The book shows Michael's 'logical opportunism' in action, and explains how the Smurfit culture and systems provided a world-beating competitive advantage. 'It is up to others to judge how well I have done in life, but I believe that I grasped with both hands the challenge I was given as a young man and, in so doing, I honoured to the best of my ability, the legacy that was left to me by my father. All in all, I can honestly say that it's been a life worth living.' Michael Smurfit Michael's life outside Smurfit - his chairmanship of the Racing Board and of Telecom Eireann; his interest in horseracing; and his ownership of The K Club and the triumph that was the Ryder Cup 2006 - all feature, alongside his love and commitment to his family.

The Way Forward for Entrepreneurship Around the World We are in the midst of a startup revolution. The growth and proliferation of innovation-driven startup activity is profound, unprecedented, and global in scope. Today, it is understood that communities of support and knowledge-sharing go along with other resources. The importance of collaboration and a long-term commitment has gained wider acceptance. These principles are adopted in many startup communities throughout the world. And yet, much more work is needed. Startup activity is highly concentrated in large cities. Governments and other actors such as large corporations and universities are not collaborating with each other nor with entrepreneurs as well as they could. Too often, these actors try to control activity or impose their view from the top-down, rather than supporting an environment that is led from the bottom-up. We continue to see a disconnect between an entrepreneurial mindset and that of many actors who wish to engage with and support entrepreneurship. There are structural reasons for this, but we can overcome many of these obstacles with appropriate focus and sustained practice. No one tells this story better than Brad Feld and Ian Hathaway. The Startup Community Way: Evolving an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem explores what makes startup communities thrive and how to improve collaboration in these rapidly evolving, complex environments. The Startup Community Way is an explanatory guide for startup communities. Rooted in the theory of complex systems, this book establishes the systemic properties of entrepreneurial ecosystems and explains why their complex nature leads people to make predictable mistakes. As complex systems, value creation occurs in startup communities primarily through the interaction of the "parts" - the people, organizations, resources, and conditions involved - not the parts themselves. This continual process of bottom-up interactions unfolds naturally, producing value in novel and unexpected ways. Through these complex, emergent processes, the whole becomes greater and substantially different than what the parts alone could produce. Because of this, participants must take a fundamentally different approach than is common in much of our civic and professional lives. Participants must take a whole-system view, rather than simply trying to optimize their individual part. They must prioritize experimentation and learning over planning and execution. Complex systems are uncertain and unpredictable. They cannot be controlled, only guided and influenced. Each startup community is unique. Replication is enticing but impossible. The race to become "The Next Silicon Valley" is futile - even Silicon Valley couldn't recreate itself. This book: Offers practical advice for entrepreneurs, community builders, government officials, and other stakeholders who want to harness the power of entrepreneurship in their city Describes the core components of startup communities and entrepreneurial ecosystems, as well as an explanation of the differences between these two related, but distinct concepts Advances a new framework for effective startup community building based on the theory of complex systems and insights from systems thinking Includes contributions from leading entrepreneurial voices Is a must-have resource for entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, executives, business and community leaders, economic development authorities, policymakers, university officials, and anyone wishing to understand how startup communities work anywhere in the world

As the world population is expanding and resources are shrinking it creates a challenging environment for people in low income and transitioning economies as well as developed countries. Hence, researchers are proposing different solutions and entrepreneurship is one of them. Academic institutions need to update their study programs and knowledge, modernize the curriculum and integrate research activities in degree programs about entrepreneurship. Economic challenges are getting very difficult to handle for every country and entrepreneurship can play a key role in dealing with these new realities. Aspects of academic entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial education unlock the discussion about the concepts, risks, actions and approaches towards the entrepreneurial university. Academic entrepreneurship focuses on the educated population who are learning and working in the universities and how they can create an entrepreneurial ecosystem so that academia can play forth the role of entrepreneurship after teaching and research. This book will contribute to the knowledge on developing an entrepreneurial ecosystem through academia. The target audience are university teachers, students, and researchers. This book will be appropriate for universities and policy makers to adopt and apply entrepreneurial approaches to develop academic entrepreneurship and an entrepreneurship ecosystem.

