Article
Innovation - Driven Academic Ecosystems and Entrepreneurial Competency: An Empirical Investigation
The transformation of higher education institutions into innovation-driven academic ecosystems has played a significant role in shaping entrepreneurial competency among students and graduates. Innovation-oriented academic environments, characterized by dynamic learning frameworks, institutional support mechanisms, and practical engagement opportunities, foster the development of critical entrepreneurial skills such as opportunity recognition, creativity, and strategic decision-making. A quantitative approach was employed to examine the relationship between key dimensions of academic ecosystems - namely innovation exposure, institutional support, and experiential learning and entrepreneurial competency. The analysis incorporated descriptive assessment, reliability evaluation, and inferential techniques, including correlation and multiple regression, to establish the strength and direction of these relationships. The findings indicate that all three dimensions exert a positive and statistically significant influence on entrepreneurial competency. Among these, experiential learning emerges as the most influential factor, highlighting the importance of hands-on engagement and real-world application in enhancing entrepreneurial capabilities. Innovation exposure contributes to cognitive flexibility and opportunity identification, while institutional support provides an enabling environment for skill development and entrepreneurial orientation. These insights contribute to the broader discourse on entrepreneurial ecosystems by offering empirical evidence of the critical role played by academic institutions in fostering innovation and entrepreneurial capacity. The implications extend to higher education policy and curriculum design, emphasizing the need to integrate experiential and innovation-driven approaches within academic frameworks to strengthen entrepreneurial outcomes.