• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.1-15
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• 2016

Startups in Korea are experiencing for themselves the laws of survival through competition in the local and international market, and are performing active business movements based on these. Korea's economic growth rate is 2.6% due to the slump in the domestic demand and reduced exports brought by the MERSC incident in 2015. The Korea Development Institute has estimated the economic growth rate in 2016 to be around 3.0%. South Korea's economy is facing the crisis of low-growth solidification due to the decrease in economic growth, and it is forecasted that growth without employment and polarization will worsen. Startups in the high-tech industrial generation of a particular field wherein the market environment is rapidly changing must maintain a competitive advantage with the capabilities and functions exclusive to them. It is very important that they maintain a competitive edge by utilizing the capabilities exclusive to startup companies. Likewise, the accumulation of resources is also crucial in determining the success of a startup business. In a poor local startup ecosystem, majority of the startup companies are performing their business activities while striving for survival, rather than success. About 80% are struggling to survive and are failing to overcome the "Death Valley" faced 3-5 years after establishing the company. Since majority of the startups fail to achieve results during the initial stages of foundation, the importance of research on business activities and achievement during the early stages of establishment is being raised. In accordance to this, this research has performed an actual analysis on how the activities of startups during their preparation phase and early stages affect their achievements. A survey was done on the CEOs or executives (people in a position to make decisions) of local small and medium-sized enterprises that are considered start-ups, and 203 valid data were collected and analyzed. Results showed that the discoveries and utilized activities necessary for the businesses of startups have a significant impact on their achievement through the entrepreneur resources and external partners' cooperation; additionally, the related implications were discussed.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.75-87
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• 2016

This study examines the impact of government funds to venture capital on investment in early-stage firms. We provide novel explanations about this relationship focusing on mechanisms by which government funds influence the perceived uncertainty, decision about investment priority, scale economy of investment, information asymmetry in investment decision, and capital expense. We argue that venture capital's investment in early-stage firms increases as government funds increase and as government funds are explicitly directed for early-stage firms. However, we further claim that the impact of government funds on early-stage investment will be decreasing as their size increases and finally be reverted to negative impact beyond a certain amount of funds to show inverse-U relationship. Our empirical examination using data from 105 Korean venture firms active as of 2013 consistently supports the claims. This study contributes to the venture capital literature by providing novel arguments about mechanisms and effects of policy intervention in venture capital. In practice, we expect our results will provide an opportunity for relevant policy makers to review their venture support policy based on empirical evidences for policy effects.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.141-158
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• 2023

From the perspective of an entrepreneur, one of the most important factors for understanding the inherent limitations of a startup, reducing the risk of failure, and succeeding is the composition of the talent, that is, the founding team. Therefore, a common concern experienced by entrepreneurs in the pre-entrepreneurship stage or the early stage of startup is the choice between independent startups and co-founding start-up. Nonetheless, in Korea, the share of independent entrepreneurship is significantly higher than that of co-founding start-up. On the other hand, focusing on the fact that many successful global innovative companies are in the form of co-founding start-up, the success factors of co-founding start-up were examined. Most of the related preceding studies are studies that identify the capabilities and characteristics of individual entrepreneurs as factors influencing the survival and success of entrepreneurship, and there is a lack of research on partnerships, that is, co-founding start-up, which are common in the field of entrepreneurship ecosystems. Therefore, this study attempted a multi-case study through in-depth interviews, collection of relevant data, analysis of contextual information, and consideration of previous studies targeting co-founders of domestic startups that succeeded in opportunistic startups. Through this, a model for deriving the phased characteristics and key success factors of co-founding start-up was proposed. As a result of the study, the key element of the preliminary start-up stage was 'opportunity', and the success factors were 'opportunity recognition through entrepreneur's experience' and 'idea development'. The key element in the early stages of start-up is "start-up team," and the success factor is "trust and complement of start-up team," and synergy is shown when "diversity and homogeneity of start-up team" are harmonized. In addition, conflicts between co-founders may occur in the early stages of start-ups, which has a large impact on the survival of start-ups. The conflict between the start-up team could be overcome through constant "mutual understanding and respect through communication" and "clear division of work and role sharing." It was confirmed that the core element of the start-up growth stage was 'resources', and 'securing excellent talent' and 'raising external funds' were important factors for success. These results are expected to overcome the limitations of start-up companies, such as limited resources, lack of experience, and risk of failure, in entrepreneurship studies, and prospective entrepreneurs preparing for a start-up in a situation where the form of co-founding start-up is attracting attention as one of the alternatives to increase the success rate. It has implications for various stakeholders in the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.77-98
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• 2020

