Analysis of Institutional Factors of Academic Entrepreneurship Ecosystem: The Case of University of Tehran

Institutions are one of the key factors of the ecosystem of academic entrepreneurship that have an effective role in the growth and development of academic entrepreneurship. The purpose of this article is to explore and analyze the institutional dimensions of the academic entrepreneurship ecosystem. The University of Tehran as one of the top long-standing universities in the country. This university is selected for research as a case study. In order to collect tacit knowledge and information of experts, the 26 experts are interviewed. The study strategy for this research is data theory and the approach of data collection is descriptive-explanatory studies. In this framework, the coding analysis method used for data analysis. The institutional components of the university entrepreneurship ecosystem were identified. Then, using field findings, the model of university entrepreneurship ecosystem with the focus on institutions has been designed and analyzed. Institutions structure human interaction. Institutional structures play an important role in the formation of productive, non-productive and destructive forms of entrepreneurial ecosystem. For this reason, countries with weak institutional structures have unproductive entrepreneurship or, in some cases, destructive entrepreneurship. Hence, institutional change is the main cause of entrepreneurial change. In this way, institutions influence the nature and results of entrepreneurship by setting the rules of the game. The findings of this study identified and classified in three levels: national, industry and organization. The main institutional factors of the academic entrepreneurship ecosystem at these levels are in the national level include: good governmental, political, economic, cultural, judicial and legislative institutions and in the industry level: industry, market institution and facilitating organizations and in the organizational level: management, technology, culture, regulation and finance institution.