What is it about?
Most incubator design assumes a large economy around the incubator: deep markets, experienced mentors, available capital. This study asks what happens when none of that holds. It draws on three years of data from 106 entrepreneurs in the uSTART incubator at the University of Trinidad and Tobago, focus groups with 51 participants, and an analysis of two decades of incubation research. The pattern was consistent: finance predicted output, jobs and revenue, but mentorship predicted capability, across every model and every measurement wave. From that evidence the paper derives five design principles for incubation in small island developing states, from putting mentorship at the centre of resource allocation to tying graduation to milestones rather than the calendar.
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Why is it important?
Dozens of small island states run incubation programmes built on templates imported from large economies, and the templates fail quietly. This is one of the first design frameworks for incubation built from longitudinal evidence gathered inside a small island economy rather than assumed from outside it. It is written for the people who design, fund and run these programmes: governments, development agencies and universities working where markets are small, mentors are scarce and capital is thin.
Perspectives
This paper closes a loop that began with my doctoral research at the University of Trinidad and Tobago, watching entrepreneurs move through the uSTART programme year after year. The finding that stayed with me was not the one I expected: money mattered, but it was mentorship that changed what people could do. I wrote this for the people who design and fund incubation programmes in small states and inherit templates that were never built for their conditions.
Inshan Meahjohn
University of Trinidad and Tobago
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: The uSTART model: an evidence-informed framework for designing business incubation in small island developing states, Journal of Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies, September 2026, Emerald,
DOI: 10.1108/jeee-03-2026-0305.
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