The Psychological Ownership of Entrepreneurial Academic:

A Case Study of Two Exits for Academic Ventures

Abstract

In this paper, we examine the concept of entrepreneurial academic, from the perspective of psychological ownership. The previous study fails to grasp the important aspects of academic venturesʼ two exits─for companies and for the entrepreneursʼ careers. We investigate the following two elements by utilizing an in-depth comparative study: 1) how entrepreneurial academics set up and change their roles, and 2) how their psychological ownership affects the relationship between entrepreneurial academics and stakeholders in the constantly changing high-tech venture environment. The results of case study show that the two exits have a particular tendency of path dependency in their development process.