A multidimensional evaluation of the effectiveness of business incubators: an application of the PROMETHEE outranking method

Considerable public resources are devoted to the establishment and operation of business incubators (BIs), which are seen as catalysts for the promotion of entrepreneurship, innovation activities, and regional development. Despite the vast amount of research that focused on the effectiveness of incubator initiatives and how to measure incubator performance, there is still a lack of understanding of how to determine which incubators are more effective than others. On the basis of data from 410 graduate firms, we concentrate on this crucial question and compare the long-term effectiveness of five BIs in Germany by applying the multicriteria outranking technique ‘preference ranking organization method for enrichment evaluation’ (PROMETHEE). In particular, we investigate whether PROMETHEE is a well-suited methodological approach for evaluation and comparison in the specific context of business incubation.