Recently, the government provided about 35 trillion won to start-ups through a large amount of start-up support funds from the Korea Credit Guarantee Fund and the Korea Development Bank, and more than 100 trillion won to start-ups over the past three years.(2015-2018) The Ministry of SMEs and Startups announced that a total of 1.4517 trillion won will be supported by 16 ministries (90 projects) after surveying start-up support projects by ministries in 2020 to create a start-up country. Indeed, among the budgets supported by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, startups accounted for 85%, while scale-ups (growth and maturity) were only 15%. However, the survival rate of Korean start-ups was far lower than that of developed countries. The survival rate for the three years after the start-up was 39.1 percent, with only about 4 out of 10 surviving, with 27.5 percent surviving for five years, and only 3 out of 10 surviving. On the other hand, overseas start-ups have a survival rate of twice as high as that of Korea for five years. Accordingly, this study aims to empirically analyze and examine the need for research on nascent entrepreneurs, which have recently been actively supported by the government, as well as the impact of start-up motivation and start-up preparation on the intention to continue business. The survey was conducted from April 1 to May 15, 2020 for nascent entrepreneurs nationwide, and 222 of the total 245 copies were analyzed, and the questionnaire was measured using the Likert 5-point scale. As a result of the analysis, first, all factors constituting start-up motivation were adopted by significantly affecting start-up satisfaction. In addition, among the sub-factors of nascent entrepreneurs' preparation, item preparation was adopted as a significant influence on start-up satisfaction. Second, the nascent entrepreneurs' satisfaction level was adopted by having a significant impact on the business continuity. Third, some of the motivations for self-realization of the motivation for start-ups were adopted by having a significant impact on the business continuity. In addition, the preparation of items for the start-up preparation of nascent entrepreneurs was partially adopted as they had a significant impact on the business continuity. Fourth, it was adopted by the mediation effect of start-up satisfaction between the motivation of the nascent entrepreneurs' preparation and the business continuity. In addition, it was adopted by the medium effect of start-up satisfaction between the nascent entrepreneurs' preparation and the business continuity. Based on the results of these studies, it is intended to draw practical implications, and to provide useful policy implications to increase nascent entrepreneurs' satisfaction and continue to carry out their start-ups.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.19 no.12
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• pp.515-522
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• 2018

Current signs of a downturn in South Korea's economy include the sharp drop in consumption. Considering internal and external complications such as the raise in minimum wage and fierce global competition, people's taste and purpose of consumption is shifting as well. Under such circumstances, crowdfunding provides a new investment and distribution channel for businesses in their initial stages. Crowdfunding can serve as a key driver of growth in early stages of business operations and lead to growth in consumption as a new distribution channel. This study explores how customers perceive the process of reward crowdfunding, especially when it comes to fairness in procedure, interaction, and distribution. In addition, we further seek how perceived fairness affects customer satisfaction and loyalty in the industry.

