Young Dreamers: An Explorative Study on How Techno-Starters Look to the Future

Many innovations do not originate from large companies, but are initiated by a subset of small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) known as techno-starters. These techno-starters are often located in the vicinity of universities and established by students, recent graduates and/or former employees (including PhDs) of those universities, who try to turn their academic knowledge into a viable business. From personal experience we know that the decision of originators of these entrepreneurs to start their own company (instead of joining a large organization) often is an intentional and wellconsidered choice. Most techno-starters fear that working for a large company will limit their creativity and their freedom to explore their entrepreneurial mindset. Indeed, it can be assumed that Abstract