Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at
https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=ctas20
Technology Analysis & Strategic Management
ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ctas20
What it takes to make it: profile and characteristics
of DIY bio laboratory founders
Weimu You, Mira Valkjärvi & George Ofosu
To cite this article: Weimu You, Mira Valkjärvi & George Ofosu (2021): What it takes to make
it: profile and characteristics of DIY bio laboratory founders, Technology Analysis & Strategic
Management, DOI: 10.1080/09537325.2021.1937978
To link to this article:  https://doi.org/10.1080/09537325.2021.1937978
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa
UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis
Group
Published online: 13 Jun 2021.
Submit your article to this journal 
Article views: 100
View related articles 
View Crossmark data
What it takes to make it: profile and characteristics of DIY bio
laboratory founders
Weimu You a, Mira Valkjärvi b and George Ofosuc
aBrunel Business School, Brunel University London, Uxbridge, UK; bManagement and Organisation, Turku School of
Economics, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; cDepartment of Geography, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen,
Giessen, Germany
ABSTRACT
As important antecedents of the emerging DIY laboratory movement, the
aspects of profiles and characteristics of those pioneers who establish DIY
laboratories have remained under-researched in extant literature. In order
to address this issue and explore common profiles and characteristics of
DIY laboratory founders, by employing content analysis, this paper
analyses secondary data on 23 founders/co-founders of eight DIY bio
laboratories that are publicly available (DIYbio.org). The results reveal
that a common profile of a DIY bio laboratory founder is someone most
likely to be highly educated (often times PhD), with experience and
expertise in the field of science and has strong ideological beliefs.
Additionally, the founders/co-founders have characteristics of
entrepreneurship, research, ideology and community that strongly
advocate for open source sharing of scientific information and for the
democratisation of science.
ARTICLE HISTORY
Received 2 January 2021
Revised 20 May 2021
Accepted 28 May 2021
KEYWORDS
DIY laboratory; founder;
characteristics; common
profile
1. Introduction
Running on an ethos of autonomy and innovation, DIY laboratories, also referred to as ‘citizen lab-
oratories’ are independent community-based science research centres that seek to promote colla-
borative and creative experiments (Seyfried, Pei, and Schmidt 2014). These laboratories do not
only challenge the near monopoly of traditional academic settings as the prime locus for practical
science, but also provide spaces for science enthusiasts and novices to meet in order to discuss
and share knowledge on emerging scientific trajectories (Halfacree 2004; Nascimento, Pereira, and
Ghezzi 2014). Since the formation of DIYbio.org in Boston in 2008, the global movement of DIY lab-
oratories has helped to facilitate the creation of many community-based science hubs in cities,
towns, and villages around the world. In this vein, and given the importance of DIY laboratories,
various aspects of the DIY laboratory movement have been studied by researchers and scholars,
and six related themes have been the main focus of academic work on DIY laboratories to date.
These six themes include: the historical antecedents of DIY laboratories (e.g. Curry 2014), its materi-
ality (e.g. Delgado 2013), identity (e.g. Meyer 2016), ethics (e.g. Eggleson 2014), politics (e.g. Delfanti
2013), and economics (e.g. Delfanti and Söderberg 2015). However, as important antecedents of the
DIY laboratory movement, common profiles and characteristics of those pioneers who established
DIY laboratories remain under-researched. In order to help facilitate the establishment and
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the
original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
CONTACT Mira Valkjärvi mira.h.valkjarvi@utu.fi Management and Organisation, Turku School of Economics, University of
Turku, Rehtorinpellonkatu 3, Turku 20500, Finland
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT
https://doi.org/10.1080/09537325.2021.1937978
governance of DIY laboratories worldwide, it is important to explore a sampling of cases involving
DIY bio laboratory founders, their profiles and characteristics. Thus, this study attempts to fill this
research gap and respond to the call by Sarpong and Liedong (2020) by investigating the following
research question:What are the profiles and characteristics of founders that establish DIY laboratories?
Research into innovative new firms and their founding teams revealed that the composition of a
team has a positive correlation with the performance of the firm (Saemundsson and Candi 2014).
Thus, understanding the types of founders that DIY laboratories have can be beneficial to under-
stand the performance of DIY laboratories in further research. Once an understanding of the
types of people that found DIY laboratories is formed, all parties of the Triple Helix model (i.e. gov-
ernment, business, and university) can then help these founders to facilitate the innovations and
new businesses these DIY laboratories aim to develop (You et al. 2020).
This paper is structured as follows: Section 2 reviews extant literature on DIY laboratories, the
people involved in DIY laboratories, as well as common characteristics of founders. Section 3
reports the research method adopted in this study. Section 4 presents the results of this research,
whilst Section 5 critically discusses the research findings in relation to previous literature. Finally,
Section 6 acknowledges limitations of the research, suggests research avenues for future studies,
and highlights the theoretical as well as managerial implications.
2. Literature review
In this section, two streams of extant literature that are central to the research question will be
reviewed, namely DIY laboratories and the people involved, as well as common characteristics of
founders.
2.1. DIY laboratories and the people involved
DIY laboratories are community hub independent laboratories, where basic to advanced exper-
iments are conducted with new scientific technologies in private settings (Sarpong and Rawal
2020). Originally aimed at spreading biotechnology usage, DIY laboratories have now gone
beyond the borders of industrial and academic institutions and are open to the public (Sarpong
et al. 2020). By definition, DIY laboratory is termed as
a place, set up by interested person(s) or group, equipped for scientific experiments, research, or teaching in
which numerous private and community-based initiatives use scientific methods alongside other forms of
inquiry such as hacking and remixing to engage with techno-scientific concerns and societal challenges. (You
et al. 2020, 5)
Some researchers have made connections between DIY laboratories and innovation communities,
stating that they share common features in the form of sharing resources to create new innovative
ideas (Akman, Plewa, and Conduit 2019). The projects undertaken in DIY laboratories are often
described by participants as educational, exploratory, developmental or entrepreneurial, to name
but a few (Grushkin, Kuiken, and Millet 2013).