This book explores the timely issue of how small businesses, micro firms and entrepreneurs respond to crises. A largely overlooked area of research, the author posits that by better understanding crisis management in small and micro firms, we can help to protect these businesses from the potentially devastating effects of a crisis. Offering guidance for scholars and practitioners, including small business owners, to better understand the concept, limitations and considerations of crisis management, specifically in the small business context, the author demonstrates that there is no single solution for a small business to cope with a crisis. Drawing from the thematic findings, the author offers valuable recommendations on how small business owners can strategically plan for the future and better manage their capability when faced with a crisis.

Entrepreneurship is an extremely important, but little understood, component of the U.S. economy. This book aids that understanding by exploring the challenges and outcomes of the start-up phases of new firms. This is the first detailed, large-scale, longitudinally-based analysis of the entrepreneurial process. Three representative samples of new firms and two representative samples of nascent entrepreneurs (those attempting to start new firms) are used to consider a variety of factors that affect successful completion of the major transitions in the life of new businesses: conception, birth, and early development (survival and growth). Surprisingly, a substantial minority of start-ups become operational new firms. Among the many lessons the authors learn are that although new firm growth appears to reflect many factors, initial size is of special consequence. Not only are many general insights for entrepreneurs revealed, but the authors also pay special attention to the involvement of women and minorities in entrepreneurship and suggest effective government policy for different stages in the entrepreneurial process.

After nearly two decades of market liberalizing reforms in the Americas, small and medium size enterprises (SMEs)--the backbone of capitalization the world over--have expanded and deepened their presence in the region. This book highlights the continuing liberalization measures nations are adopting to facilitate SME creation and growth, the remaining barriers that have not yet been torn down (e.g. business licensing procedures, credit access, work rules) as well as new regulatory and financial impediments that have been threatening SME sector gains during the last decade. Using case studies from Latin America's big emerging markets along with the case of Costa Rica's important laboratory for entrepreneurship, the contributors address the current and prospective outlook for Latin American entrepreneurs and their enterprises in the new global environment.

In this book, leading international scholars provide a timely reconsideration of how and why entrepreneurship matters for economic development, particularly in emerging and developing economies. The book critically dissects the evolving relationship between entrepreneurs and the state.

This book examines intellectual property (IP) as an important value driver for start-ups. Businesses of all sizes are inevitably confronted with intellectual property issues at some point, but start-ups and their collaborators face unique challenges and opportunities in IP management. Identifying, generating, and exploiting intellectual property can lead to sustainable competitive advantages and avoidance of risks. Many start-ups sense the complexity of IP management and therefore place their energy elsewhere. However, the clear conclusion to be drawn from this unique collection of contributions is that putting an IP management strategy in place is critical to the successful development of a business. Prof. Dr. Martin A. Bader and Prof. Dr. Sevim Suzeroglu-Melchiors have years of experience as consultants, entrepreneurs, business owners, and researchers where they saw firsthand the need for a comprehensive yet practical resource for start-ups and their key stakeholders. This book explores different perspectives in dealing with IP from six different angles: the start-up's view, the investor's view, the corporation's view, the university's view, the global IP office's view, and the advisor's view. Each section consists of chapters written by leading experts from around the globe including Silicon Valley, Canada, Israel, Switzerland, Germany, Finland, France, Australia, Brazil, India, Japan, Singapore, and South Africa. Contributors bring practical experience from a wide range of sectors, such as information and communication technology, software, artificial intelligence, machine learning, cybersecurity, industrial automation, internet of things, life sciences, pharma, crop science, biotech, medtech, mining, sustainability, climate tech, and even quantum technologies. This timely publication serves as a guidebook for entrepreneurs and other key stakeholders in the start-up ecosystem. It empowers founders to develop their own IP management strategy to mitigate risk, create and capture value, and lay the groundwork for sustainable growth. An essential reference for start-ups to achieve business excellence. "This edited book volume offers valuable insights, bringing together perspectives of key stakeholder groups from a wide variety of innovation ecosystems - an invaluable resource." -Carsten Fink, Chief Economist, World Intellectual Property Organization, Geneva "A timely book for those wanting a clear overview of the issues the different players encounter in the start-up ecosystem. A useful resource indeed. Congratulations to the editors and team."-Audrey Yap, Managing Partner YUSARN AUDREY LLC, Past President LESI, Chairman Singapore Innovation & Productivity Institute, Singapore "A 'must read' for all innovators in the start-up world. It is truly a fantastic book and one I would recommend being bought and read (in full)!"-Laurence Freeman, Professor (Adjunct), CU Denver Business School, Jake Jabs Center for Entrepreneurship, Denver, Colorado, United States

