The wind industry is a mainstream energy technology which has now reached 50,000 megawatts (MW) of installation worldwide with a value of almost $10 billon in 2004 (one third of the total global investment in renewables). However, wind energy supplies barely 1% of all energy consumed. Government policies that promote renewable energy are necessary but insufficient to spur growth. The key is achieving further reductions in the Cost of Energy; however, the simple scaling up of existing technology is not a viable solution and new approaches to turbine and rotor blade design are needed. This paper examines the case of A2Wind, an innovative rotor blade company; focusing on its value proposition (superior carbon fiber blades) and the entry barriers it must overcome to establish itself in the wind energy market.

This study examined business ownership among foreign-born Hispanic entrepreneurs. Through semi-structured face-to-face interviews, the researchers examined motivations to enter business ownership as well as different business practices and the possible relationship between these practices and business viability. It appears that in the Las Vegas metropolitan area, pull factors have a stronger impact on entrepreneurship than push factors do, drawing individuals into entrepreneurship. In addition, the importance of preparing of a business plan and investing in advertising for business viability is identified.

The essence of this paper is to determine the major barriers that inhibit the growth of small enterprises in Kisumu town in Western part of Kenya. The study was guided by the following hypotheses:

A literature review having preceded our empirical test clearly indicates a strongly positive causal association between barriers' variable and small enterprises growth variable.

Primary data were collected from 100 entrepreneurs of small enterprises in Kisumu town. Structured questionnaires were administered to the entrepreneurs and their employees.

The findings of this study indicate that entrepreneurs of small enterprises face many barriers. These barriers result from lack of skills, institutional support from the organizations and poor implementation and co-ordination of policies by the implementing agencies. These factors results to moribund of enterprises hence slow growth of Small enterprises in the region.

The paper concludes by recommending that the environment of small enterprises should be enhanced by introducing support programmes such as training, consultancy and counseling to enable small enterprise grow.

This paper deals with the role of a construct defined as "organizational growing pains" as a potential barrier to corporate entrepreneurship. It has a dual purpose:1) to explain the nature of the construct of "growing pains" and suggest how they might function as a barrier to corporate entrepreneurship, and 2) to present the results of some preliminary empirical research designed to investigate the relationship between corporate entrepreneurship and growing pains.

It was hypothesized that organizations' growing pains will be an obstacle to its corporate entrepreneurship efforts. Data was collected from over 400 participants representing 17 divisions of an organization. Hypotheses were tested using linear regression analyses and correlation analyses. Results of the study supported hypothesized relationships, indicating that organizational growing pains are detrimental to corporate entrepreneurship. This has significant implications for researchers in corporate entrepreneurship and managers of organizations.

The paper suggests a framework for assessing the effects of entrepreneurial motivation and start-up reasons, founder and venture characteristics, and perception of entrepreneurial and business environment on entrepreneurial growth intentions. The focus is on entrepreneurs in transition economies. The paper develops as follows. First, the theoretical foundations of studying entrepreneurial growth aspirations; second, the variables proposed to be included in the framework; finally, some theoretical and practical implications, limits of the study, and directions for further research.

Entrepreneurial focused organizations that define and promote innovation as a critical subcomponent of their organizational ideology are increasingly faced with the challenge of how to define and teach innovation through routines. Some of these challenges include the need to create enough structure in these routines so that an individual can learn how to read their environments effectively in order to introduce new concepts, processes, technologies, or ventures. At the same time, these routines cannot be too restrictive in that they impede individual creativity, which may impact strategic advantage. This difficulty is further compounded when organizational definitions of innovation as found in organizational ideology statements (e.g., mission and value statements) and in innovations routines (e.g., daily meetings, classes) are not consistent with each other. Ramifications of organizations either attending to or not attending to this balance can impact individual beliefs with respect to what individuals can do in the organization. Validation or violation of these beliefs also known as psychological contracts may result in individuals becoming more excited or more disenfranchised with their organization, thereby impacting their ability to achieve creative outcomes in these organizations. Drawing from interview data from individuals, this paper presents initial findings for future exploration and research regarding this topic.