Further, regarding the participants in DIY laboratories, Charisius, Friebe, and Karberg (2013, 23) as
cited in Meyer and Vergnaud (2020) suggest that there are nerds, entrepreneurs, hackers, and pro-
fessional scientists involved. Similarly, Trojok (2016) as cited in Meyer and Vergnaud (2020) finds that
there are natural scientists, engineers, artists, and philosophers involved in DIY laboratories, while
most of them hold university degrees. In a larger-scaled study, Woodrow Wilson International
Centre for Scholars carried out a survey involving over 350 participants in activities of DIY labora-
tories in 2013, and the results revealed that the participants in DIY laboratories are typically well-edu-
cated; they work 7 h per week on their projects averagely; besides their engagement in DIY
laboratories, more than half of them are fully employed; and about a quarter of them are students.
Additionally, about two thirds of the participants are between 25 and 45 years old, and 75% of them
2 W. YOU ET AL.
are male (Grushkin, Kuiken, and Millet 2013). In a similar vein, a smaller survey with 48 responses con-
ducted at two biohacker events in Amsterdam and Berlin suggest very comparable results: 69% of
the participants in DIY laboratories are male; 60% of them are between 25 and 40 years old, and most
of them hold academic degrees (Schulz 2016). Yet it is important to note that these studies discuss
participants of DIY laboratories or DIYers, which may include those that have founded the labs, work
in the labs and those that are the target audience.
2.2. Common characteristics of founders
In entrepreneurship literature, typical characteristics of founders have been extensively researched,
with a focus on specific factors such as age, educational background, and personal traits, etc. For
instance, Ronstadt (1983) studied the correlation of a founder’s age with his/her initiation into entre-
preneurial activity and found that more entrepreneurs start their entrepreneurial careers between
the ages of 25 and 55. With empirical evidence from different countries, extant literature (e.g.
Sayigh 1962; Alexander 1964; Carroll 1965) suggest that successful entrepreneurs typically have a
higher level of education than the general public. Furthermore, Hisrich and Peters (1995) identified
certain areas of technical and industry experience as an essential condition for the emergence of
entrepreneurship, particularly in the field of manufacturing.
As for personal traits, Schumpeter (1967) indicated that the most distinguishing characteristic of
an entrepreneur is his/her innovative nature. While innovations are often surrounded by a veil of
mystery and criticised for being considered as solutions for everything and always positive (Joly
2019), this research does not focus on the nature of innovations but the people behind them.
This research looks at innovations from the perspective of the individuals and their ability to be crea-
tive, come up with ideas or solutions, and take these further as their innovative nature. In a more
recent study, Nair and Pandey (2006) confirmed that the economic status of the family, age, technical
education/training as well as work experience in a similar or related field seem to favour entrepre-
neurship. Furthermore, in comparison to the rest of the population, entrepreneurs tend to be more
innovative in their attitude (Nair and Pandey 2006). Yet these characteristics are for a so-called typical
entrepreneur and while those entrepreneurs in innovative new technology start-ups could be poss-
ibly closely related to DIY laboratories, the theoretical differences in ideology require a closer inves-
tigation into specific characteristics of DIY laboratory founders. Specifically, the difference in aims is
important to note here, that the aims of traditional start-ups and new technology start-ups are
similar in the pursuit of a profit seeking venture, yet DIY laboratories differ from this perspective
as they rather aim for knowledge sharing while the role of profit-making is not at the centre of
their pursuit.
Considering the reviewed streams of extant literature, this research specifically focuses on those
individuals that took part in founding the DIY laboratory communities, with the hope to potentially
opens up a rich research realm in understanding this type of bio-technology entrepreneurship.
3. Methodology
As DIY biology and bioengineering laboratories represent the most prominent type of DIY labora-
tories and have received the most academic attention, this study exclusively focuses on DIY
biology laboratories as an example of DIY laboratories. Among DIY biology laboratories, DIYbio.org
is undoubtedly one of the most well-known communities and a part of the original vein of the move-
ment. Thus, the researchers direct their attention to the DIY laboratories that are related to the DIY-
bio.org community. In the empirical research, the researchers followed a step-by-step sampling
process to identify and select the specific DIY laboratories to be examined. A flowchart that illustrates
the selection process of the DIY laboratories is presented in Figure 1.
First, by analysing archival data on DIYbio.org, the researchers manually identified 110 DIYbio
groups, which are associations of people (online and offline) that are interested in DIYbio
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 3
(DIYbio.org 2021). As not all of these 110 DIYbio groups have actual laboratories, namely dedicated
physical spaces, whether static or mobile, with materials and equipment, the researchers filtered
these groups by only including such groups that have laboratories. This process has eliminated
some DIYbio groups without laboratories and identified 56 DIYbio laboratories in total. A list of
the 56 identified DIYbio laboratories can be seen below in Table 1.
Next, the researchers manually explored the websites of the 56 DIYbio laboratories and excluded
19 cases based on the criterion of the lack of a website. Continuing from this, the next selection cri-
terion was whether the website provided information of the founders of the lab, this then reduced
the amount of possible cases to 20. The final criterion to choose the cases was to include those still
operational, that provided enough information of the founders and were in English. Based on this,
we identified eight laboratories that are currently active and provide sufficient information of the
founder/co-founders on their official websites in the English language.