Elgar Advanced Introductions are stimulating and thoughtful introductions to major fields in the social sciences, business and law, expertly written by the world's leading scholars. Designed to be accessible yet rigorous, they offer concise and lucid surveys of the substantive and policy issues associated with discrete subject areas. Providing a panoramic overview of the evolving world of scenario planning, this Advanced Introduction uses topical case studies to analyze the developing methodologies of scenario planning. Written by Paul J.H. Schoemaker, a leading authority on the topic, this book synthesizes rigorous theory and practical experiences including best practises, normative views, and future challenges or opportunities for scenario planning. Key Features: Explains why future uncertainties require more than traditional risk analysis when ambiguous unknowns or Black Swans are involved Illustrates scenario planning through an in-depth case analysis of the biosciences which, in the wake of global pandemics, are gaining in societal import Examines how historical thinking and historiography can enrich scenarios by revisiting future projections made for South Africa post-apartheid Shows why scenario planning fosters critical and creative thinking by overcoming myopic framing, overconfidence and other biases in organizations Examines methodological and statistical techniques in scenario planning, including model building and simulations, and their connections to strategy formulation Interdisciplinary in its approach, this Advanced Introduction will prove invaluable to students and scholars of public policy, business management, and organizational studies. Its tools and practical advice will also be a vital resource to practitioners and policy leaders involved in leading or implementing scenario planning in their organizations.

Elgar Research Agendas outline the future of research in a given area. Leading scholars are given the space to explore their subject in provocative ways, and map out the potential directions of travel. They are relevant but also visionary. This book makes the case for a change in the research agenda on entrepreneurship policy. An exemplary group of authors addresses the agenda for entrepreneurship policy researchers, policy makers and practitioners in the field. A key theme is the importance of context, which is particularly marked where policy transfer is attempted. Themes covered include monitoring and evaluation, policies to promote internationalisation and critical approaches to analysing public policy in the field. The book also presents national cases where relevant policy experience is judged as worthy of wider dissemination. These chapters focus on entrepreneurship policy issues in China, Japan, Russia, South Africa, Sub Saharan Africa and Poland. This book will be required reading for researchers and policy makers alike. A key message to researchers is the need to increase their understanding of the policy process as well as their engagement with policy makers. At the same time policy makers need to increase the use of systematically gathered evidence into the policy making process. Contributors include: N. Arshed, V. Barinova, H. Do, I. Drummond, X. Li, T. Mazwai, I. Mitsui, B. Ndemo, B. Piasecki, J. Potter, A. Rogut, D. Smallbone, D. Storey, M. Xheneti, J. Xu, S. Zemtsov

From Corporate Professional to Passion-Driven Retiree

Mark Goldsmith enjoyed a 35-year career in the cosmetic business, managing household name brands during Madison Avenue’s Mad Men heyday. Looking for new challenges in retirement, Goldsmith took his wife’s suggestion to volunteer for the Principal for a Day program, specifically asking to be sent to the toughest New York City school available—which turned out to be Horizon Academy at the city’s infamous Rikers Island jail.

