In a forthcoming article in the Journal of Business Venturing, EMAC researchers Kolympiris, Kalaitzandonakes and Miller examine where university-employed scientists start their firms.

The authors find that proximity to venture capital firms and key research infrastructure, such as medical schools, may help to attract new firms and create entrepreneurial environments that can boost local employment and encourage economic growth at large.

Nevertheless, the personal characteristics of academic entrepreneurs dominate the choice of location. For instance, academic entrepreneurs at later stages of their career are considerably more likely to start their firm away from their academic homes. These findings, therefore, suggest that a deeper understanding of the location choice of firms spawned by universities may require more attention to the characteristics and incentives of the academic entrepreneurs that establish them.

In the recently published “The Size and Distribution of the Benefits from the Adoption of Biotech Soybean Varieties” EMAC researchers and collaborators from WAEES and the University of California Davis, measured the global economic impacts of herbicide tolerant soybeans in their first 15 years of adoption. Their analysis finds economic benefits amounting to a total of about US$46 billion. These include benefits to consumers and producers all over the world (86% of total) as well as benefits to the innovator (14%).  (more…)

“Genetically modified (GM) crops, foods, ingredients, and feeds produced from them have been very much in the news. In the United States, voters have gone to the polls in California and Washington to reject initiatives that would have required mandatory warning labels on foods containing even traces of GM crop-derived materials. Connecticut passed a GM labeling bill that will not take effect until five other states adopt similar legislation; such legislative actions are pending in about 20 other states.”

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“It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove.”

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