In this paper the authors are surveying the connection between organizational culture and leadership styles in small firms in Bosnia and Herzegovina. For that purpose they have formed 6x6 interdependence matrix of organizational culture and leadership styles and on that basis they have conducted survey in 57 small firms. The obtained results are shoving that:

The will for independence is often advanced as a fundamental motivation for becoming an entrepreneur, but, according to Ettinger (1983), it should be divided into three forms, which can be placed on a continuum: the will to reject others' power, the desire of autonomy and the pursuit of power. As a result, there would be two kinds of entrepreneurs: those who are solely motivated by self-determination and those who are ready to ultimately sacrifice part of their freedom to the profit of power and who, as a consequence, can more easily expand their business. After defining the concepts of autonomy in the managerial and psychoanalytical theoretical settings, our paper aims at showing, on the basis of 30 open-ended interviews of entrepreneurs based in France, Lebanon and Tunisia, that there is no clear-cut dividing line between entrepreneurs motivated by autonomy and those who seek power, but that there is one between those "pushed" to entrepreneurship and those "pulled" by it.

The authors examine Human Resource Management (HRM) practices using data from two case studies of high technology entrepreneurial organizations in Portugal. The objectives of the study are: Describe HRM and identify HRM practices used in the organization; Understand how decisions were made concerning adoption of new HRM practices and; Explore the perception of the primary decisions makers and employees in the organization and their acceptance of HRM systems and practices.

The main conclusions are: Formal HRM practices (i.e. those which are "prescribed" and "official") that are similar across organizations can yield different social results. Trust-building practices are an important element in the process through which HRM impacts organizational performance. HRM has to implement a developmental process through which workers can understand and accept HRM practices to have a sustained impact on organizational performance.

Is the artist an entrepreneur? The fundamental question of bridging artists and their artistic expressions as entrepreneurial activities is a research domain that remains largely unexplored. On the surface, artists are perpetually engaging in creating (developing) artistic expressions (new products) with the sole purpose of displaying (marketing) and earning a living (revenues). However, there is little research that links that explores the entrepreneurial dynamics of artists. Hence, the establishment of a relationship between art and entrepreneurship will provide the research domain to facilitate further research and exploration in unraveling the association of entrepreneurship and art. Although this research effort attempts to present the learning styles of aspiring artists, a brief overview of a proposed conceptual model is introduced as a contextual setting of the broader research domain; secondly, it will extract a component from the conceptual model and present exploratory results on the learning styles of artists. Given the reality of minimal research on the entrepreneurial nature of artists, the authors of this paper will attempt to make an axiomatic shift and introduce traditional entrepreneurial literature, thus, initiating the research and the aspiring intellectual debate. The research efforts will mirror the plethora of entrepreneurship theory and practice research.

An increasing number of companies in the service and trade industries with physical distribution channels also do transactions online with consumers. However, a large part of these companies do not succeed with such business-to-consumer (B2C) online transactions even if they succeed offline. The literature of explaining and giving advice on such an entrepreneurial challenge is growing, but still limited. This paper contributes to this field.

In this paper eight strategic opportunities are identified when such traditional companies go online and become multi-channel companies. The eight opportunities are findings based on personal interviews of 11 general managers who have strategic responsibility for implementing the companies' online channel. While most papers focus on the important role of IT for traditional companies to succeed online, the unique findings reported in this paper show that cultural and organizational factors are of higher importance. The paper spells out in detail the content of such factors. The empirical part at the end of the paper data indicates that the focus on cultural and organizational factors do give higher sales online, and that companies that apply these eight factor have a high customer satisfaction.

Previous studies on entrepreneurship, market orientation, and innovation mainly related it to business performance; there is a lack of studies that relate these capabilities to customer value. The paper aims to investigate the impact of entrepreneurship, market orientation and innovation on customer value. A mail survey was used to collect data from hotel managers. In total, 247 out of 801 managers responded to the research giving an effective response rate of 29%. All measures had robust psychometric properties. The results indicate that entrepreneurship has a strong and positive relationship with customer value. Entrepreneurship was also found to have a significant indirect effect on customer value through integrated market orientation and innovation. The results further suggest that entrepreneurship and market orientation are important antecedents of innovation. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by offering the conceptual model of the linkage among entrepreneurship, market orientation, innovation and customer value.