Lastly, the researchers supplemented the selected DIY bio laboratory founders/co-founders’
profiles on the websites by external information gathered from various sources, such as news
articles, personal websites, online interviews, blog posts, personal LinkedIn and ORCID profiles
etc., by manually searching for information about the founder/co-founders. When there is a
sufficient supply of information across platforms, secondary data have been established as a valid
source of main data (Ranta et al. 2018; Ritala, Golnam, and Wegmann 2014). Specifically, in the
domain of DIY laboratory research, You et al. (2020) studied the business model of three types of
DIY laboratories using solely secondary data. Furthermore, data triangulation can be increased
when an extensive set of data from various data sources has been used (Ranta et al. 2018). Addition-
ally, the use of online discourse as a source of data for this research was appropriately chosen as a
means to understand the common characteristics of founders as well as the typical narratives they
themselves see as valid, and a similar approach was adapted in a study conducted on the develop-
ment of the DIY movement by Meyer and Vergnaud (2020). Profiles of founder/co-founders of the
eight selected DIY bio laboratories are demonstrated below in Table 2.
Figure 1. Selection process of the DIY laboratories.
4 W. YOU ET AL.
The data collected from various sources was saved in the form of text documents, which formed a
data set for the researchers to perform the analysis. Based on the literature reviewed, a thematic
analysis was conducted by coding the materials in accordance with the identified features of foun-
ders/co-founders and allowing for new themes to emerge from the materials. These themes along
Table 1. Identified DIYbio laboratories.
DIY laboratory Year of establishment Location
[kat]alab Vienna 2017 Vienna, Austria
(Art)ScienceBLR Unknown Bangalore, India
BioArt Laboratories 2012 Eindhoven, Netherlands
BioFoundry 2014 Alexandria, New South Wales, Australia
BioBlaze Community Bio Lab 2017 South Elgin, Illinois, USA
BioCurious 2010 Santa Clara, California, USA
Biodidact 2014 Los Alamos, New Mexico, USA
Biologigaragen 2010 Copenhagen, Denmark
Biologik Labs 2013 Norfolk, Virginia, USA
Biomakers Lab Peru 2014 Lima, Peru
BioNyfiken 2014 Stockholm, Sweden
Bioscope 2014 Geneva, Switzerland
Biotech Without Borders 2017 Brooklyn, New York, USA
BioTehna 2013 Ljubljana, Slovenia
Biotown 2017 Ottawa, Canada
BosLab 2014 Somerville, Massachusetts, USA
Bricobio 2013 Montreal, Canada
Brmlab Unknown Prague, Czech Republic
Bugss 2013 Baltimore, Maryland, USA
BuiQuisitive 2015 Brunswick, Victoria, Australia
Capital Area Biospace Unknown Reston, Virginia, USA
Charlottesville Open Bio Labs 2015 Charlottesville, Virginia, USA
ChiTownBio 2017 Chicago, Illinois, USA
Counter Culture Labs 2013 Oakland, California, USA
Denver Biolabs 2015 Denver, Colorado, USA
DIY Bio Barcelona 2014 Barcelona, Spain
DIYbio Toronto 2013 Toronto, Canada
DIYbioTech 2013 Longwood, Florida, USA
F.lab Unknown Bankok, Thailand
Forma Labs 2014 Cork, Ireland
Garoa Open BioLab 2011 Sao Paolo, Brazil
GaudiLabs Unknown Lucerne, Switzerland
Genspace 2010 Brooklyn, New York, USA
Hackuarium 2014 Renens, Switzerland
HiveBio 2013 Seattle, Washington, USA
Indie Lab 2012 Richmond, Virginia, USA
Just One Giant Lab 2015 Paris, France
La Jolla Bio Lab 2015 La Jolla, California, USA
La Paillasse 2011 Paris, France
La Paillasse Saône 2015 Villeurbanne, France
L’Eprouvette 2005 Lausanne, Switzerland
Lifepatch 2012 Yogyakarta City, Indonesia
London Biohackspace 2009 London, UK
MadLab Biolab Unknown Manchester, UK
Open bioLab Graz Austria 2013 Graz, Austria
Open Science Network 2010 Vancouver, Canada
Open Wetlab 2012 Amsterdam, Netherlands
Ottawa Bio Science 2018 Ottawa, Canada
PechBlenda Lab Unknown Barcelona, Spain
ReaGent 2015 Gent, Belgium
SoudBio Lab 2016 Seattle, Washington, USA
Symbiolab 2014 Maribor, Slovenia
The LAB 2011 Los Angeles, California, USA
top 2017 Berlin, Germany
TrySci Community Biolabs 2014 Independence, Missouri, USA
Turbine Bio Lab 2018 Newcastle, UK
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 5
Table 2. Profiles of founders/co-founders of selected DIY bio laboratories.
