From resource munificence to ecosystem integration: the case of government sponsorship in St. Louis

Government sponsorship of entrepreneurship has become a popular policy tool in the last 15 years. Despite this popularity, past academic studies have largely focused on firm-level survival rates and treated the effects of government sponsorship in isolation, which fails to capture the full effect of the sponsorship. That is, the objectives of the public sector include enhancing the macro-level entrepreneurial environment of the region as well as the success of individual firms. We expand research in this area through a case study in St. Louis, Missouri. We focus on the Arch Grants, a public–private coalition that provides $50,000 to 20 winners through their annual competition. Based on interviews of 46 recipient firms and 15 support organizations, we first demonstrate how government sponsorship can create a cohort of entrepreneurs who are able to learn from each other about business strategy, local mentors and other resources. Second, we uncover the process through which sponsorship can facilitate coordination among local entrepreneurship support organizations. Thus, we conclude that the evaluation of government sponsorship should go beyond the traditional firm-level performance measurement and consider the integration and enhancement of the local entrepreneurship ecosystem.     

Epigenetic Economic Dynamics: The evolution of big internet business ecosystems,evidence for patents

The aim of this article is to contribute to literature with new findings from biogenetics that are becoming increasingly important. In particular, we will discuss the new analytic frameworks that may open as a result of the incorporation of epigenetics in evolutionary economic thinking. This new approach is illustrated by studying the evolution of big Internet industry groups such as Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon and Samsung. With it we shed light on the dynamics of business groups, which we approach as ‘business ecosystems’.     

From boundary line to boundary space: The creation of hybrid organizations as a Triple Helix micro-foundation

In a Triple Helix framework, independent hybrid organizations can be created at the intersection of overlapping yet separate institutional spheres to address innovation blockages. However, the formation process of these organizations, which incorporate and combine elements from the Triple Helix spheres, has seldom been investigated. We address this gap by proposing a model that conceptualizes the creation process of these organizations. We argue that their creation opens up a “boundary space” that differs from a boundary line. By comparing empirical results of three cases, we identify a three-step creation process (recognizing a gap; bringing Triple Helix representatives together and creating a consensus; and designing an ad hoc contingent solution). We highlight the individual role of a boundary spanner in these dynamics. The results provide new insights on the micro-foundations of the Triple Helix. They also suggest an extension of the “boundary spanner” concept.     

Shareholder value implications of service failures in triads: The case of customer information security breaches

The rise in front-end service outsourcing in recent years, despite its advantages, has also exposed buyer firms to unique challenges. One of the most salient risks for buyer firms in service triads is service failure due to the service provider. Indeed such service failures may be more costly for firms due to the greater relational and operational costs that may arise from the presence of the third-party provider. Yet, neither the services literature nor extant operations literature on service triads has paid much attention to the financial consequences to the buyer firm – i.e., service risks – of such service failures in triads. To fill this gap, we investigate the financial penalty of service failures due to the service provider using the event study methodology and a sample of 146 customer information security breaches as our empirical context. Analysis of the abnormal returns reveals that service failures due to the front-end service provider lead to greater shareholder losses than such failures due to the buyer firm. This provides important new insight into the financial risks arising from outsourcing front-end services. Further, we investigate the ability of the buyer firm's employee and financial resources to temper these shareholder losses. We find that buyer firm employee productivity can moderate the greater financial penalty associated with such triadic service failures but that buyer firm leverage tends to not have such a mitigating effect. This provides new guidance for theory and practice regarding how buyer firms can position themselves to buffer the financial risks arising from service failures due to front-end service providers.     

The symbiosis of entities in the social engagement network: The role of social ventures

Social entrepreneurship is increasingly recognized as a mechanism for creating social and economic value. By applying population ecology, resource dependency and resource-based view perspectives, this paper develops a conceptual model to provide greater insight into how social entrepreneurship ventures collaborate with other organizations in a network to fulfill resource requirements. Through this process social ventures address unmet social needs to create value which leads to the development and growth of individuals, communities, and regions. Using a large city's economic development actors involved in small business promotion as test cases, this exploratory study illustrates that social ventures effectively acquire resources from the primary social engagement network actors: corporations, governments, and other social ventures. The framework introduced in the paper provides a means by which to better understand the context in which relevant social engagement players in a network exist and the synergies that they can develop.     

