OB3 Research was commissioned by the Welsh Government to undertake an evaluation of its membership of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Industrial Liaison Program (MIT-ILP) over a five-year period between 2019 and 2024.
The Welsh Government wanted to review whether it had secured value for money from its investment over the last five years to the program and to make a decision about its continued involvement with MIT-ILP, particularly in light of the current challenging fiscal environment.
The aim of the evaluation was to explore the impacts for Wales of participating in the MIT-ILP. This included the impact to participating Welsh businesses and the wider impacts observed by entrepreneurship ecosystem stakeholders.
It was expected that the evaluation considered:
awareness of the MIT-ILP and motivation for participating
nature of participation
value and impacts of participation, including difference made to:
o leadership development and cultural change
o business innovation (intrapreneurship) and validation
o business sustainability and/or growth.
The evaluation, which was undertaken between November 2023 and February 2024, adopted a mixed-method approach to include a desk review, an on-line survey and in-depth interviews with delegates from the business community and wider entrepreneurial ecosystem.