Goldsmith instantly connected with the men of Rikers, leveraging the skills he’d honed in decades of corporate experience and his strong desire to help. This passion ultimately led to the creation of his not-for-profit organization Getting Out and Staying Out (GOSO), which has helped thousands of young men pursue their goals for their education, employment, and emotional well-being to create a new life for themselves beyond the criminal justice system.

This book brings together research related to sustainability, green, and eco-entrepreneurship to explore what the author describes as cleaner entrepreneurship, which also links to social issues and public policy. Particularly in emerging markets, public policies have encouraged the co-creation of sustainable entrepreneurial activities. It begins by discussing sustainable entrepreneurship in the context of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) and presents global perspectives of entrepreneurship and social consciousness. It then presents a framework describing how sustainable entrepreneurship can address issues such as poverty, access to healthcare, and gender inequality. The book closes by laying out future standpoints of green entrepreneurship and how global-local partnerships will encourage reverse innovation and collective business development projects.

In recent years, university?industry?government interactions have come to the forefront as a method of promoting economic growth in increasingly knowledge-based societies.This ground-breaking new volume evaluates the capacity of the triple helix model to represent the recent evolution of local and national systems of innovation. It analyses both the success of the triple helix as a descriptive and empirical model within internationally competitive technology regions as well as its potential as a prescriptive hypothesis for regional or national systems that wish to expand their innovation processes and industrial development. In addition, it examines the legal, economic, administrative, political and cognitive dimensions employed to configure and study, in practical terms, the series of phenomena contained in the triple helix category. This book will have widespread appeal amongst students and scholars of economics, sociology and business administration who specialise in entrepreneurship and innovation. Policy-makers involved in innovation, industrial development and education as well as private firms and institutional agencies will also find the volume of interest.

This volume explores emerging models, methods and tools in the management of research and development (R&D) in the knowledge era, with a particular focus on the challenges of the emerging technologies. The contributions are organized in five parts. Part I, Managing Emerging Technologies, provides methods and tools to understand the challenges created by the emergence of new technologies. Part II, Technology and Engineering Management Tools and Policies, explores different technology and engineering tools, including topics such as product concept development, design, selection and adoption, using technology roadmaps and bibliometrics. Part III, Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship, explores R&D, knowledge transfer and entrepreneurial education. Part IV, Commercialization of Technological Innovations, explores the development and application of the technology transfer process which allows managers to succeed in commercializing the outcomes of R&D projects. Part V, Managing the Engineering Enterprise, explores the effect economic decision-making, leadership styles, change management and quality management have on an organization's ability to plan and execute initiatives and projects. Research and Development has always played a critical role in the engineering and technology focused industries. In an era of big data and smart applications, knowledge has become a key enabler for R&D. Managing R&D in the knowledge era requires use of key tools and methods. However, emerging technologies pose many challenges and cause uncertainties or discontinuities, which make the task of managing R&D even more difficult. This book will examine these challenges and provide tools and methods to overcome them. Exploring such industries as automotive, healthcare, business intelligence, energy and home appliances, this book is a valuable resource for academics, scholars, professionals and leaders in innovation, R&D, technology, and engineering management.

This groundbreaking work brings together a comprehensive set of scholarly articles that help shape our understanding of the strategies deployed to create and grow new business entities. The editor draws on a broad set of multi-disciplinary contributions to the domain of new venture development from scholars who publish in the fields of economics, entrepreneurship, finance, organization theory and strategic management.

This comprehensive book will ensure your business plan is robust enough to start, run or revitalise any business enterprise.

Whether your goal is raising start-up finance for a new business, requesting venture funding from a corporate parent or directing operational management, "The Definitive Business Plan" will help you deliver the information the decision-makers are really looking for.

Accessible to the newcomer and detailed enough for the experienced planner, the third edition of this international bestseller explains how to tailor a plan for specific readerships and meet specific objectives, helping you to focus your attention on strategic planning as well as on operational controls.