• 한국벤처창업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2020.11a
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• pp.163-166
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• 2020

저출산으로 경제활동인구가 감소했는데도 청년실업자가 늘어난 나라는 한국, 이탈리아, 그리스인데 이는 OECD국가 중 유일하다. OECD 청년고용률은 2009년 40.5%에서 2019년 43.5%로 증가했지만 순위는 30위에서 32위로 하락했다. 코로나19사태로 매출이 감소한 국내 301개사는 채용을 미루거나 포기한 비율이 전체 50.5%애 이르면서 앞으로 청년 취업 상황을 악화시킬 것으로 보인다. 양질의 일자리가 증가하면 이를 통해 개인은 경쟁력을 확보하게 되고 산업은 고급 인력을 바탕으로 성장구조를 만든다. 따라서 민간과 정부는 창업을 적극적으로 독려하고 활성화 시킬 필요가 있다. 청년창업대상자를 중심으로 진행하는 사업은 중소벤처기업부의 청소년 비즈쿨 사업과 창업에듀, K-스타트업, 청년창업사관학교, 학생창업유망팀 300등이 있다. 그러나 대부분의 지원 사업이 초기창업단계에 지원역량이 강화되어 있고 공급자 위주로 창업지원 사업을 운영하다보니 창업 성과는 미미하다. 통계청 자료에 의하면 20대는 생계유지에 대한 문제와 창업자금으로 인해 창업을 망설이고 30대는 가족을 돌보는 것에 대한 부담감과 기업가에 대한 부정적인 인식으로 창업을 기피 하는데 이는 40대이상 다른 연령층보다 높게 나타났다. 본 연구는 개인적, 환경적 요인이 연령에 따라 창업의지에 어떤 영향을 미치는지 비교분석하여 일자리 활성화를 위한 정부의 청년창업지원대책 기초자료에 도움이 되고자 한다. 청년창업대상자의 금전에 대한 태도, 창업역량, 성공한 롤모델, SNS 활용능력, 창업지원정책, 사회적지지, 인적네트워크, 해외시장 관심도가 창업의지에 어떤 상관 관계를 갖는지 비교연구를 진행하고자 한다. 10대의 경우 취업과 창업을 고민하는 특성화고등학생 150명, 20대 150명, 30대 150명으로 총 450명의 데이터를 가지고 SPSS 23을 통해 다중회귀분석을 진행하고 원인을 비교해 앞으로의 정책이 창업을 독려하고 지속력을 갖기 위한 방향으로 시사점을 제안한다.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.155-164
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• 2024

This study examines whether startup firms start with the resources they already have and expand the resources they can mobilize in the process of business management (Effectuation Model) using public data provided by the government. The results of the study show that the Effectuation Model can partially explain the behavior of early-stage startup firms. Therefore, in terms of policy implications based on these findings, government policies for entrepreneurship should not be based on the selection of companies based on sophisticated business models and hypothetical profit models, but rather on a system that actively supports entrepreneurship in areas that are challenging, even if they seem somewhat reckless at the moment, or that best match the entrepreneur's knowledge. Next, in order to actively spread entrepreneurship, it is necessary to spread business history or entrepreneurial experience. To this end, it is necessary to drastically change the current financial system for startups, where the founder bears all the financial risk, and to more actively consider ways to reduce the risk of startups by allowing society and the financial system to share some of the risk of startups.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.215-235
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• 2024

As artificial intelligence (AI) technology is recognized as a key technology that will determine future national competitiveness, competition for AI technology and industry promotion policies in major countries is intensifying. This study aims to present implications for domestic policy making by analyzing the policies of major countries on the start-up of AI companies, which are the basis of the AI industry ecosystem. The top four countries and the EU for the number of new investment attraction companies in the 2023 AI Index announced by the HAI Research Institute at Stanford University in the United States were selected, The United States enacted the National AI Initiative Act (NAIIA) in 2021. Through this law, The US Government is promoting continued leadership in the United States in AI R&D, developing reliable AI systems in the public and private sectors, building an AI system ecosystem across society, and strengthening DB management and access to AI policies conducted by all federal agencies. In the 14th Five-Year (2021-2025) Plan and 2035 Long-term Goals held in 2021, China has specified AI as the first of the seven strategic high-tech technologies, and is developing policies aimed at becoming the No. 1 AI global powerhouse by 2030. The UK is investing in innovative R&D companies through the 'Future Fund Breakthrough' in 2021, and is expanding related investments by preparing national strategies to leap forward as AI leaders, such as the implementation plan of the national AI strategy in 2022. Israel is supporting technology investment in start-up companies centered on the Innovation Agency, and the Innovation Agency is leading mid- to long-term investments of 2 to 15 years and regulatory reforms for new technologies. The EU is strengthening its digital innovation hub network and creating the InvestEU (European Strategic Investment Fund) and AI investment fund to support the use of AI by SMEs. This study aims to contribute to analyzing the policies of major foreign countries in making AI company start-up policies and providing a basis for Korea's strategy search. The limitations of the study are the limitations of the countries to be analyzed and the failure to attempt comparative analysis of the policy environments of the countries under the same conditions.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.83-96
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• 2020

