Technology-based Ventures Research Articles

Developing a Framework for Technopreneurial Behavior: The Mediating Role of Technopreneurial Intention and Moderating Role of Attitudes

Technopreneurship is a combination of technology and entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs who are involved in technology-based ventures called technopreneurs employ technology throughout their venture operations and produce technology-based services or products. In the era of globalization, especially post-COVID-19 pandemic, technopreneurship has become more significant as it can drive economic growth. Hence, it is very crucial to further investigate technopreneurship behaviour among university students, as they are the future generation that will lead the development of the country and magnify globalization. Few technopreneurs studies have been conducted previously, however, technopreneurs in the Malaysian context are scarce. Thus, this study proposes to investigate the relationship between subjective norms, perceived behavioural control, and technopreneurs' education towards technopreneurs' behaviour, to ascertain the mediating effect of technopreneurs' intention between subjective norms, perceived behavioural control, and technopreneurs' education towards technopreneurs behaviour, and lastly to determine the moderating effect between attitudes, technopreneurs intention, and technopreneurs behaviour, that is based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour. This study proposed a research method through a survey via questionnaire. In determining the sample size, the software of Raosoft is proposed, and for data analysis, the study has proposed SPSS for data screening and PLS-SEM for the main analysis.

ECONOMIC IMPACT OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT PRACTICES ON INNOVATION PERFORMANCE: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY IN TECH STARTUP ECOSYSTEM

Objective: In an age when competitive advantage needs to be sustained through innovation, especially in the very fast and dynamic tech industry, good practices in project management make a vital contribution toward successfully manoeuvring through the complexities of innovation projects. This study highlights the economic implications of project management on innovation performance within technology-based ventures, particularly in Saudi Arabia’s evolving tech ecosystem. Method: An empirical analysis of 372 responses using an SEM approach investigates the alignment of innovation objectives with project management practices by identifying key factors that contribute to innovation performance in an evolving tech ecosystem in Saudi Arabia. Results and Discussion: The research concluded that good project management practices can, to a high extent, enhance the innovative capability of tech startups, whereby the converted ideas can come into existence and be taken from the idea level to the marketplace. Research Implications: The practical implications of the research were to recommend ways in which tech startups and other firms can enhance their innovation performance by embracing best practices in project management. This implies that by coupling these economic practices with strategic innovation objectives, by fostering collaboration, and by managing resources and risks efficiently, organizations can substantially enhance their innovation capacity and ensure long-term success in competitive markets. Originality/Value: This study contributes to the growing body of knowledge at the border between project management and innovation and can contribute something new for both practitioners and policymakers within the tech environment.

Driving Configuration for Growth of New Technology-Based Ventures in China from an Optimal Distinctiveness Perspective

The survival and sustainable development of new technology-based ventures (NTBVs) have become challenging due to the unpredictable and dynamic technological environment as well as the scarcity of their own resources. Considering the tension between “conformity” and “distinctiveness” faced in NTBVs’ growth, based on the optimal distinctiveness perspective, we develop a configurational framework to investigate how combinations of multiple factors (i.e., political guanxi, business guanxi, exploratory innovation, exploitative innovation, environmental dynamism, and environmental munificence) lead to high enterprise growth. This study analyzes survey data of 30 Chinese NTBVs by conducting a necessary condition analysis (NCA) to inspect the necessary relationships between each condition and the outcome and employs fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to determine the configurations to achieve growth. It is shown that individual elements do not compose the necessary conditions for yielding high enterprise growth, and high levels of new venture growth require different configurations of antecedents to be achieved. Furthermore, four types of driving pathways are identified for the NTBVs’ growth, each of which contains different compositions of enterprise strategy and external environment. These findings enhance the literature on enterprise growth and its influencing factors and provide implications for NTBVs to achieve high-quality growth and development.

