2018 Volume 7 Issue 2 Pages 160-166
What roles can university start-ups play in the industrial life cycle? Since prior research on university start-ups has not addressed how their typical characteristics or the technological path dependence of companies contributes to industrialization, we examined the long-term significance of their roles by observing the development of two such start-ups focused on advanced materials—specifically, organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). At present, the industrial structure for OLEDs is shifting as new, aggressive players enter the market and manufacture of OLEDs. Our findings revealed that the university start-ups established diverse cooperative relationships with leading companies with the purpose of investigating opportunities to enter the OLED market and with the results of driving both incremental, sometimes radical innovation and the industrial life cycle in general. The university start-ups were thus highly influential at the turning points of the industrial structure for OLEDs. In the future, researchers should scrutinize the specific management-related issues involved in start-ups for advanced materials at earlier stages that present considerable ambiguity for commercialization, including for the governance structure amid turbulent market conditions.
