Technological entrepreneurial intent in a geographically isolated environment: The case of the Canary Islands

The level of technology entrepreneurship in a geographic region is an indicator and input to the creation of wealth and prosperity, via the creation of new jobs, business opportunities, and technological value add. Underlying cultural factors, personality traits, and economic incentives and barriers can all have an impact on entrepreneurial intent and thus influence the growth of the technology-based economy and prosperity of a region. A follow-on study to prior work in this area in the U.S. is focused on the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago off the Northwest coast of mainland Africa comprised of seven islands and approximately two million inhabitants. Due to their geographical characteristics, they are considered a geographically isolated region by definition given by the European Commission. This isolation causes a territorial, social and cultural exclusion phenomena. Despite having two large Universities with a high population of graduates in business, science and technology disciplines, the rate of technology-based business start-ups continues to remain very low. This study provides an initial assessment of the technological entrepreneurial intent of Canarian university students using the ACE (Accelerating Collegiate Entrepreneurship) model as a baseline tool to understand the potential relationship between cultural factors and this low intent.