Discriminating “Schumpeterian” from “Austrian” informal investors—an empirical assessment

This study proposes a theoretically informed typology of international informal investors. This means that the Schumpeterian type is contrasted with Austrian informal investors. The governing paradigm in the neoclassical framework is economic equilibrium. However, the creation of disequilibrium is central to Schumpeterian entrepreneurship. This is unlike Austrian entrepreneurship, which regards movement toward economic equilibrium. Hence, Schumpeterian-type investors are perceived to facilitate disequilibrating change, whereas Austrian-type investors promote equilibrating change. Employing a two-group discriminant analysis with robust data from Norway, the findings support the concept that Schumpeterian and Austrian-type investors differ with regard to their selection of investment proposals, monitoring, and, not least, their backgrounds. The data suggest that Schumpeterian-type investors invest more actively, into the “early stage” category of new firms than Austrian-type investors. Schumpeterian-type investors are more highly educated than their counterparts and monitor their firms more actively by financial reports and stockholder meetings. By contrast, Austrian-type investors appear to have more experience than their Schumpeterian counterparts. The implications of these findings are discussed.