This paper addresses the following three research questions: (1) Why don't more Born Globals exist? (2) Is it possible to increase the absolute number of Born Globals? and (3) Is it possible to accelerate the internationalization process for venture-backed start-ups? To address the first question, evidence is drawn from the literature as well as from observations made during the first author's experiences assisting U.S. high technology companies with their Japan market entry and Japan market development efforts. To address the second and third questions, propositions are motivated with the intention of normatively reducing the uncertainty associated with the internationalization of new ventures, thereby removing a significant barrier to going global.

This is a case study in international entrepreneurship intended to convey the strategic vision, business expertise, and managerial style of a young Jordanian-born entrepreneur named Ahmad Taha, who arrived in the United States in the early1990s to study engineering and ended up an accomplished dealer and exporter of second-hand restaurant equipment. Mr. Taha was an outstanding planner, a calculated risk taker, and a team player. His strategy was to "go global" to take advantage of market opportunities and, simultaneously, satisfy customer demand. He capitalized on the "Re-use and Re-cycle" movement, and the trend toward frugality.

The slowdown of the economic growth in the European Union (EU) made its members search for new engines capable of reviving the economy. One of the ways chosen by the French government to shake up the economy was to encourage the creation and growth of young innovative companies, also called start-ups (report FutuRIS, 2004). Indeed, the growth of the economies such as the USA, the UK and Israel is often attributed to a dynamic layer of high-tech start-ups operating in a favourable legal, financial and cultural environment (Gompers and Lerner, 2001, FutuRIS 2004).

Although the start-ups are associated with high potential gains, they also bear high technological and financial risks. Due to these high risks, traditional modes of financing, such as bank loans, do not support newly created firms, while alternative modes, such as venture capital (VC), remain underdeveloped in Europe. At the turn of the century, venture and seed investments in Europe composed less than 0,2% of its GDP, while in the USA they represented nearly 0,5% of the gross domestic product. In addition, France was lagging behind the average level of venture investments in Europe with nine countries ahead of it (EVCA, NVCA, 2001).

To fill in the equity gap of early-stage start-ups, the French government initiated, within the framework of the law of Finance (1999), the creation of seed funds (SF). Nowadays, there are eighteen national seed funds in France launched for a period of ten years to invest into innovative companies searching for the first round of financing. It is important to underline that although the seed funds enter into the first financial round, they keep on investing into a start-up till an opportunity to withdraw the capital appears: in most cases such as an IPO or a LBO.

A growing body of research is available regarding the economic value of venture capital as an asset class, and its impact on society and industry through the stimulation of innovation. The authors of this document seek to understand and apply that research to the post-bubble era in which a new generation of venture managers must operate. The investment environment has gone through a major restructuring during the crisis of 2000-2003, characterized by greater specialization, emphasizing capital development of growing companies with products already in the market, to the detriment of early-stage support for innovative entrepreneurs. In the new era of uncertainty, characterized by a maturing, increasingly professional venture capital industry, stock prices have come back to earth and financial returns are the product of sustained effort by seasoned teams rather than brilliant improvisation by a few visionaries. The authors draw from their experience in the management of several early-stage funds to show that support by business angels and mentor networks is an increasingly important factor in successful high-technology investing: Euro-America III's investments that originated as referrals from angel investors generated values that were 2.47 times higher than referrals from other venture capital funds. Investments that originated from the personal networks of fund managers generated values that were 2.69 times higher than referrals from other venture capital funds.

The results of an empirical study of the venture capital financing choices of 59 entrepreneurs are reported. The relative importance of seven selection criteria are obtained by self-report and by conjoint simulation. The conjoint analysis demonstrates that entrepreneurs seeking venture capital place greatest importance upon valuation and personal compatibility and place little importance upon value-added services or the skill and independence of the venture capitalist. These results appear to depend upon industry, size of the financing round, and the gender and financing experience of the entrepreneur. Differences between the results obtained from the two methodologies also suggest that entrepreneurs are poor at introspecting into their capital-sourcing decision processes.

The paper addresses the symbiotic relationship of social entrepreneurship and corporate social responsibility and presents a successful case of social enterprise, business venture collaboration instrumental in initiating social change. A brief review of the context and nature of social entrepreneurship is followed by a discussion of its role in contributing to the effort needed to realize social goals focused on sustainable development and in providing opportunity and medium for corporate social responsibility. A successful case of social enterprise and bussines collaboration that demonstrates the synergy attained is presented.