Environmental Sustainability Orientation, Reward-Based Crowdfunding, and Venture Capital: The Mediating Role of Crowdfunding Performance for New Technology Ventures

Extant literature has investigated the effects of new ventures’ environmental sustainability orientation (ESO) on the crowdfunding (CF) performance and on the ability to secure venture capital, separately and with mixed results. In this article, we address the study of these relationships simultaneously. Specifically, we examine how the presence of ESO features influences new technology-based ventures’ ability to secure funding in reward-based CF campaigns and how the CF performance mediates the effect of such features on attracting subsequent venture capital. Using a sample of new hardware ventures that have launched a CF campaign on Kickstarter, we document a negative effect of the presence of ESO on CF performance. We also find that, for new hardware ventures using reward-based CF, the presence of ESO has a positive direct effect on the likelihood of receiving subsequent venture capital after CF, as well as a negative indirect effect due to its negative impact on the performance in CF.

How to facilitate technology push innovation strategy in a university context – towards an action-based startup experience

The one-semester master's seminar "Startup Experience" enables student entrepreneurs to explore potential applications based on existing and patented university technologies. On this premise, they develop their own technology-based venture while following a specific course structure that includes action-oriented learning sessions, regular mentoring sessions with representatives from the startup scene, reflective diaries after each session, and ongoing interactions with various stakeholders in the field of the respective application. This paper will present the conceptual development, practical execution and evaluation of the seminar.

Framing the Digital Transformation: Evidence from Taiwan

This paper examines the framing of the digital transformation, which has recently been emphasized increasingly through various organizations around the world. We apply framing theory to emphasize the use of languages and vocabularies in the strategic change process. Within our empirical setting of Taiwan, we use topic modeling approach to recognize framing structures. Our data sources are both secondary (newspaper and magazine articles) and primary (12 interviews). We identified five linguistic framings that Taiwanese sectors and organizations typically use to legitimatize their move toward digitalization: cross-field integration, demand orientation, smart cloud platform, international competition, and R&D innovation. We also find that organizations’ choice of framings is shaped by the firms’ characteristics, referred to as publicly governed entities, traditional private business, or technology-based ventures.

Ethnicity and the role of the founders' human and social capital in technology-based ventures

PurposeThis study examines the social and human capital of successful Arab and Jewish technological entrepreneurs in Israel, and explores how human and social capital differ between technology-based industries.Design/methodology/approachA quantitative study was conducted using a sample of 1,184 technology-based ventures from two technology-based industries—life science (LS) and information technology (IT)—that were founded by Jewish and Arab entrepreneurs.FindingsThe results show that in the LS industry, successful Arab entrepreneurs possess higher human and social capital compared with Jewish entrepreneurs. However, in the IT industry, the Jewish entrepreneurs possess higher human and social capital. These findings reflect the deeper entrepreneurial challenges and opportunities regarding ethnic entrepreneurs' ability to break through technology-based industries. Future research directions are provided.Originality/valueThis study makes two contributions to the theoretical understanding of ethnic entrepreneurship and technology-based ventures. First, this study focuses on the impact of human and social capital on economic growth in the context of technological entrepreneurship in technology-based industries, since the ethnic entrepreneurship literature has mainly focused on traditional industries. Second, this study examines the effect of the founders' ethnicity, and explores how human and social capital factors vary across industries due to their specific contextual characteristics.

Business Incubators, Accelerators, and Performance of Technology-Based Ventures: A Systematic Literature Review

This review aims to identify the typologies of business incubators (BI) and business accelerators (BA) and to define a taxonomy integrating both the BI’s and BA’s characteristics and services portfolio, facilitating the adoption of open innovation practices. A systematic literature review (SLR) was carried out encompassing the research topic concerning the relationship between the incubation structures and the performance of technology-based ventures. This comprehensive SLR encompasses a total of 1614 publications, aiming to advance the knowledge on BI and BA. This SLR allowed for the identification of current trends and future challenges, as well as of the most important authors, publications, and journals in this research framework. This SLR establishes a new taxonomy for BI and BA, based upon three main pillars: human capital, social capital, and organizational capital. BI and BA help in the development of new high-technology ventures, by being facilitators for open innovation practices. This SLR is limited by the literature, as the collection of publications was performed exclusively through ISI Web of Science (WoS). Further research can be made into the modes of how these structures impact open innovation practices at the regional level using a knowledge spillover approach.