Traditionally social problems had been largely left to be handled by non-profit organizations, not because of lack of interests in social causes but mostly because of lack of innovative ideas to solve them in commercially viable ways. This market failure has recently been fixed by social enterprises, which manage to provide both solutions for social issues and commercially viable business models. As a result, we have been witnessing a sudden spike of public interests in these social enterprises as well as a call for empirical investigation on social enterprises by prior studies. However, empirically investigating a social enterprise has been a challenging endeavor mostly due to the insufficient number of successful social enterprises. Answering to the call in this study, we empirically investigate Goyohan Taxi, a successful social enterprise that partners with visually impaired cabdrivers and offers a taxi service, by both longitudinally interviewing the founder and adopting in vivo observation throughout the entrepreneurial journey of Goyohan Taxi. Based on the single case study method, we find that Goyohan Taxi adopts two distinctive decision-making mechanisms, the de-escalation of commitment and the orthogonality of commercial and social goals. Although generalizability of the our finding is minimal due to the limitation of single case study method, our finding contributes to the research of social entrepreneurship by offering new avenue of research in decision-making process of social entrepreneurs.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.51-78
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• 2021

Followed by 'start-up', the theme of 'scale-up' has been considered as an important agenda in both corporate and policy spheres. In particular, although it is a term commonly used in industry and policy fields, even a conceptual definition has not been achieved from the academic perspective. "Corporate Growth" in the academic aspect and "Business Growth" in the practical management field have different understandings (Achtenhagen et al., 2010). Previous research on corporate growth has not departed from Penrose(1959)'s "Firm as a bundle of resources" and "the role of managers". Based on the theory and background of economics, existing research has mainly examined factors that contribute to firms' growth and their growth patterns. Comparatively, we lack knowledge on the firms' growth with a focus on 'annual revenue growth rate'. In the early stage of the firms, they tend to exhibit a high growth rate as it started with a lower level of annual revenue. However, when the firms reach annual revenue of more than 100 billion KRW, a threshold to be classified as a 'middle-standing enterprise' by Korean standards, they are unlikely to reach a high level of revenue growth rate. In our study, we used our sample of 333 companies (6.7% out of 5,000 'fastest-growing' companies) which reached 15% of the compound annual growth rate in the last three years with more than USD 100 million. It shows that sustaining 'high-growth' above a certain firm size is difficult. The study focuses on firms with annual revenue of more than $100 billion (approximately 120 billion KRW) from the 'Inc. 2020 fast-growing companies 5,000' list. The companies have been categorized into 1) Fast-growing companies (revenue CAGR 15%~40% between 2016 and 2019), 2) Hyper-growing companies (40%~99.9%), and 3) Super-growing (100% or more) with in-depth analysis of each group's characteristics. Also, the relationship between the revenue growth rate, individual company's strategy choice (market orientation, generic strategy, growth strategy, pioneer strategy), industry/market environment, and firm age is investigated with a quantitative approach. Through conducting the study, it aims to provide a reference to the 'Hyper-Growing Model' that combines the paths and factors of growth strategies. For policymakers, our study intends to provide a reference to which factors or environmental variables should be considered for 'optimal effective combinations' to promote firms' growth.