Designing a Knowledge-Intensive Entrepreneurship (KIE) Model: A Case Study of the Academic Center for Education, Culture and Research (ACECR)
Keywords:
knowledge, based economy, intensive entrepreneurship, knowledge spillover theoryAbstract
Knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship is an ecosystemic approach aimed at creating, developing, distributing, and applying knowledge resources among various environmental actors. This approach emphasizes open knowledge structures and seeks to establish a generative source of learning, innovation, and socioeconomic dynamism. Accordingly, the implementation of such an approach in research-oriented organizations requires a model capable of explaining the institutional, cognitive, environmental, and knowledge-dissemination ecosystem mechanisms. The aim of this study was to design a knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship (KIE) model for the Academic Center for Education, Culture and Research (ACECR). Data were collected through interviews with 12 academic and organizational experts. The methodological approach of the study was qualitative, and thematic analysis was employed. The findings comprised 129 basic themes, 41 organizing themes, and 6 overarching themes, including ontological manifestation, governance reference-building in knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship, contingent cognitive mapping of knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship capacities, phenomenological environmentalism of the knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship chain, the strategic ecosystem of the knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship chain, and the realization of the higher-order goals of knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship. Based on the findings, it can be stated that the originality of the proposed model lies in redefining knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship as an institutional logic for enabling the flow of knowledge generated within ACECR. This logic regards knowledge as the foundation for shaping governance actions, capacity building, environmental interaction, and developmental value creation. Accordingly, the research model indicates that ACECR can, beyond its research-oriented mission, become a reference-setting, connective, and transformative institution within the knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship ecosystem and, through knowledge spillovers, contribute to solving national problems, strengthening knowledge-based self-reliance, and sustaining socioeconomic value creation.
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