DIY laboratory
Founder/Co-
founders Education background of founder/Co-founders Data sources
BioBlaze
Community Bio
Lab
Sarah Ware, PhD PhD . BioBlaze Community Bio
Lab
. Bio Summit
. LinkedIn
. TEDxNaperville
. TEDxTalks
BioCurious . Eri Gentry, BA
. Kristina
Hathaway, BS
. Josh Perfetto,
BS
. Raymond
McCauley, MSc
. Joseph
Jackson, MSc
. Tito
Jankowski, BS
. Eri Gentry: BA, Economics
. Kristina Hathaway: BSc, Economics
. Joseph Jackson: MSc, Computer Science
. Raymond: MSc, Computer Science, Electrical
Engineering, Biochemistry, Biophysics,
Bioinformatics, Nanotechnology, Cancer biology
. Joseph: MSc, History and Philosophy of Science
. Tito Jankowski: Sc.B, Biomedical Engineering
. BioCurious
. Institute of the Future
. LinkedIn
. Techonomy
. The White House
Biodidact Prisca Tiasse, PhD PhD in Molecular Biology . LA Daily Post
. International Association
of Women
. New Mexico Technology
Council
Charlottesville
Open Bio Labs
Shaun Moshasha,
MSc
MSc, Commerce, Marketing and Management
BSc, Biochemistry, Physics
. Charlottesville open bio
labs
. Bio Summit
. LinkedIn
. Charlottesville Rotary
. iGEM.org
ChiTownBio . Khalid Alam,
PhD
. Andrew
Scarpelli, PhD
. Jordan
Harrison, BSc
. Isaac Larkin,
PhD
. Khalid Alam: PhD in biochemistry
. Andrew Scarpelli: PhD in Molecular Biology
. Jordan Harrison: Bachelor in Biology
. Isaac Larkin, PhD in Biological Sciences
. ChiTownBio
. Argonne National
Laboratory
. LinkedIn
. Open Bio Economy
DIYBio Barcelona . Nuria Conde,
PhD
. Daniel
Grajales, PhD
. Esteban
Martin, MEng
. Rosen Ivanov
. Nuria Conde: PhD in Biology
. Daniel Grajales: PhD in Electronic
Communications
. Esteban Martin: Master in Engineering of
Software and System Informatics
. Rosen Ivanov: Graduate of AR-Science
. DIYBio Barcelona
. Institute for Advanced
Architecture of Catalonia
. LinkedIn
. ORCID
Just One Giant Lab . Leo Blondel,
MA
. Thomas
Landrain, MSc
. Marc Santolini,
MSc
. Leo Blondel, MA: ongoing PhD studies in
Computational Biology
. Thomas Landrain, MSc: Former PhD studies in
Biology
. Marc Santolini: MSc, Philosophy of Science &
Liquid Physics
. Just One Giant Lab
. AXA Research
. LinkedIn
SoundBio Lab . Zach Mueller,
MSc
. Regina Wu, BA
. Michal
Galdzicki, PhD
. Zach Mueller: Master in Professional Accounting
. Regina Wu: Bachelor in Biology
. Michal Galdzicki: PhD in Bioinformatics and
Bioengineering
. SoundBio Lab
. Science Mag
. LinkedIn
6 W. YOU ET AL.
with the basic information of the DIY bio laboratories were collected into an Excel spreadsheet to
further analyse the coded data as well as new themes and to complete the cross-case analysis (Eisen-
hardt 1989). Based on the coding, new patterns emerged and they are described in the Findings
section below in more detail, with some exemplary quotes.
4. Findings
This section presents a descriptive analysis as well as a thematic analysis based on the collected data
of the founders of the selected DIY laboratories.
4.1. Descriptive analysis
This study selected eight DIY bio laboratories and analysed the profiles of the 23 founders/co-foun-
ders of these laboratories. With 6 cases, the majority of the DIY bio laboratories are located in the
United States of America, while the other two cases are located in Europe, namely Spain and
France respectively. Of the eight DIY bio laboratories, three have a single founder, while the remain-
ing five have 3–6 founders. The educational background of founders is distributed as follows: eight
with PhD degrees, eight with master’s degrees, six with bachelor’s degrees and one founder with
unspecified educational backgrounds. In addition, some founders have either several degrees or
pursued different types of qualifications and professional trainings during their careers. While
some of the founders’ ages could have been deduced based on educational data and news articles,
the data would have been liable to error and thus was excluded from the analysis. Furthermore, of
the founders four were working for the laboratories full-time, eight were working part-time while
having another profession, five volunteered their time and expertise for the laboratories, and six
had moved on from the laboratories to other ventures while the laboratories were still operating.
Of the five laboratories with several founders, three had a specific business-related person while
two had a tech specialised person. These specified founders did not share the features of research
or entrepreneurship as did the other founders. Figure 2 illustrates the most common characteristics,
moderate characteristics and the least common characteristics of DIY bio laboratory founders/co-
founders. These themes will be discussed in more detail in this section.
Figure 2. Features of DIY bio laboratory founders/co-founders and their occurrence in the data analysis.
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 7
4.2. Profile of DIY bio laboratory founders
This section will outline the profile of DIY bio laboratory founders and their features with some
extracts from the collected data. The founder of a DIY bio laboratory has the following characteristics:
research focus, entrepreneurship, ideology, community and educational thinking. Figure 3 illustrates
the different characteristics considered within the analysis and their relative appearance. Based on
the thematic analysis, a word cloud was formed by using the themes found during the coding
process of the analysis and assigning weight to each theme based on its occurrence. In this word
cloud, the most common words are research, ideology, entrepreneur and community. The less fre-
quent ones are investor, volunteer, technology and inventor.
Research focus highlights the founders’ background in research within the institutional setting of
traditional research. They may be actively pursuing a research career while working with the DIY bio
laboratory or conducting research within the laboratory. This category also includes the way the
founders think of the world and the importance of research for them, as illustrated by the below
extracts:
He published 9 peer-reviewed papers during that time. He decided to leave academia to focus entirely on build-
ing and experimenting with alternatives to a rusty academic system for the production of open knowledge and
innovations. Founder 19, DIY Bio Laboratory 7 (Just One Giant Lab 2020)
10+ years of experience in theoretical physics and network science in prestigious universities. Founder 20, DIY
Bio Laboratory 7 (Just One Giant Lab 2020)
Entrepreneurship refers to the activities, thinking or spirit the founders emit. This can be seen from
the ventures the founders have taken before, during and in some cases after. It may be in the form of
starting several projects simultaneously, or that the establishment of a laboratory has sparked move-
ment towards a company or vice versa. This may be seen as more of a thought process and as an
ability to support others in their entrepreneurial path. In addition, some of the founders also
chose to start DIY bio laboratories because they saw a need for such a space within their local com-
munity, displaying clearly an entrepreneurial mindset. Yet also in some cases there was the typical
story of ending up doing something that was successful, as in some entrepreneurial cases. The below
extracts reflect on this:
Founder 9 has founded or helped to found several different biotechnology companies, started a mentorship
program, and is now turning his attention to education. Without any DIY Bio labs in the area, Founder 9 had
no choice but to build one. Founder 9, DIY Bio Laboratory 4 (Bio Summit 2019)
Founder 23 says they constantly applies expertise from their community science work. Especially in a start-up
company, resourcefulness, low-cost creativity, and on-the-spot problem-solving are essential. Founder 23, DIY
Bio Laboratory 8 (Tachibana 2019)
Ideology and community are highly linked among the founders, as their ideology often pushes
towards a specific community or need to create a community. The ideology that the founders
Figure 3. Commonalities among founders/co-founders of selected DIY bio laboratories.