Technopreneurial Intentions: The Effect of Innate Innovativeness and Academic Self-Efficacy

Several factors can affect students’ intention to start a new technology-based venture (technopreneurial intentions). Understanding these factors is important when developing technical educational programs. This study investigates the effect of innate innovativeness and academic self-efficacy on technopreneurial self-efficacy and the forming of technopreneurial intentions. It does this by developing a conceptual model that relates technopreneurial intentions, technopreneurial self-efficacy, academic self-efficacy, and innate innovativeness. The data was collected from 378 undergraduate engineering students enrolled in a Jordanian university with a self-administered questionnaire survey. The results of the structural equation modeling (SEM) using AMOS showed that technopreneurial self-efficacy had a positive and significant impact on technopreneurial intentions. Academic self-efficacy had both a direct and indirect positive effect on technopreneurial intention. The indirect effect occurred through increased technopreneurial self-efficacy. Innate innovativeness had a direct effect on technopreneurial intentions, but it did not have a significant indirect effect through technopreneurship self-efficacy as was initially hypothesized. The findings suggest that those who show interest in starting a new technology-based venture have a strong belief in their abilities to perform the technological and entrepreneurial tasks needed, are confident about their ability to acquire the academic technical skills required, and have the inner motivation to seek what is technologically new and different.

The Connections Between Founders’ Social Network and Human Capital in Technology-Based New Ventures

Abstract This research examines the relationship between a founding team’s social network and the acquisition of its critical human capital. First, explicitly dealing with technology-based firms, we disaggregate the founder(s) social network into four sub-networks: academic, industry, finance, and personal (family and community). Then, we detail the relationship between these individual sub-networks and the acquisition of both technical and business skilled human capital. Our results confirm that individual sub-networks have a differential effect on acquiring both technical and business human capital.

TMT functional complementarity and post-IPO performance: Evidence from the U.S. biotechnology industry

Drawing insights from the resource dependence and the upper echelons theories, this study examines how top management team (TMT) IPO reconfiguration – the managerial change between immediately before and after an initial public offering (IPO), affects firm performance in the post-IPO years. We investigate this through the lens of TMT functional complementarity - the degree of differing functional knowledge held by the firm's TMT in the pre-and post-IPO stage. We argue that TMT functional complementarity positively affects firm post-IPO performance. Further, this relationship is positively moderated by executive managerial discretion, measured by CEO duality and TMT insider board membership. We test our model using a sample of 250 US biotechnology firms that went public from 1991 to 2019, and the empirical results largely support our hypotheses. This study contributes to the literature of upper echelons, technology-based ventures, and IPO firms.

A qualitative study on social entrepreneurship: technology-based social ventures and humanitarian entrepreneurial mindset

Abstract Seen as an effective approach for sustainable development of disenfranchised communities, spurring legislation initiatives and private investment, social entrepreneurship has gained the attention of many economies across the globe. Social entrepreneurship arises as an effective practice for solution development for access to education, healthcare, water, food, or electricity. In the United States, several university programs are tackling the development of technology-based social ventures. While there has been growth in assessing social entrepreneurship education, little exchange of what works in a technology-based social entrepreneurship program occurred. To contribute to the body of empirical knowledge of what works in a program dedicated to technology-based solutions which have the potential to stimulate global improvements, the researcher performed a qualitative analysis of the Penn State HESE program’s ENGR 451 course on social entrepreneurship. The purpose of this research was to gather some baseline data about three areas connected to developing culturally fit technology-based ventures and the humanitarian entrepreneurial mindset developed throughout this process. The paper reported on a grounded theory study using in-depth interviews with the 49 students enrolled in the ENGR 451 course on social entrepreneurship, 70% studying engineering. The research analyzed two areas related to engineering entrepreneurship: the entrepreneurial mindset generated by participation in the course and the process of developing culturally fit technology-based social ventures with particular interest in task-role distribution, idea generation, and design-thinking stages. The current study is part of a larger qualitative study exploring how and what students in the HESE program learn about social entrepreneurship and how this learning influences their intent to be part of or to start a social venture. The findings have potential impact across social entrepreneurship program design, are intended to inform educators of social entrepreneurs about social entrepreneurship program design and the humanitarian entrepreneurial mindset.

