M Nurullah Gulec

Employee spinoffs—firms founded by former employees of established companies—consistently outperform unrelated entrants. This study investigates the underlying drivers of this advantage, with a focus on the inheritance of critical customer and supplier knowledge from parent firms. Using comprehensive administrative data on Turkish firms from 2006 to 2020, including firm-to-firm transaction records and matched employer-employee data, we show that inherited value chain knowledge plays a crucial role in spinoffs' superior performance. This inherited social capital explains over half of the observed performance gap, with a one-standard-deviation increase in inherited connections linked to a 20% rise in real sales. By identifying this key mechanism for entrepreneurial success, our research deepens the understanding of how prior employment and firm-specific knowledge create enduring advantages for new ventures, advancing both entrepreneurship theory and practice.

This paper analyzes labor mobility as a mechanism for knowledge transfer in Turkey's R&D ecosystem. Using a unique dataset combining firm-level, labor, and subsidy data, we examine how researchers moving between firms impact innovation and productivity. We leverage government R&D personnel subsidies to track the movement of skilled researchers across firms. Our empirical analysis identifies knowledge spillovers, demonstrating how researcher mobility benefits recipient firms by enhancing innovation and economic performance. By employing causal identification through exogenous shocks, we provide insights into the broader effects of R&D policies on knowledge diffusion and market efficiency.