This new edition has been completely updated throughout.

This book explores how a long-term innovation can take place based on historical analyses of the development of reverse osmosis (RO) membrane from the early 1950s to the mid-2010s. The RO membrane is a critical material for desalination that is a key to solve water shortages becoming serious in many places of the world. The authors conducted in-depth field studies as well as analyses of rich archival data to demonstrate how researchers, engineers, managers, entrepreneurs, and policymakers interacted each other for this material innovation to be realized. A series of historical analyses in this book uncovered that initial government supports, strategic niche markets, emergence of breakthrough technology, and company-specific rationales played significant roles for companies to overcome four types of uncertainty, technological, market, competition, and social/organizational ones, and enabled the companies to persistently invest in the development and commercialization of the RO membrane. This book depicts that innovation does not arise on a sudden, but that it is actualized through long lasting process with turns and twists, which is driven by many non-economic rationales beyond economic motives.

The garment industry is one of the world's largest industries, yet there are few sustained examinations of its importance to the global economy and the very vital role that immigrant entrepreneurship has played. Focusing on the garment industry in seven world cities Paris, London, Birmingham, Amsterdam, New York, Miami and Los Angeles this book tackles the complex relationship between the development of immigrant entrepreneurship and the shift to global, post-industrial urban economies. The interconnections among immigrant entrepreneurs, social networks, market conditions and regulatory matters are thoroughly explored in a comparative way. Starting from the idea that general social, economic and political processes manifest themselves in ever changing, historically specific shapes, the contributors offer intriguing insights into the dynamics of entrepreneurial management against the backdrop of such processes as: the differential spatial impact of economic restructuring; the significance of governance at various levels; and the conditional use of social capital. With contributions from leading experts in the field, this is a must for those wishing to supplement their knowledge in globalization, labour, economics, immigration and the garment industry broadly speaking.

This open access book is an outcome of the EU's Horizon 2020 project 'Financial and Institutional Reforms for an Entrepreneurial Society' (FIRES). Building on historical, economic and legal analysis, and combining methods and data across disciplines, the authors provide policymakers, stakeholders and scholars with valuable new tools for assessing and improving Europe's entrepreneurial ecosystems. Then experts from Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom discuss tailored strategies for introducing entrepreneurial policy reforms in their respective countries.

The scope of this volume is primarily to analyze from different methodological perspectives similar valuation and optimization problems arising in financial applications, aimed at facilitating a theoretical and computational integration between methods largely regarded as alternatives. Increasingly in recent years, financial management problems such as strategic asset allocation, asset-liability management, as well as asset pricing problems, have been presented in the literature adopting formulation and solution approaches rooted in stochastic programming, robust optimization, stochastic dynamic programming (including approximate SDP) methods, as well as policy rule optimization, heuristic approaches and others. The aim of the volume is to facilitate the comprehension of the modeling and methodological potentials of those methods, thus their common assumptions and peculiarities, relying on similar financial problems. The volume will address different valuation problems common in finance related to: asset pricing, optimal portfolio management, risk measurement, risk control and asset-liability management.The volume features chapters of theoretical and practical relevance clarifying recent advances in the associated applied field from different standpoints, relying on similar valuation problems and, as mentioned, facilitating a mutual and beneficial methodological and theoretical knowledge transfer. The distinctive aspects of the volume can be summarized as follows: Strong benchmarking philosophy, with contributors explicitly asked to underline current limits and desirable developments in their areas. Theoretical contributions, aimed at advancing the state-of-the-art in the given domain with a clear potential for applications The inclusion of an algorithmic-computational discussion of issues arising on similar valuation problems across different methods. Variety of applications: rarely is it possible within a single volume to consider and analyze different, and possibly competing, alternative optimization techniques applied to well-identified financial valuation problems. Clear definition of the current state-of-the-art in each methodological and applied area to facilitate future research directions.