8 W. YOU ET AL.
share often relates to open science, open education and other open-related fields of information
sharing. There is a clear thought that science should be accessible for all, as well as education.
This type of thinking often leads to forming a community to share within or by joining an existing
community that shares the ideological beliefs of the founders. This also links to the final character-
istic of education, as most of the founders believed in education being for all and that it should be
shared and participatory. This can be seen from the below extracts:
Founder 1 strongly advocates for open-source sharing of scientific information and for the democratisation of
science. Founder 1, DIY Bio Laboratory 1 (TEDxNaperville 2020)
… the project soon attracted a community of both amateurs and professional scientists that completely over-
whelmed its capacity to support collaborative work. Hence the need for DIY Laboratory 2. Founder 2, DIY Bio
Laboratory 2 (Institute of the Future 2020)
Founder 8 also has a passion for science education for all, and they believe that the discipline, critical thinking,
persistence and creativity required for good scientific research is an excellent basis for any education, whether
one becomes a scientist or not. Founder 8, DIY Bio Laboratory 3 (Biodidact 2020)
Founder 21’s mission is to push innovation in the biotech community through open-source technologies while
lowering barriers for anyone that shares similar passions in biotechnology. Founder 21, DIY Bio Laboratory 8
(SoundBio Lab 2020)
Table 3 illustrates how the different terms fluctuate throughout the cross-case analysis, and also
how they differ within cases. As some laboratories have more founders than others, it provides some
hints into the importance of the dynamics within the teams.
4.3. Other key factors in founders
While the profile of a DIY bio laboratory founder may be applied to laboratories with single founders
and multiple founders, there is a specific difference between the two. Single founders often require
having all the characteristics to be able to start the laboratory, while laboratories with multiple
Table 3. Cross-case analysis of the selected DIY Bio laboratories and their founders/co-cofounders.
DIY laboratory Basic information Science factors
Entrepreneurial
factors Internal factors
External
factors
BioBlaze
Community Bio
Lab
PhD; Part-time Entrepreneur;
Business
Ideology;
Community,
Educator; Volunteer
Media
Biocurious BA, BS, MSc, MSc, MSc,
ScB; All founders/co-
founders left the lab
(6x)
Research (2x);
Inventor
Entrepreneur (5x);
Business (3x); Serial
(4x)
Ideology; Community
(3x)
Media
Biodidact PhD; Full-time Research;
Inventor
Entrepreneur Ideology;
Community;
Educator
Charlottesville
Open Bio Labs
MSc; Part-time Research;
Technology
Entrepreneur; Serial Ideology; Educator
ChiTownBio PhD, PhD, BS, PhD; Part-
time, Volunteer (3x)
Research (4);
Inventor (2x)
Entrepreneur (2x);
Business; Serial
Ideology (4x);
Community;
Educator; Volunteer
(3x)
DIY Bio Barcelona PhD, PhD, MEng (1 N/A);
Part-time (4x)
Research (2x);
Technology
(2x)
Entrepreneur Ideology;
Community;
Educator (3x)
Media
(2x)
Just One Giant
Lab
MA, MSc, MSc; Full-time
(3x)
Research (3x) Entrepreneur Ideology (3x);
Community (3x)
Media
(3x)
SoundBio Lab MSc, BA, PhD; Volunteer
(2x), Part-time
Research (2x);
Technology
Entrepreneur;
Business
Ideology (2x),
Community (3x);
Educator (2x)
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 9
founders can have the joint characteristics through several founders. In addition, in multiple founder
laboratories, there are often people included that do not necessarily fit the common profile, but have
complimentary knowledge or expertise, for example in form of business or technology. In addition,
founders may at the start seek out new members to join the team, who will later compliment the
founders’ skills but would not have been considered founders otherwise.
While entrepreneurship was a common feature among the founders of DIY bio laboratories, there
is a very specific trait that was shared by a small sample of founders, namely serial founders. This
phenomenon is seen in the entrepreneurial literature and is seen within the sample of founders
in its traditional form of serial entrepreneurs but also specific to the laboratory scene of serial labora-
tory founders. It is also noted that these types of founders often leave the established laboratory for
another venture or stay on with a less-essential role. While these founders shared ideological stances
within the scope of the DIY movement, they did not necessarily share an interest in the educational
aspects that other founders found important. In addition to serial entrepreneurs, there was also a
subgroup of entrepreneurial founders with a specific ability/interest in inventing tangible inventions,
often targeted at the scientific field. These founders fit the common characterisation of inventor
entrepreneurs and they tended to be less inclined towards the common characteristics of DIY bio
laboratory founders. In addition to the inventors, there is clear creativity among the founders,
that is displayed in varying ways, either through inventions, authorship, new designs or products.
In addition, in a minority of the cases the individuals came from families that were in entrepreneur-
ship, supporting the research about entrepreneurial family and upbringing. Yet there were also indi-
viduals that were brought up into the DIY movement, which could pose as an interesting new area of
research, as indicated from the below extracts:
Founder 10 has invented and developed a number of biosensing technologies. Founder 10, DIY Bio Laboratory 5
(Argonne National Laboratory 2020)
Although Founder 9 was fortunate to have learned from their two intelligent parents that started their own suc-
cessful business, unfortunately not everybody has that opportunity. Founder 9, DIY Bio Laboratory 4 (Charlottes-
ville Open Bio Labs 2020)
5. Discussion
When we consider the common characteristics of a DIY bio laboratory founder, we found this person
to be highly educated with a strong focus on research. Given that all the DIY bio laboratories were in
the field of Biology, as that was the chosen field of study, it is natural that science has an important
role within the DIY bio laboratories. They have a high tendency towards entrepreneurship, whether
in the form of innovative new products or offering their skills to the general public. The founders of
DIY bio laboratories have strong ideological beliefs that they follow in their actions in the form of
open science, information sharing and community science. The founders often seek community
with likeminded people or in the lack of community aim to create new communities for those
that share their ideological beliefs. This is supported by research into new technology-driven
firms, as technology-oriented founding teams are often found to share similar ideological stances
and have a high focus on the development of technology (Saemundsson and Candi 2014). Yet
this condition has also been attributed to these firms being unable to change from their original
strategy and adapt to customers’ needs (Saemundsson and Candi 2014), which could be a reason
behind why so many DIY bio laboratories find it challenging to achieve profitability and remain
active.
