Date: 26^th April, 2019

Time: 12:00-13:00 p.m.

Venue:Room 1102, The Administration Building, Zhejiang University

【Speaker Introduction】:Nick Vonortas is Professor of Economics and International Affairs at The George Washington University in Washington D.C. He is a faculty member of the Department of Economics, of the Institute for International Science and Technology Policy, and of the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration. He has served for several years as the director of both the IISTP and of the graduate program in International Science and Technology Policy. He is now the director of Ph.D. Candidacy (Unit II) of the Department of Economics. Professor Vonortas is editor of the peer-reviewed journal Science and Public Policy. He holds a Ph.D. and M.Phil. in Economics from New York University (USA), a MA in Economic Development from Leicester University (UK), and a BA in Economics from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Greece).

【Seminar Abstract】：The dominant discourse on Entrepreneurial Ecosystems remains focused on the profile of a handful of successful locations. This has hindered a deeper understanding of the socio-economic mechanisms that shape entrepreneurial activity across different locations and how ecosystems operate in distinct places. Our dual goal in this research is to identify latent hierarchies in the critical dimensions of entrepreneurial ecosystems and to assess whether the configurations of successful ecosystems present dissimilarities. Through fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) we address this issue with data from the State of São Paulo, Brazil. Findings generate a typological hierarchy of attributes. Knowledge Infrastructure rises as the key element in our analysis while the range of critical dimensions seem to be much more restricted than previously argued. Besides universities as catalysts, support systems/entrepreneurial habitats and human capital to fill knowledge-intensive jobs are the key components. A second layer is made up of policy quality, physical infrastructure, income level and credit availability. Somewhat different configurations emerge with similarly successful outcomes. Our results suggest that one-size-fits-all models may fail to fathom local idiosyncrasies, possibly providing misguided directions for intervention in specific occasions.