The embedding process of community ventures: creating a music festival in a rural community

Community entrepreneurship is a potentially powerful mechanism to improve the well-being of rural communities. To mobilize inhabitants for collective action, an emerging community venture must be embedded within a local community. Yet, the embedding process of community ventures is not well understood. Accordingly, this study explores how a community entrepreneur (CE) embedded an emerging community venture into a rural community and simultaneously stimulated social change in the community. Drawing on a longitudinal case study of a CE who created a jazz music festival in a rural Norwegian community, a dynamic conceptual framework was developed that highlights the roles and mechanisms that support the embedding process. The CE promoted social change by introducing external impulses to the local community and assumed a bridging role between the villagers and external actors in the embedding process. Some villagers assumed local embedding roles, while several external actors assumed external embedding roles. I identified four strategies that were used to increase the embeddedness of the community venture in the rural community and one strategy that was used by the CE to de-embed the venture in order to avoid constraints imposed by the local community. The importance of the different roles and mechanisms changed over time.     

The shared environmental responsibility principle: new developments applied to the case of marine ecosystems

Estuaries provide advantageous sites for both harbors and fish habitats. In many countries, harbor expansion in estuaries contributed to the decline of fish populations with impacts at the global scale. Restoring these habitats is important to prevent a global biodiversity crisis but is costly and potentially unaffordable for polluters under the Polluter Pays Principle. Such affordability issues prompt decision-makers to reduce environmental targets of restoration programs. Harbor infrastructures destroy fish habitats but generate benefits for society and contribute to the public interest, raising some questions on who is responsible for environmental degradations and who can afford environmental restoration costs? One way to allocate restoration costs is to analyze the amount of harbor services consumed by economic sectors. This paper addresses these questions by computing burden sharing scenarios with an input–output matrix. These scenarios are simulated under the shared responsibility principle to distribute restoration costs among stakeholders in the Seine estuary, France.     

Anomalies in emerging markets: The case of Mexico

In this article we explore the relationship between 19 of the most common anomalies reported for the US market and the cross-section of Mexican stock returns. We find that 1-month stock returns in Mexico are robustly predicted only by 3 of the 19 anomalies: momentum, idiosyncratic volatility, and the lottery effect. Momentum has a positive relation with future 1-month returns, while idiosyncratic volatility and the lottery effect have a negative relation. For longer horizons of 3 and 6 months, only the 3 most important factors in the US market predict returns: size, book-to-market, and momentum.     

The role of the entrepreneurial encounter in the emergence of opportunities: Vallée’s Dallas Buyers Club

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to explore the conceptual potential of the Deleuzian notion of the encounter in order to better understand the genealogy of opportunities. We adopt a processual perspective of opportunities. In order to translate this notion to the domain of entrepreneurship, we analysed and interpreted Jean-Marc Vallée’s Dallas Buyers Club. This film follows the creation of the first club in the United States that illegally allowed HIV-positive people to supply themselves with foreign antiretroviral drugs from Mexico or Japan. The article highlights encounters in this process that disturb the entrepreneur’s belief systems and allow him or her to be open to potential opportunity. It finally explores how the encounter may improve our understanding of the political becoming of opportunities within the entrepreneurial process.     

Innovation ecosystems as a service: Exploring the dynamics between corporates & start-ups in the context of a corporate coworking space

The desire to create innovative organizational spaces has led to various instantiations of innovation ecosystems. Towards this direction, there is a growing interest in establishing corporate innovation ecosystems in the form of ‘corporate coworking spaces’ (CWS). From a relational ontological standpoint, this study builds on the collaborative spaces literature with the aim to investigate the emerging dynamics between corporates and start-ups in an innovation ecosystem. Through an abductive research strategy (ARS) as well as service design methods, we explore how co-creation between corporates and start-ups emerges (or not) in an innovation ecosystem that serves as a collaborative space in Denmark. Our empirical findings challenge the mostly overenthusiastic connotations and thus the study contributes to the critical coworking research stream. More specifically, we give emphasis on the co-constructive entanglement of socio-spatial arrangements and we propose a framework for revisiting the design of CWS through 1) balancing the engineered and evolving parts of the ecosystem, 2) facilitating stakeholder alignment, 3) adopting a service-oriented approach and 4) developing inclusive strategies. Apart from the implications for scholars and practitioners who study and design CWS, we argue that future research would especially benefit from building on a service-oriented approach of innovation ecosystems and we call for more interdisciplinary research.     