Furthermore, the research found that the founders of DIY bio laboratories have a high level of
education, given that of the 23 founders all of them have at least an undergraduate degree while
eight have a doctorate. This supports the idea that founders have a higher level of education
than the general public (Sayigh 1962; Alexander 1964; Carroll 1965). This is also supported by the
ideological aspects behind DIY laboratories as spaces where science and education are made
10 W. YOU ET AL.
accessible to the general public, to achieve such a goal the founders must be able to share from their
own knowledge base. Some even refer to this act as mentoring for non-Biology science related par-
ticipants (Eggleson 2014).
While the founders of DIY bio laboratories are often younger than founders of more traditional
start-ups, as these labs are often established during the founders’ studies, this finding is still in
line with previous research (Ronstadt 1983). Yet, from the perspective of industrial experience,
DIY bio laboratory founders often have less experience than traditional entrepreneurs (Hisrich and
Peters 1995), while the gap between when the education was completed is shorter for DIY bio lab-
oratory founders (Dickson, Solomon, and Weaver 2008). Interestingly, some studies have found that
an entrepreneur’s educational background and experience in the field of business have a positive
influence on profitability (Jo and Lee 1996), which in turn can explain why some DIY bio laboratories
do better than others.
Moreover, entrepreneurs are often labelled as innovative and creative in literature (Schumpeter
1967; Nair and Pandey 2006), which is the case with DIY bio laboratory founders. This can be seen
from the basic nature of the DIY movement, as an innovation itself, but also from the craftmanship
activities, idea co-creation and focus on inventions, which is supported by previous studies into
craftsmanship and inventor-entrepreneurs (Miner, Smith, and Bracker 1992). The literature into
inventor-entrepreneurs are also in line with DIY bio laboratory founders, as they tend to be either
self-employed or work for research institutions (Amesse et al. 1991). Yet while DIY bio laboratories
and their founders act as hubs for co-creation and innovations, these would not be achieved
without the communities within them and which they actively pursue to build. The founders
focus on community by finding like-minded individuals that all share similar beliefs, this can be
seen in a way as a homogenous group of people just as those that tend to lead community-
based entrepreneurship ventures (Parwez 2017).
Additionally, the researchers found that in some cases the aspect of heritage became important
when discussing DIY bio laboratory founders. Some of the founders had either entrepreneurial
parents or parents that belonged to the DIY movement, which is in line with the literature of discuss-
ing the likelihood of children of entrepreneurs becoming entrepreneurs themselves. A research con-
ducted by Lindquist, Sol, and Van Praag (2015) found that 60% of children with entrepreneur parents
became entrepreneurs themselves when compared to the general public. The research also took into
consideration the role of adoption and adoptive parents. Another aspect of interest in the findings
from the DIY bio laboratory founders was their tendency to establish either several laboratories or
other ventures. This is in relation to the literature of serial entrepreneurship, now while studies
have not found performance wise any difference between novice, serial and portfolio entrepreneurs,
the characteristics of the entrepreneurs were key distinction. These were in relation to parental back-
ground, work experience and age (Westhead and Wright 1998).
Table 4 compares the common characteristics of DIY bio laboratory founders and traditional
founders. It is important to note that in the literature of traditional founders, the literature is
rather extensive and focused more on the common features of either a special type of entrepreneur
or those in specific fields.
5.1. Theoretical and practical contributions
This study contributes to entrepreneurial research as it gives insight into a new phenomenon of DIY
bio laboratories and their founders. DIY bio laboratories have a different aim from traditional start-
ups and thus provide a different contextual background to the traditional entrepreneurial research.
While the setting is different, the characteristics as well as some of the monetisation solutions the DIY
bio laboratories have selected to use are to some extent similar. From a managerial aspect, the
research provides implications into the importance of community in new ventures and how support-
ing DIY bio laboratories can be beneficial for new business and innovations. The research also notes
that for DIY bio laboratories it is important to have either well-rounded individuals or a team of
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 11
individuals with complementing talents even from the founding stage. This study acts as a starting
point into understanding why certain DIY laboratories are successful and will guide further research
into uncovering the success factors of the DIY laboratory movement.
5.2. Limitations and future research
As a study based solely on content analysis of publicly available data, this paper acknowledges
several limitations: first, although data are collected from multiple sources, the analysis on character-
istics of DIY bio laboratory founders/co-founders is based on only secondary data. This may leave
room for error as these secondary sources may often paint a more positive and optimistic view of
the founders and laboratories equally. We acknowledge that the descriptions on the websites
provide us with a deliberate narrative of the founders’ view on entrepreneurship, which in itself is
a social construct. Future studies are encouraged to draw their analysis based on primary data,
such as interviews with the founder/co-founders of DIY bio laboratories, to further unveil the charac-
teristics of DIY bio laboratory founders. An especially important aspect to uncover is the role of ideol-
ogy and how the founders’ ideological stance can imprint on the laboratory setting and cultural
development as suggested by Bryant (2014).
