels, 37 concepts, and 28 categories were obtained.

4.2 Axial coding

The categories of open coding were further summarized to establish the connection between different categories and develop the primary category. The categories were made more rigorous by developing their nature and level, and the independent categories were associated, and the potential logical relationship between the categories was discovered and established. 20 subcategories and 3 primary categories were formed through induction, as shown in Table 2.

Selective coding aims to link certain core categories to other categories, validate their relationships, and complement the categories that have not yet been fully conceptualized. The typical relationships of the primary categories in this study are shown in Table 3. Through repeated thinking and comparison of the primary and secondary categories and the interview materials, we found that all the primary categories can represent different characteristics, and the lack of any one category can not accommodate all the contents of the interview materials [19].

Through selective coding, a clear story line about the academic entrepreneurship behavior map was obtained: affected by the internal and external influencing factors, the scholar holding a technology walks out a unique academic entrepreneurship trajectory on the “academic entrepreneurship behavior map”. There are four key coordinates on the “academic entrepreneurship behavior map”: technology holding, finding technology application scenarios, stabilizing technology application scenarios, and mature operation. The essence of academic entrepreneurship is entrepreneurship, so it must follow the business logic and financing logic (Table 3).

4 interview texts were collected from the academic entrepreneurial enterprises, and then the theoretical saturation of the constructed model was constructed by referring to the previous 4 reserved network interview texts and 1 field interview text. And a full-sample search of the obtained codes was conducted using Nvivo11 software.

The results showed that the key coordinates, ecological elements and their logical relationships of academic entrepreneurship behavior map were still within the core categories obtained in this study, and no new primary and secondary categories and relationships were found, so the obtained codes were nearly saturated.

It is found that there is a “behavior map” of academic entrepreneurship in Chinese universities through case studies. The “coordinates” of academic entrepreneurship behavior map include four stages: starting point, finding technology application scenarios, stabilizing technology application scenarios, and mature operation.

5.2 Influencing factors of academic entrepreneurship behavior map

Because each stage is affected by the internal and external influencing factors, each entrepreneurial project will walk out of its own unique “trajectory”.

5.3 Underlying logic of academic entrepreneurship

Liu Run, a well-known business consultant, made a point in his book Underlying Logic: See the Bottomline of the World: “Only the underlying logic can be applied to new environmental changes, thus producing a methodology to adapt to the new environment.” This study agrees with this view, and it does find that there is an underlying logic in the academic entrepreneurship process.

6.1 Main conclusions

The multidimensional integration model of academic entrepreneurship behavior map was constructed based on grounded theory to systematically explain its main logic. The study found that: (1) The “coordinates” of academic entrepreneurship behavior map include four stages: starting point, finding technology application scenarios, stabilizing technology application scenarios, and mature operation. (2) The internal and external influencing factors work together on the entrepreneurial subject, which determines which position the entrepreneurial subject can go on the academic entrepreneurship behavior map. (3) The internal influencing factors include entrepreneurial intention, values, career development orientation, knowledge, values, psychological factors, etc.; the external influencing factors include subject nature, academic entrepreneurship environment, industry opportunities, etc. The internal and external influencing factors are independent of each other, which can not only affect academic entrepreneurship alone, but also produce superposition effects. (4) Academic entrepreneurship also follows the underlying logic of entrepreneurship.

6.2 Practical enlightenment

(1) Scholars themselves: consolidating entrepreneurial literacy

Firstly, Identify the Key “coordinates” and clarify the entrepreneurial position

Scholars can consider the depth of entrepreneurial behavior by combining the internal and external factors of entrepreneurship and the possibility of success. For example, most scholars choose to sell patents directly, and about 80% of scholars can make prototypes according to the needs of enterprises, but the proportion of teams that can make products is very small. If the team can gain a foothold in the product, it will consider continuing to start a business.

Secondly, Strengthen the cultivation of academic entrepreneurship concept. Many scholars are not willing to start a business, and their internal entrepreneurial drive is insufficient. Some scholars are willing to take root in basic research, preferring to deal with the physical world; some scholars regard academic research as a means to make a living, and they do research to publish papers and evaluate professional titles, and have no real plans to apply their research to any specific scenarios. Still, some scholars have no sense of academic entrepreneurship. They only know that research can be used to publish papers, but never consider the concept of the commercialization of scientific achievements. Few scholars are willing to start a business, but they have no way of doing it. Their patent was not sold, and was abandoned after paying patent fees for several years. Thus, there is a huge waste of innovation resources, including talents, scientific research funds and scientific achievements.

Therefore, the concept of academic entrepreneurship should be implanted in the hearts of young researchers in the stage of graduate education, so that they can form the awareness of the commercialization of scientific achievements.

In the wave of innovation and entrepreneurship, it is necessary to guide researchers on how to commercialize their scientific achievements, give researchers enough power mechanism, and provide carts with wheels for the “pony” driving innovation. Give researchers a map to know where they may go in the future, rather than bumping or staying where they are.

Thirdly, enhance academic entrepreneurs’ understanding of entrepreneurship laws. Let scholars realize that the road of transformation of scientific and technological achievements into commodities and the scientific research process are two kinds of ideas, and objectively understand that there is no real concept of being an enterprise at the beginning of entrepreneurship

(2) University: It is suggested to provide guarantee mechanism

Firstly, University should Build Bridges. If universities can sort out the patents owned by teachers and ask science parks to help meet the needs of enterprises, there will be more successful patents.

Teachers have no sales experience, making it difficult to reach companies with real needs. And they do not have enough energy to do so. Therefore, if China wants to promote the development of academic entrepreneurship, it must improve the support system for academic entrepreneurship and effectively provide guarantee from the organizational and government levels.

Secondly, it should provide Institutional guarantee. If the ownership of service invention has always belonged to universities, and teachers do not have the right to dispose of it by themselves, then they won’t have enough motivation to transform their scientific achievements. In the survey, teacher spay a 10% management fee to the university, leaving the remaining 90% for themselves. In this way, their enthusiasm has been significantly improved.

(3) Government Policy guarantee.

Take Suzhou in China as an example, which ranks among the top 10 cities in China in terms of innovative development and economic development. In the survey, a large number of enterprises in the science parks in Suzhou are in the stage of product research to application research, and the rate of return is very high, reaching 100 billion level. This confirms that a scientific and reasonable technology financial service system is needed in the process of academic entrepreneurship.