Professor Linda Edelman studies entrepreneurship with a particular focus on new ventures and on women. She is involved in a number of projects that look at new ventures, specifically reviewing the angel investment literature, exploring angel investing using a signaling theory lens, and looking at student entrepreneurship through the GUESSS dataset. She also conducts research on women’s entrepreneurship. In two recent book chapters, she explores the readiness for early stage investment in firms with women-led entrepreneurial top management teams and the readiness for early stage angel funding in firms with gender-diverse top management teams. She is also interested in change processes in new ventures, specifically exploring the antecedents of change in young, high-growth firms.

Professor Fred Ledley is Director of the Center for Integration of Science and Industry, which focuses on understanding the path by which scientific discoveries and inventions are translated into public value, and how this translation may be accelerated. The Center’s interdisciplinary research teams integrate the perspectives of science and business to construct analytical models of the relationship between scientific advances, the success of products and companies based on this science, and value creation. Initial publications in Nature Biotechnology and elsewhere describe an analytical model for the maturation of biotechnologies, and show that product development and investment is often asynchronous with metrics of technology maturation. While investments in nascent stage technologies may provide positive, near-term returns, research shows that these investments are often overvalued, and rarely lead to successful products or long term capital growth. Analytical models of technology maturation could inform business strategies, investment, and public policy and increase the efficiency of translational science.

Professor Tatiana Manolova’s work explores the competitive strategies of new and small firms, particularly in the context of emerging economies. Her recent paper “Are pure or hybrid strategies right for new ventures in transition economies?” co-authored with I. Manev and J. Harkins (University of Maine) and B. Gyoshev (IBS, Bulgaria) proposes that new ventures in transition economies need to move toward the productivity frontier, or “catch up” with capable industry competitors, making the intensity of strategic commitment an important factor in explaining new venture performance. In the movement toward the productivity frontier, a hybrid strategy, or a combination of low cost and differentiation positioning, is most likely to maximize performance. The study was nominated for Best Paper award at the Strategic Management Society annual conference and is forthcoming in the International Small Business Journal.