Hong Kong's entrepreneurship: behaviours and determinants

It is widely known that Hong Kong's economic success is to a large extent attributed to its dynamic entrepreneurs. However, economic studies on Hong Kong's style of entrepreneurship are few. This paper attempts to throw light on this issue. It argues that Hong Kong is an entrepreneurial society. A unique feature of Hong Kong's style of entrepreneurship lies in its ability to conduct ordinary, rather than extraordinary, discovery. Through the use of guerrilla business strategy, imitation and regional arbitrageurship, entrepreneurial firms in Hong Kong are able to exploit narrow profit margins and to survive global competition. Moreover, the cultural, economic and political environments of Hong Kong are found to be favourable in incubating adaptive entrepreneurship. This paper concludes that, although Hong Kong's style of entrepreneurship emerges out of its unique environments, Hong Kong's experience can be useful to other developing economies. The critical issue is whether latecomer countries can successfully develop adaptive entrepreneurship compatible with their backgrounds so as to exploit international market opportunities.