Understanding the success of regional entrepreneurial startup ecosystems is crucial for the advancement of local economies, job creation and growth. The current paper takes a unique theoretically focused look at common ecosystem elements that regional startup ecosystems may need to pay extra attention to in order to become as competitive as top-tier startup ecosystems. In our analysis, we compare two prominent models on elements of ecosystems: the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Elements by Stam and van de Ven (2019 and the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Diagnostic Toolkit (2013). We conclude this paper with drawing up eight propositions and an invitation for future empirical research to test these propositions in practice.
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Sustainability and economic growth—the integration and balance of social, environmental, and economic needs—is a salient concern for sustainable development and social well-being. By focusing on a sustainable innovation project, we explore how entrepreneurial ecosystems become sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems and investigate the interactions of entrepreneurial actors. We conducted an inductive, single-case study of a specific collaborative innovation project in the denim industry specialized in a specific geographic location. From our data, we show that the presence of four conditional aspects foster sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems. These include sustainability orientation of actors, recognition of sustainable opportunities and resource mobilization, collaborative innovation of sustainability opportunities, and markets for sustainable products. We make two observations that contribute to the literature. First, we see that in a sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystem, entrepreneurial experimentation is a highly interdependent and interactive process. Second, we see that recognition of sustainable opportunities is distributed among different actors in the ecosystem. Our findings also have implications for practitioners and policy-makers.
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Promoting entrepreneurship is an enabler of smart, sustainable and inclusive growth and it is one objective EU regions have pursued since the EC included it into 2020 Strategy. Entrepreneurship development has economic and social benefits, since it is not only a driving force for job creation, competitiveness and growth; it also contributes to personal fulfillment and to achieve social objectives. That is why the EU encourages entrepreneurial initiatives and to unlock the growth potential of businesses and citizens. However, only a 37% of Europeans (Eurobarometer 2012) would like to be self-employed. The Entrepreneurship Action Plan adopted by the EC in 2013 to reignite Europe’s entrepreneurial spirit includes initiatives for educating young people on entrepreneurship. To ensure that EU economy remains globally competitive, young generations of Europeans need to be inspired to develop their entrepreneurial mindset. EU 2020 Action Plan argues that young people benefitting of a specialised entrepreneurial education are more likely to start-up a business and to better tackle challenges in their professional career and life in general. Hence, there is good reason to ensure better quality of entrepreneurial education. Most approaches in recent years have focused on improving the skills or competences youngsters should obtain only within the education system. However, an integrated approach is needed, where the school, their friends, family and the social environment, shall play each one a relevant role, contributing to generate a more adequate atmosphere to boost their entrepreneurial mindsets, intrapreneurial attitudes and innovation capacities. This project will identify and exchange – through a quadruple helix approach- good practices for creating friendlier entrepreneurial ecosystems and actions to boost entrepreneurship in young people mindsets. The good practices and lessons learnt will be transferred into Action Plans to be included in regional policies.
This study responds to the calls by Stough, Welter, Block, Wennberg, & Basco (2015) and Basco (2024) to study the mechanisms through which enterprising families and their firms influence and contribute to regional economic development and how this engagement with the context influences family firm performance (James, Hadjielias, Guerrero, Discua Cruz, & Basco, 2021). Our findings will help policymakers to get a better understanding of how and under what conditions family entrepreneurs can or will take on a leadership role in the regional ecosystem. Furthermore, a more profound understanding of how enterprising families and their firms engage in socially responsible activities in their context will provide insight that help build strong entrepreneurial ecosystems. In addition, our study will showcase examples of enterprise-driven leadership of places and CSpR in the Northern part of the Netherlands.Conference paper at EIASM conference in Barcelona Spain. September 2024