Secondly, this paper only studies DIYbio.org related DIY laboratories, while other types of DIY lab-
oratories are neglected. Thus, future studies are recommended to examine founders/co-founders of
more types of DIY laboratories in addition to DIYbio.org related ones, such as DIY laboratories associ-
ated with hackerspaces and fab labs. Furthermore, the selected eight DIY laboratories are all based in
developed countries (i.e. USA, Spain and France), and within these countries the majority of DIY bio
laboratories are located in the USA, which may give a biased view of the results. As DIY laboratories
founders from emerging economies could possess different characteristics from the ones from
developed countries due to different institutional forces and contexts, it would be beneficial for
future research to also consider and focus on DIY laboratory founders from developing countries
and study their common profiles and characteristics. The characteristics of founders that would
prove new streams of research are in relation to the factors of parental background, age, serial entre-
preneurship and the role of other ethical issues than just the open science perspective. In addition,
the aspect of community within DIY laboratories seems to be connected to literature in community-
entrepreneurship and social enterprises, within the same context of developing economies, as such
research into these concepts with the phenomena of DIY laboratories would be beneficial.
Table 4. A comparison between DIY bio laboratory founders and traditional founders.
DIY bio laboratory founders Traditional founders
Common features identified in this study
. High level of education
. Science background
. Entrepreneurial
. Innovative & creative
. Ideology
. Community
. Lack of industrial experience
Common features found in literature
. Age (between 25 and 55)
. High educational level
. Personal traits: innovative nature
. Economic status of family
. Work experience in field
. Children of entrepreneurs
Moderate features identified in this study
. Education focus
. Serial entrepreneur
Field-specific features found in literature
. Technological and industry experience
Minor features identified in this study
. Inventor
. Family background
Specialised features found in literature
. Inventor-entrepreneurs (work for research institutions as well)
. Novice, serial and portfolio entrepreneurs
12 W. YOU ET AL.
Last but not least, with the understanding of common characteristics of founders, future studies
can explore how these founding teams affect the success and profitability of the laboratories as long-
term entities. On the other hand, replying on more primary data collected from DIY laboratory foun-
ders, future studies are encouraged to investigate not only the success of DIY laboratories but also
the failures, so as to unravel the characteristics of DIY laboratory founders and their well-rounded
impact on the performance of the respective DIY laboratories.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes on contributors
Dr Weimu You is Lecturer in Sustainability and Global Value Chains at Brunel University London. His research interests
include sustainability, global value chains, innovation and technology management. His work has appeared in interna-
tionally peer-review academic journals such as Critical Perspectives on International Business, International Journal of
Management Reviews, International Journal of Production Research, Journal of Cleaner Production and Technological Fore-
casting and Social Change.
Mira Valkjärvi, MSc is a doctoral researcher in the field of Management and Organization at the University of Turku and
a project researcher at the University of Eastern Finland. She is also a researcher within the CICAT2025 research con-
sortium funded by the Academy of Finland. Her research interests include Circular Economy, service-dominant logic,
agency, ideology and entrepreneurship.
George Ofosu is a doctoral candidate at the Center for International Development and Environmental Research - ZEU,
Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen, Germany. His research interest spans across environmental geography, citizen science,
and international business in emerging markets.
ORCID
Weimu You http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9159-6238
Mira Valkjärvi http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4514-5169
References
Akman, H., C. Plewa, and J. Conduit. 2019. “Co-creating Value in Online Innovation Communities.” European Journal of
Marketing 53 (6): 1205–1233.
Alexander, A. P. 1964. Greek Industrialists. Athens: Centre for Planning and Economic Growth.
Amesse, F., C. Desranleau, H. Etemad, Y. Fortier, and L. Seguin-Dulude. 1991. “The Individual Inventor and the Role of
Entrepreneurship: A Survey of the Canadian Evidence.” Research Policy 20 (1): 13–27.
Argonne National Laboratory. 2020. Khalid Alam. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://chainreaction.anl.gov/
innovators/khalid-alam/.
Biodidact. 2020. Our Story. Accessed September 3, 2020. http://biodidact.net/.
Bio Summit. 2019. Shaun Moshasha. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://www.biosummit.org/participants/2019/
shaun-moshasha.
Bryant, P. T. 2014. “Imprinting by Design: The Microfoundations of Entrepreneurial Adaptation.” Entrepreneurship Theory
and Practice 38 (5): 1081–1102.
Carroll, J. J. 1965. The Filipino Manufacturing Entrepreneur: Agent and Product of Change. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Charisius, H., R. Friebe, and S. Karberg. 2013. Biohacking: Gentechnik aus der Garage. Munich: Carl Hanser Verlag GmbH
Co KG.
Charlottesville Open Bio Labs. 2020. Team. Accessed September 3, 2020. http://openbiolabs.org/team/shaun-
moshasha/.
Curry, H. A. 2014. “From Garden Biotech to Garage Biotech: Amateur Experimental Biology in Historical Perspective.” The
British Journal for the History of Science, 47 (3): 539–565.
Delfanti, A. 2013. Biohackers. The Politics of Open Science. London: Pluto Press.
Delfanti, A., and J. Söderberg. 2015. “Repurposing the Hacker. Three Cycles of Recuperation in the Evolution of Hacking
and Capitalism.” Three Cycles of Recuperation in the Evolution of Hacking and Capitalism (June 23, 2015).
Delgado, A. 2013. “DIYbio: Making Things and Making Futures.” Futures 48: 65–73.
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 13
Dickson, P. H., G. T. Solomon, and K. M. Weaver. 2008. “Entrepreneurial Selection and Success: Does Education Matter?”
Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development 15 (2): 239–258.
DIYbio.org. 2021. DIYbio Sphere. Accessed March 3, 2021. https://sphere.diybio.org/.
Eggleson, K. 2014. “Transatlantic Divergences in Citizen Science Ethics—Comparative Analysis of the DIYbio Code of
Ethics Drafts of 2011.” Nanoethics 8 (2): 187–192.
Eisenhardt, K. M. 1989. “Building Theories from Case Study Research.” Academy of Management Review 14 (4): 532–550.