Understanding the influence of technological capability and exogenous pressure on business model dynamics: insights from a longitudinal case study

PurposeThe purpose of the study is to explore how technological capability and exogenous pressure interactively influence business model (BM) dynamics over time in new technology-based ventures.Design/methodology/approachThe study adopts a longitudinal case study of the BM innovations of a Chinese financial technology venture. The structural approach and temporal bracket are used to analyze and theorize the data.FindingsThe findings indicate that distinct contextual changes impel a firm to refine or abandon existing BMs over time. In different stages, the antecedents interactively influence BM dynamics with three successive patterns, namely pressure dominance, parallel influence and hybrid influence. While both antecedents trigger changes during the initiation and implementation of new BMs, they also serve as the filter and the enabler, respectively, during the ideation and integration of BMs.Research limitations/implicationsThe study inductively develops three propositions regarding the relationship between BM dynamics and its antecedents, which is based on the data collected from one single firm. Future research should test the propositions in other domains and take more cross-level antecedents into consideration.Originality/valueThe study contributes to the nascent research stream of BM dynamics by offering in-depth insights into the interaction of internal and external antecedents and by linking the differentiated roles of antecedents to the BM innovation process. The research offers some practical implications for new technology-based ventures seeking to develop BMs in a fast-changing environment.

Standing on the shoulders of giantesses: how women technology founders use single and mixed gender networks for success and change

PurposeBuilding on research about entrepreneurship and social capital, the purpose of this paper is to explore how women founders of technology-based ventures in Canada access and use formal external entrepreneurial networks to build their companies.Design/methodology/approachThe study draws on 25 semi-structured interviews with women founders of technology firms and leaders of formal networks.FindingsThe authors demonstrate the positive impact of women only networks (WON) for founders including increasing entrepreneurial diversity, access to financing, and founder credibility and sponsorship. The authors show how women founders use mixed gender and WON to build their businesses and conclude that membership in WON can be a vital step.Research limitations/implicationsThe sample size is small and most participants reside in highly urban areas, which may limit generalizability. Findings may not generalize beyond Canada due to cultural and structural differences.Practical implicationsThe research suggests that external WON should be encouraged as important resources for founder identity work which may enable positive change.Social implicationsThis research can assist in designing initiatives that support women entrepreneurs and promote gender parity.Originality/valueThe authors draw on research in women's leadership development to explain how WONs for entrepreneurs help founders create overlapping strategic networks – a unique form of social capital – and serve as identity workspaces for the identity work women founders must complete. The authors argue that the identity work in WONs can be a mechanism by which gender structures are challenged and eventually changed.

The role of information availability: A longitudinal analysis of technology entrepreneurship

The rapid spread of digital technologies has fostered an assumption that all entrepreneurs have equal and easy access to knowledge stocks irrespective of their context. We challenge this assumption by examining the contextual influence of information availability and argue that technology entrepreneurship involves a search process reliant on timely access to ideational components. We hypothesize that in contexts where information is more readily available, potential technology entrepreneurs are at an advantage, resulting in higher rates of technology entrepreneurship. Even after controlling for other important factors, such as polity, educational attainment, research and development spending, foreign direct investment, and gross domestic product growth, our results show a positive relationship between information availability and the proportion of entrepreneurs who pursue technology-based ventures instead of low-tech ventures. We further find that the effect of information availability on technology entrepreneurship increases in the presence of stronger intellectual property rights, suggesting that information availability enhances technology entrepreneurship more readily in contexts with incentives for innovation disclosure.

On the signaling effect of reward-based crowdfunding: (When) do later stage venture capitalists rely more on the crowd than their peers?

Venture capitalists (VCs) make only a small number of investments and are more likely to invest in ventures where other VCs have invested previously. As such, valuable opportunities may be forgone if they are not funded by VCs in the first place. We demonstrate how crowdfunding (CF) can remedy this concern. Using a sample of new technology-based ventures, we reveal that ventures initially funded through reward-based CF can be even more likely than those initially backed by VCs in attracting follow-up funds from VCs. This happens when ventures originally funded via reward-based CF complement the certification they derive from CF with patents and a founding team with a track record of success. In those cases, VCs rely on the crowd more than their peers. Overall, the results suggest that signal complementarity can at least equalize the effectiveness of an a priori inferior and an a priori superior signal.