The role of control power allocation in service supply chains: Model analysis and empirical examination

In complex and competitive business environment, there have been many examples of supply chain members fighting for power. Therefore, researchers have begun focusing on the impact of control power allocation on the supply chain. This paper examines the allocation of power in different service supply chain relationships, analyzing the impact of service level on optimal control power allocation and comparing the differences between the optimal power distribution in service supply chains and that of manufacturing supply chains. We adopt a mathematical model building method to discuss this issue, verifying the theoretical perspectives through empirical studies of China's largest state-owned logistics company, the China Railway Company, and the private ownership enterprise, Tianjin SND Logistics Company. We also develop a conceptual model of the influence of control power on the performance of service supply chains, based on the modeling and case analysis. The conceptual model shows several results: the control power allocation determines the dominant structure of the supply chain; the service provider's wholesale pricing strategy and the service integrator's sales price strategy present different outcomes under various dominant structures of the supply chain, which will greatly affect the performance of the corresponding supply chain; and the relationship between the supply chain dominant structure and the price can be adjusted by the service level.     

The power of coworkers in service innovation: the moderating role of social interaction

Service innovation is central to firms when explaining business success and competitiveness. However, little is known about how useful feedback and help/support from coworkers affect desirable innovation outcomes. This study draws on a conceptual model and theorizes that firms’ support of useful feedback from coworkers and coworkers’ help and support along with social interaction would achieve service innovation. In a sample of 382 employees from a large multinational firm, as hypothesized, employees with highly useful feedback and help/support from coworkers exhibited the highest level of firm service innovation. Moreover, managers can enhance this positive relationship by relying more on increased social interaction among employees for innovation performance.     

The digital transformation of business models in the creative industries: A holistic framework and emerging trends

This paper examines how digital technologies facilitate business model innovations in the creative industries. Through a systematic literature review, a holistic business model framework is developed, which is then used to analyse the empirical evidence from the creative industries. The research found that digital technologies have facilitated pervasive changes in business models, and some significant trends have emerged. However, the reconfigured business models are often not ‘new’ in the unprecedented sense. Business model innovations are primarily reflected in using digital technologies to enable the deployment of a wider range of business models than previously available to a firm. A significant emerging trend is the increasing adoption of multiple business models as a portfolio within one firm. This is happening in firms of all sizes, when one firm uses multiple business models to serve different markets segments, sell different products, or engage with multi-sided markets, or to use different business models over time. The holistic business model framework is refined and extended through a recursive learning process, which can serve both as a cognitive instrument for understanding business models and a planning tool for business model innovations. The paper contributes to our understanding of the theory of business models and how digital technologies facilitate business model innovations in the creative industries. Three new themes for future research are highlighted.     

Multi-criteria analysis of economic complexity transition in emerging economies: The case of Paraguay

Like many emerging economies, the productive structure of the Paraguayan economy is not complex. It relies extensively on low value-added activities in the primary sector such as agriculture and cattle ranching. These activities have a lower return in terms of economic and social benefits than other potential productive activities and do not contribute to increasing capability accumulation. In this paper we present a tool to support the identification of strategic sectors and products which if taken advantage of, could leverage development through the accumulation of productive capabilities. Our guiding question is: Which productive sectors should be promoted to foster economic development in Paraguay through a transition towards a more complex economy? To answer this question, we use concepts from the Economic Complexity theory to identify new products and cluster them based on the Product Space methodology for the determination of potential products and combine it with the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) for multicriteria analysis considering multiple criteria. In doing so, our proposed methodology contributes to both the Economic Complexity and the AHP literature. Through this combination, we tackle the multiplicity of juxtaposed criteria, which should be considered at the prioritization stage in the crafting of economic restructuring measures according to the country's capabilities. Our evaluation showed that the combination of the approaches is useful, and for Paraguay's case, it helped identify sectors, which, if promoted by policymakers, could help boost economic development through complexity and capability accumulation.     

Coping with coopetition—Facing dilemmas in cooperation for sustainable development: The case of the Dutch smart grid industry

This paper is amongst the first to examine coopetition strategy for sustainable development at the network level. Companies who want to successfully implement complex innovative technologies that support sustainable development need to collaborate with other actors of the innovation ecosystem, including their competitors, so that they can develop standards, interoperable products, pool knowledge, and resources and bundle forces to compete against other technologies. Collaboration with competitors brings benefits, but also many risks. We investigated how firms cope with these risks when establishing an innovation ecosystem to implement a new technology in society. We conducted research in the Dutch smart grids sector and explored how these firms minimize inherent risks of coopetition. We found that system‐building actors in the Dutch smart grid field not only minimize inherent risks, but from the start of their collaboration they implement so‐called enablers to prevent these risks upfront.     

