University spin-offs: entrepreneurship, growth and regional development INTRODUCTION

Over the past years, the role of universities has been faced with important changes that led to substantial attention from both researchers and policy-makers to their third mission, labelled 'a contribution to society', besides the teaching and research missions. University spin-offs (USOs or ASOs, for Academic spin-offs), emerged among the potential means for universities to pursue the third mission. Research on the creation, emergence, development and scaling up of USOs has grown significantly with contributions from multiple subject areas. This special issue contributes to the research debate by presenting novel insights that deepen and enhance our understanding of the dynamics surrounding the entrepreneurial aspects of academic spin-offs, their growth and their mutual relationship with regional development. The special issue provides rigorous qualitative, quantitative and theoretical investigations to form a research agenda which will help guide future research efforts.