Approaching the relationship between entrepreneurship and innovation from different angles

Zusammenfassung

Entrepreneurship and innovation can be viewed as different sides of the same coin. Innovation is more related to novelty creation whereas entrepreneurship is more related to value creation. In other words, innovation is the source of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship allows innovation to flourish and to realize its economic and social value (Zhao 2005). The challenge is to understand the whole process from initial ideas to lasting realisations but, unfortunately, there is no common sense about how such process shall look like (Brem 2011). This dissertation covers a wide variety of topics relevant to the research into innovation and entrepreneurship and aims to represent a step forward in the understanding of the relationship between both concepts. This dissertation is structured in 6 chapters, being Chapter 1 devoted to present the research focus, objectives and structure. The main body is organised in 4 chapters as follows: Chapter 2 investigates Information and Communication Technology (ICT) adoption/usage frequency by different entrepreneurship types and the impact of this adoption/usage frequency on their performance, which is captured by earnings. Chapter 3 explores the interrelation between the share of the self-employed workforce in a given country that can be considered ‘entrepreneurial’ –which is associated with the share of Kirznerian entrepreneurs– and trademark registration at the country level. Chapter 4 examines whether the innovative nature of an economy as expressed by its level of R&D expenditure, affects the relative weight of different self-employment types based on occupational status and start-up motive. Chapter 5 analyses how the interplay between country R&D expenditure and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) laws affect entrepreneurs’ performance at the individual-level. The final chapter presents a summary of the main findings and implications of the work, and gives an outlook on future research areas on the various topics investigated in this dissertation. The empirical analysis is based on microdata drawn from the Fifth and Sixth waves of the European Working Conditions Survey –EWCS 2010 and 2015– (Eurofound). Data on registered trademarks at the country-level is derived from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Data on R&D expenditure at the country-level is derived from Eurostat. Finally, data on IPR protection in each economy is derived from the World Economic Forum's Executive Opinion Survey (WEF-EOS). As regards empirical methods, linear regressions and discrete choice models (binary, ordered and non-ordered) are used.