Drivers, barriers and success factors of academic spin-offs: a systematic literature review

The considerable economic contribution of academic spin-offs (ASOs) has drawn numerous scholars’ attention to explore the factors that influence their development. The body of literature pertaining to this topic is growing, though the findings remain relatively controversial and fragmented. Existing literature reviews only describe the general phenomenon instead of focusing on precise areas. Therefore, the main objective of this review is to provide a holistic and in-depth exploration of the factors that drive, impede and are critical for the success of ASOs by posing three specific questions: (1) What drives academics to become entrepreneurs? (2) Which barriers must they overcome during the venturing process? (3) Which factors influence the success of ASOs? Following the basic procedure outlined by Tranfield et al. (Br J Manag 14(3):207–222, 2003) for conducting a systematic literature review, this research selected, evaluated, summarised and synthesised 193 relevant articles. The findings indicated that individual factors carried significantly higher explanatory power in relation to the entrepreneurial behaviour of academics. However, the venturing process and the success of ASOs are influenced not only by factors at the micro-level, but also strongly depend on factors at the meso and macro-levels such as relationships with parent organisations and regional contexts. Furthermore, factors that impede the ASO venturing process and factors at the macro-level are still under-researched and deserve further investigation. In addition, this review discusses several potential promising theoretical and practical implications for stakeholders at different levels, which should be helpful to further promote the development of ASOs in the future.