Grushkin, D., T. Kuiken, and P. Millet. 2013. Seven Myths & Realities about Do-It-Yourself Biology. Synbio 5. Washington, DC:
Wilson Center & Synthetic Biology Project.
Halfacree, K. 2004. “I Could Only do Wrong: Academic Research and DIY Culture.” In Radical Theory/Critical Praxis:
Making a Difference Beyond the Academy, edited by D. Fuller and R. Kitchin, 68–78. Vernon and Victoria, BC,
Canada: Praxis (e)Press.
Hisrich, R. D., and M. P. Peters. 1995. Entrepreneurship—Starting, Developing and Managing a New Enterprise. Boston:
Irwin.
Institute of the Future. 2020. Erica Gentry. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://www.iftf.org/erigentry/.
Jo, H., and J. Lee. 1996. “The Relationship Between an Entrepreneur’s Background and Performance in a new Venture.”
Technovation 16 (4): 161–211.
Joly, P. B. 2019. “Reimagining Innovation.” In Innovation Beyond Technology, edited by S. Lechevallier, 25–46. Singapore:
Springer.
Just One Giant Lab. 2020. Team. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://jogl.io/.
Lindquist, M. J., J. Sol, and M. Van Praag. 2015. “Why do Entrepreneurial Parents Have Entrepreneurial Children?” Journal
of Labor Economics 33 (2): 269–296.
Meyer, M.. 2016. "Steve Jobs, Terrorists, Gentlemen, and Punks: Tracing Strange Comparisons of Biohackers".
in Practising Comparison: Logics, Relations, Collaborations, edited by J. Deville, M. Guggenheim, and Z. Hrdlickova,
281. London: Mattering Press.
Meyer, M., and F. Vergnaud. 2020. “The Rise of Biohacking: Tracing the Emergence and Evolution of DIY Biology Through
Online Discussions.” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 160: 120206.
Miner, J. B., N. R. Smith, and J. S. Bracker. 1992. “Defining the Inventor-Entrepreneur in the Context of Established
Typologies.” Journal of Business Venturing 7 (2): 103–113.
Nair, K. R. G., and A. Pandey. 2006. “Characteristics of Entrepreneurs: An Empirical Analysis.” The Journal of
Entrepreneurship 15 (1): 47–61.
Nascimento, S., A. G. Pereira, and A. Ghezzi. 2014. From Citizen Science to Do It Yourself Science. Ispra, Italy: Joint Research
Centre, European Commission.
Parwez, S. 2017. “Community-based Entrepreneurship: Evidences from a Retail Case Study.” Journal of Innovation and
Entrepreneurship 6 (1): 1–16.
Ranta, V., L. Aarikka-Stenroos, P. Ritala, and S. J. Mäkinen. 2018. “Exploring Institutional Drivers and Barriers of the
Circular Economy: A Cross-Regional Comparison of China, the US, and Europe.” Resources, Conservation and
Recycling 135: 70–82.
Ritala, P., A. Golnam, and A. Wegmann. 2014. “Coopetition-Based Business Models: The Case of Amazon.com.” Industrial
Marketing Management 43: 236–249.
Ronstadt, R. C. 1983. “Initial Venture Goals, Age and the Decision to Start an Entrepreneurial Career.” Mimeographed
paper at the Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the US Academy of Management, August.
Saemundsson, R. J., and M. Candi. 2014. “Antecedents of Innovation Strategies in New Technology-Based Firms:
Interactions Between the Environment and Founder Team Composition.” Journal of Product Innovation
Management 31 (5): 939–955.
Sarpong, D., and T. Liedong. 2020. “Special Issue Call: The Management and Implications of DiY Laboratories for
Innovation and Society.” Technology Analysis and Strategic Management. https://think.taylorandfrancis.com/
special_issues/technology-analysis-strategic-management-implications-laboratories-innovation-society/.
Sarpong, D., G. Ofosu, D. Botchie, and F. Clear. 2020. “Do-it-yourself (DiY) Science: The Proliferation, Relevance and
Concerns.” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 158: 120127.
Sarpong, D., and A. Rawal. 2020. “From the Open to DiY Laboratories: Managing Innovation Within and Outside the
Firm.” In Innovating in the Open Lab: The New Potential for Interactive Value Creation Across Organizational
Boundaries, De Gruyter Studies in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, 263–274. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter
Oldenbourg.
Sayigh, Y. A. 1962. Entrepreneurs of Lebanon. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Schulz, C. 2016. “The Role of Hackers in the Open Innovation Process of the Pharmaceutical Industry.” Master Thesis,
University of Münster.
Schumpeter, J. A. 1967. The Theory of Economic Development. New York: Oxford University Press.
Seyfried, G., L. Pei, and M. Schmidt. 2014. “European Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Biology: Beyond the Hope, Hype and Horror.”
Bioessays 36 (6): 548–551.
SoundBio Lab. 2020. About. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://www.sound.bio/about.
14 W. YOU ET AL.
Tachibana, C. 2019. “Community Science: Not Just a Hobby.” Science Mag. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://www.
sciencemag.org/features/2019/08/community-science-not-just-hobby#.
TEDxNaperville. 2020. Sarah Blossom Vare, PhD. Accessed September 3, 2020. https://tedxnaperville.com/current-
speakers/sarah-ware.
Trojok, R. 2016. Biohacking: Gentechnologie für alle: Biomaterial, Geräte und Software zur Bearbeitung von Genen. Munich:
Franzis Verlag.
Westhead, P., and M. Wright. 1998. “Novice, Portfolio, and Serial Founders: Are They Different?” Journal of Business
Venturing 13 (3): 173–204.
You, W., W. Chen, M. Agyapong, and C. Mordi. 2020. “The Business Model of Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Laboratories–A Triple-
Layered Perspective.” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 159: 120205.
TECHNOLOGY ANALYSIS & STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT 15