This track continues the discussion on Entrepreneurial Support Organizations (ESOs), initiated at the Seville, Stockholm and Pisa R&D Management Conferences, by analyzing the dynamics and relationships of entrepreneurs and startups within entrepreneurial ecosystems. It pays particular attention to ESOs, such as accelerators, incubators, academic spin-offs, and other mechanisms and actors that foster startup innovation and success (Bergman and McMullen; 2022), and act as enablers of entrepreneurial development and growth within modern ecosystems (Assenova and Amit; 2024; Theodoraki et al., 2022).

Indeed, open innovation literature highlights how startups’ collaborations with other actors within entrepreneurial ecosystems can enhance their performance. Moreover, cross-industry innovation extends innovation opportunities by bridging industry boundaries, and transferring specific knowledge, established technologies, existing solutions or business models from other industries (Carmona-Lavado et al., 2023), thereby enhancing startups’ potential for growth and development. In this context, entrepreneurial ecosystem represents very favorable supportive environment that promote the interaction among various mechanisms and actors, fostering startup innovation (Spigel, 2017). In particular, ESOs provide ideal settings for startups to access resources, knowledge and networks, representing a valuable tool for economic development practitioners and ecosystem champions seeking to grow local start-ups (Clayton, 2024).

Despite the significant efforts in both academic and policy discussions, many unanswered questions remain, and several research streams emerged over the past few years. Recently, Stam et al. (2025) opened these black boxes, identifying six different themes -configuration of elements, social interactions, outcomes, evolution, boundaries, and measurement- yet emphasized that further development and refinement are still required. Research on entrepreneurial ecosystems continues to lag behind conceptual advances, largely due to a limited understanding of their dynamic interactions. Specifically, it is necessary to conceptualize entrepreneurial ecosystems as complex systems characterized by evolving processes, numerous actor interactions, and interdependencies among activities (Abootorabi et al., 2021; Mazzoni et al., 2025). We claim that ESOs play a key role in those processes and interactions, and that they deserve further exploration.

We invite the submission of both theoretical and empirical papers whose topics or areas of interest include, but are not limited to:
- How ESOs (accelerators, incubators, venture builders, etc.) operate and their design.
- How local ESOs promote regional development.
- How dynamic interactions and interdependencies among different actors in entrepreneurial ecosystems unfold.
- How entrepreneurial ecosystems’ structure can support startups’ development and growth.
- How startups foster knowledge spillovers within entrepreneurial ecosystems.
- How ESOs and entrepreneurial ecosystem evolve.
- How entrepreneurial ecosystems promote the emergence and adoption of sustainable innovations.
- How different policy frameworks for entrepreneurial ecosystems provide support mechanisms for innovation generation and/or adoption.

More generally, this track welcomes contributions that will analyze the dynamics of ESOs, and could help policies to improve entrepreneurial ecosystems and foster sustainable development.