Does Venture Opportunity Variation Matter? Investigating Systematic Process Differences between Innovative and Imitative New Ventures

• Published in: Small business economics Vol. 33; no. 2; pp. 229 - 255
• Main Authors: Samuelsson, Mikael, Davidsson, Per
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston Springer 01.08.2009; Springer US; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Business and economics; Business and Management; Business innovation; Business studies; Economics; Ekonomi; Entrepreneurs; Entrepreneurship; Equilibrium; Formal education; Företagsekonomi; Growth models; Human capital; Hypotheses; Industrial Organization; Joint ventures; Longitudinal Growth Modelling; Management; Microeconomics; New venture creation; Organization theory; Pregnancy; SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP; Small and medium sized enterprises; Social capital; Social innovation; SOCIAL SCIENCES; Start up firms; Startups; Studies; Technological innovation; Traditions; Venture opportunity variation; Venture opportunity variation; New venture creation; L26; Entrepreneurship; Longitudinal Growth Modelling
• ISSN: 0921-898X; 1573-0913; 1573-0913
• DOI: 10.1007/s11187-007-9093-7

The central thesis in the article is that the venture creation process is different for innovative versus imitative ventures. This holds up; the pace of the process differs by type of venture as do, in line with theory-based hypotheses, the effects of certain human capital (HC) and social capital (SC) predictors. Importantly, and somewhat unexpectedly, the theoretically derived models using HC, SC, and certain controls are relatively successful explaining progress in the creation process for the minority of innovative ventures, but achieve very limited success for the imitative majority. This may be due to a rationalistic bias in conventional theorizing and suggests that there is need for considerable theoretical development regarding the important phenomenon of new venture creation processes. Another important result is that the building up of instrumental social capital, which we assess comprehensively and as a time variant construct, is important for making progress with both types of ventures, and increasingly, so as the process progresses. This result corroborates with stronger operationalization and more appropriate analysis method what previously published research has only been able to hint at.