Abel Meru

Business Incubation and Business Development in Kenya: an Assessment of the Impact of Business Incubation on Business Development in Kenya Abel Meru

The study was driven by the need to determine the roles of incubator manager, entrepreneur profile,and impact of business environment and that of business incubation process on business development in Kenya especially at the start-up,development and maturity phase. The study used a cross-sectional research design,to solicit information from existing business incubators in Kenya. A random sample of two hundred incubating businesses/entrepreneurs and twelve incubator managers was selected. To test the hypotheses,data was subjected to factor analysis, multiple regression,multivariate analysis of variance and non-parametric tests. Although results from testing hypothesis were expected,it was discernible that the respondent entrepreneurial profile had no significant relationship with the incubation process. It was clear that disparities existed between how respondents rated the importance of business-incubation process with actual services received and surprisingly,they received fewer services than anticipated. As the incubation concept is relatively new,clear macro policy guidelines would be necessary if the full potential of business-incubation is to be exploited to fully benefit the nation.