The process of entrepreneurial action at the base of the pyramid in developing countries: a case of vegetable farmers in Benin

The assumption that entrepreneurship is a critical factor in expanding employment, creating wealth and contributing to poverty alleviation at the base of the pyramid (BoP) in developing countries has led to the development of many initiatives to strengthen the entrepreneurial activities of poor people. Despite the fact that entrepreneurship is seen as a strategy in combatting poverty, the process that leads to entrepreneurial action in a BoP context is still unclear. In this paper, we illustrate the possibilities a multi-layered perspective offers to understand the complexity of entrepreneurship in poverty settings. Based on five focus group discussions and 36 in-depth interviews with vegetable farmers in Benin, we examined the entrepreneurship of poor people. We learned that entrepreneurial action is the nexus of individual and exogenous factors in complex relationships. Based on this, we elaborate on the characteristics of the process model of entrepreneurial action. We provide a process-based view of entrepreneurship at the BoP, suggesting a need for consistency between individual, behavioural strategies and contextual elements. We discuss the implications of our findings for BoP practice and provide a framing perspective that we hope will encourage a greater focus on the complexity of entrepreneurship phenomenon.     

The political uncertainty and stock market behavior in emerging democracy: the case of Taiwan

This paper examines the congressional effect between the pre- and post-democratization on the stock market by the asymmetric Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heterosce desticity (GARCH) model in the period 1984–2004. The results found that the congressional effect is negative effect on stock returns but volatility is not significant. However, the democratic effect on stock returns is negative and increased of volatility. Moreover, the congressional effect on stock market returns following democratization significantly exceeds that before democratization, but have no significant effect for the volatility in the same circumstances. These results provide evidences consistent with the contention of liberalization (Hayek, Am. Econ. Rev. 35, 519–530, Individualism and Economic order, The university of Chicago press, Chicago, London, 1945, 1948; Popper, The open society and its Enemies, Princeton university, NJ, 1950).     

Corporate financial distress: The case of publicly listed firms in an emerging market economy

Occurrences of financial distress (FD) are not readily obvious yet can span several periods. This paper examines episodes of FD using industry‐relative (IR) firm‐/ accounting‐, market‐ and macro‐level information. Mixed logit regressions reveal that firm‐ and market‐based measures, as well as macro‐level variables explain the likelihood of FD in 263 publicly listed non‐banking firms in the Philippines during the period 1995 to 2018. Rates of identification of firms in financial distressed states of close to 69 percent are obtained at a cutoff probability of 0.30 in the model with time‐varying intercept and slope. This study shows the importance of recognizing heterogeneous firm behavior. The ability to more accurately predict the probability of FD and to determine the financial health of firms can help financial institutions in allocating funds and policy makers in predicting crises episodes.     

Applying LSA text mining technique in envisioning social impacts of emerging technologies: The case of drone technology

This research proposes a novel method of identifying and understanding the holistic overview of emerging technologies’ unintended consequences. Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) text mining technique is employed to yield multiple groups of contextually similar terms from future-oriented data sources, comprising both experts’ and the public's concerns regarding future technologies. Resulting term clusters are considered as new abstractions, or so-called scenarios, of future social impacts. Furthermore, the study acquires greater depth and breadth in conceptualizing social impacts through considering condition- and value-related terms as key linking factors to previous social impact-related literature. Our proposed methodology seeks to gain insights into the utilization of future-oriented data sources for the foresight activity, hoping to mitigate public skepticism and pursue a better social acceptance of emerging technologies.     

Learning and technological capability building in emerging economies: The case of the biomass power equipment industry in Malaysia

There is increasing recognition that the transfer of foreign technology to developing countries should be considered in light of broader processes of learning, technological capability, formation and industrial development. Previous studies that have looked at this in the context of cleantech industries in emerging economies tend to overlook firm-level specifics. This paper contributes to filling this gap by utilising in-depth qualitative firm-level data to analyse the extent to which the use of different learning mechanisms can explain differences in the accumulation of technological capabilities. This is explored via an examination of eight firms in the biomass power equipment industry in Malaysia during the period 1970–2011. The paper finds that firms relying on a combination of learning from foreign technology partners and internal learning by planned experimentation make most progress in terms of technological capability. Nevertheless, local spill-over effects were found to be important for some firms who learned principally from imitation of local competitors, although significantly, firms learning from local spillovers failed to advance beyond extra basic operating technological capabilities. Those firms who proactively pursued learning from foreign partners, on the other hand, advanced further, reaching basic innovative levels of technological capabilities. These findings are relevant for a wider range of industrial sectors in emerging economies.