Enablers of exit through trade sale: the case of early-stage research-based spin-offs

A significant share of new technology-based ventures exit through trade sale at an early stage of firm development. While trade sale is an important exit route for entrepreneurs and investors, and a potential source of new innovations and technology for acquiring firms, we have limited knowledge about the factors that help to effectively achieve a trade sale. We employ a unique dataset tracking the population of research-based spin-offs in Norway and conduct in-depth case studies of nine trade sales. Building on 52 interviews and other secondary data, we inductively develop propositions outlining three dimensions that lead to a successful trade sale—potential synergies, credible alternatives, and uncertainty reduction. We show that these enablers of trade sales are not only linked to the focal venture but also related to the idiosyncratic dyad with the buyer, reflecting both the potential for and likelihood of trade sale. Consequently, our study contributes to the literatures on entrepreneurial exit and academic entrepreneurship by mapping the important but under-explored area of trade sale as an exit mode.Plain English SummaryPotential synergies and credible alternatives increase the potential of a research-based spin-offs’ trade sale, but the likelihood of a trade sale depends on how uncertainty reduction is managed. A trade sale is an important exit route for entrepreneurs and investors, and a potential source of new innovations and technology for acquiring firms. Research-based spin-offs are often acquired during their early stages of development by large corporations. We track the population of Norwegian research-based spin-offs and study nine trade sales in depth. Our findings concerning the importance of synergy potential, credible alternatives, and uncertainty reduction have implications for both academic entrepreneurs and potential buyers for how they can complete an exit through trade sale. Since scientific research is critical for society, our findings have implications for policymakers in the form of interesting ideas for influencing trade sales, a potentially important route for commercialization of scientific research.

Experiential Learning of Information Systems in Functional Contexts: The Digital Brand Strategy Project

Successful technology-based ventures and the notion that every company constitutes a “digital” company have driven increased interest in information technology even for students majoring in areas other than information systems. With the growing need for experiential learning, educators in business schools face challenges in identifying effective delivery mechanisms to impart theoretical foundations and practical applications in functional contexts that students find relevant. In this paper, we describe how we designed and implemented a project that fulfilled the above needs and integrated information systems and marketing. We describe the motivation for this project, its learning objectives, and its innovative design and implementation, and we provide an example of the project to illustrate its execution. While this project could be a standalone piece in an information systems course, we show it to be an effective way to communicate how one can apply information systems in a different functional context.

Firm-environment alignment of entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation in technology-based ventures: A configurational approach

ABSTRACT This study explores configurations for firm-environment alignment of entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation in technology-based ventures to explain firm performance. Classifying entrepreneurial opportunities by their source and location as technology driven and market driven, we develop a framework to investigate a multitude of factors in the firm and in the environment that influence firm performance only when aligned with each other. The study examines technology-based ventures using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis. Our results highlight the presence of complete firm-environment alignment of technological and market opportunity exploitation in cases with very high organizational growth rates. High-growth cases are driven by market opportunity exploitation. Firm-environment misalignment characterizes low-growth cases. Our results extend entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation literature to encompass a configurational setting from a quality perspective and provides entrepreneurs, managers, and policy-makers with informed choices of alternative growth strategies when focusing on organizational and policy priorities.

Socio-cultural factors explaining technology-based entrepreneurial activity: Direct and indirect role of social security

Nurturing technology-based ventures requires consideration of societal factors besides economic factors. This study aims to analyze the direct effect as well as moderation effect of social security on technology-based entrepreneurial activity. Research hypotheses are tested through panel data analysis. National level data on 45 countries for 8 years (2006–2013) are obtained from multiple sources, including Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, World Competitiveness Yearbook, Hofstede's national culture dimensions, and so forth. The results imply that social security, as it is known, has a negative relationship with the overall rate of entrepreneurial activity. However, social security has a positive effect on the share of technology-based entrepreneurial activity. In addition, the positive impact of social security shows a gradual decline as individualism increases. Our findings provide solid empirical evidence on the relationship between social security and entrepreneurial activity, which was ambiguous in the previous studies. The research examines the interaction effects between social security and national culture for the first time. These are expected to provide a practical insight for policy makers seeking to promote entrepreneurial activity at the national level.