Does a business plan really matter for a small or medium-sized new venture?: three types of new ventures in Taiwan

Abstract

Numerous debates exist on the efficacy of business plans on new venture performance, particularly when the new venture is either small or medium sized. The empirical evidence on these debates is also conflicting. We examine the effect of a comprehensively conceived business plan on three types of new venture performance considering other key successful factors (entrepreneurial orientation, non-knowledge resources and knowledge resources) and under various contingencies. The results show that a sufficiently conceived business plan has a positive effect on the new venture performance regardless of the venture size and type, but the effect of a business plan on the performance is higher with a larger initial investment of a new venture. We also observe that the effect of a business plan on performance is lower for domestic corporate-based ventures than for those that are personal or foreign-based.