The Marketing Science Interface: promoting the Entrepreneurship Agenda within the Science, Engineering and Technology (set) Constituency of Higher Education

Abstract

University based entrepreneurship in the UK is of increasing interest to both policy makers and university managers; evidenced by government sponsored initiatives such as the Science Enterprise Challenge, (SEC) in the UK – promoting entrepreneurship within higher education and the more recent development of the National Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship, (NCGE). However, while the idea of the “entrepreneurial University” has begun to find support within a small number of constituencies the literature suggests that there are still a considerable number of barriers to the promotion of entrepreneurship within universities, in the UK, as well as across the EU and indeed the US, (Morrison 2004, Bok 2003, Etzkowitz 2003, Clarke 1998, 2003). While there is a growing agreement about the need for UK universities to become more entrepreneurial, a crucial question it seems is how might this be done effectively? (Gibb 2000). In this paper, using a case study approach, the authors seek to provide an answer to this question.