MIOIR Seminar Series - Corporate Strategy Externalities and Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Emergence
| Dates: | 10 March 2026 |
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| Times: | 15:30 - 16:30 |
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| What is it: | Seminar |
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| Organiser: | Alliance Manchester Business School |
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| Who is it for: | University staff, External researchers, Alumni, Current University students |
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| Speaker: | Professor Maryann Feldman |
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Corporate Strategy Externalities and Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Emergence
Abstract: This study advances entrepreneurial ecosystem theory by repositioning incumbent firms as dynamic, endogenous actors whose strategies shape ecosystem trajectories over time. By conceptualizing corporate strategy externalities as a form of external enablement, we link micro-level corporate decisions to macro-level patterns of ecosystem emergence and demonstrate how ecosystems co-evolve with incumbent firm strategies rather than arise solely from policy design or decentralized entrepreneurial action. We examine these mechanisms through a longitudinal mixed-methods case study of GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and its antecedents in the Research Triangle region of North Carolina from 1990 to 2012, a period marked by major corporate restructurings and rapid ecosystem development. Combining an original firm–founder database with archival materials and interviews, we trace three waves of entrepreneurial spawning associated with distinct strategic shifts at the incumbent firm. The findings show that GSK’s strategies—implemented to advance firm-level objectives—generated externalities that unintentionally reconfigured regional opportunity structures, catalyzed productive entrepreneurship, and contributed to the emergence and deepening of the regional entrepreneurial ecosystem.
The paper is co-authored with Paige Clayton (Georgia Institute of Technology).
Speaker Bio:
Maryann P. Feldman is the Watts Professor of Public Policy and Management at the Watts College of Public Service and Community Solutions at Arizona State University and research director at the Global Center for Technology Transfer.Professor Feldman chairs the Policy Forum of the Science, Technology and Economic Policy Board of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, where she also chairs a congressional mandated assessment of the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program. She is a senior fellow at Heartland Forward, a nonpartisan “think and do tank” focused on improving economic performance. Feldman serves on the advisory board of the Canadian Institute for Advance Research (CIFAR) global program on Innovation, Equity and the Future of Prosperity. She is a board member of the Ontario Brain Institute. Feldman is an editor of the journal Research Policy, the leading journal in the field of innovation studies. Professor Feldman was a winner of the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research for her contributions to the study of the geography of innovation, the commercialization of university research and the role of entrepreneurial activity in the formation of regional industry clusters. Feldman is a prolific and highly cited author. She received the Distinguished Scholar award from the Technology and Innovation Management division of the Academy of Management. Her recent research focuses on place-based economic development and the factors that promote economic restructuring and resilience.
Seminar Details:
The Manchester Institute of Innovation Research runs a series of regular seminars given by visiting speakers to Manchester. These seminars are open to anybody who is interested in science, technology and innovation policy and management.
Refreshments will be available for networking from 3:15 pm, before the seminar.
We encourage AMBS and UoM staff and students to join us in person. An online option will be available via Microsoft Teams Online (see below). Please feel free to share this invitation with your networks.
Speaker
Professor Maryann Feldman
Role: Watts Professor of Public Policy and Management
Organisation: Watts College of Public Service and Community Solutions at Arizona State University
Travel and Contact Information
Find event
9.041 AMBS (Hybrid)
Aliiance Manchester Business School
Booth Street West
Manchester