This study explores the intersection of socially responsible business and design. In particular, the research examines how leaders of new business ventures who endeavor to be more socially responsible, use design as a tool to communicate their vision and values and to position themselves strategically in the marketplace.

The way in which entrepreneurs and business leaders employ design in their organization can significantly impact how their vision, values, and mission are ultimately communicated to internal and external stakeholders. Understanding effective design strategies can therefore help organizations gain competitive advantage; so much so, that many traditional MBA programs now include design courses as part of their curriculum (Joziasse, 2000). While gaining insight into effective design strategies can benefit all businesses, it is particularly important for the survival of socially responsible new ventures since their consumers and stakeholders demand more evidence of their values.

The presentation will exhibit short video clips of social entrepreneurs commenting on the strategic role design played in the development of their organization. Emerging themes reveal design to be an effective tool for: 1) Strategic business planning, to focus the vision and test the business model through reflective practice; 2) Communication, to crystallize the message and convey less tangible concepts. 3) Empowering people, to nurture self-concept and foster creativity within the organization; 4) Growth, personal and organizational; and 5) Innovation and Change, particularly with respect to challenging existing paradigms.

Identifying the factors driving women's ability to launch a sustainable venture amid the political, economic, and social challenges of post-war economies in Rwanda a! nd Afghanistan is the aim of this work. Understanding these drivers of success is important because women traditionally take on the role of caring for families left without husbands and fathers once war has ceased, and because women are critical resources during the rebuilding period. The project consists of interviews with women entrepreneurs launching enterprises in the two countries and will focus on the challenges hindering their business' growth and the circumstances enabling their success in these post-conflict settings. These entrepreneurs confront myriad challenges in launching their start-ups, including lack of capital, infrastructure weakness, and societal stereotypes. Yet despite the obstacles this small network of women is turning to business to support their families, create employment, and fight the poverty gripping their nations.

Today, French public policy implementation needs a new entrepreneurial approach (Osborne and Plastrik, 1997). This paper aims to elaborate and propose several key guidelines to assist public servants in acting efficiently, in order to contribute to the development of an entrepreneurial model in public policy implementation.

This model is based on process analysis, actor's involvement in changes, and construction of collective entrepreneurial representations. The model's originality comes from its maieutic dimension which allow politicians to avoid traditional resistances to changes modifying the ways people see, think and act (Padioleau and Le Guern, 2004).

The framing questions for the study are: how was designed, and developed this systemic entrepreneurial model of public policy implementation, as a substitute for bureaucratic public management model (Gingrich, 2005). We will underline the results, implications and limits of this model and the way to improve it. We will also analyze how the entrepreneurial model tends to develop entrepreneurial spirit and abilities of people, and of organization, furthering exchanges, involvement in work, transversality, value creation and improving global performance. We will also highlight the entrepreneurial public organization's characteristics, its implications for the actors, and how they can be implemented.

This paper concerns the possibility that entrepreneurs' perceptions of networking might drive enacted networking behaviors - and that these behaviors might impact new venture progress (either directly or through network structure). More specifically, the paper describes an empirical study that sought to clarify the role of networking behaviors and network structures in new venturing. The results suggest that (i) differing definitions of "networking" across nascent entrepreneurs drive differential network management behaviors (behaviors encompassing network creation, exploitation, and maintenance); and (ii) particular behavioral choices on the part of entrepreneurs are more likely to lead to new venture progress. In theoretical terms, the results indicate that traditional measures of network structure might obscure the direct impact of individual behaviors on business outcomes; hence, the existing research focus on network structure as a cause of business outcomes might well be balanced with an enhanced understanding of network structure as an outcome of individual behaviors.

Social networks play a critical role in the formation of new ventures. Entrepreneurial networking is the key approach for the entrepreneurs to gain information and strategic resources. The object of this paper is to develop a conceptual model of entrepreneurial process connect with social networks and performance. In this article, we explore the relationship between two levels of social networks (personal and inter-organization) and distinguish three entrepreneurial processes (discovery of opportunities, securing of resources, gaining of legitimacy). Furthermore, the study discusses the influence of entrepreneurial activities' processes on the performance of new venture creation. In this explorative study, we analyze the technological-based venture case in Taiwan and develop a number of propositions concerning the effects of networking on the start-ups.

At a time when Philippine economy is in the midst of major upheaval and transformation, a new type of leadership with an entrepreneurial mind-set distinct from the conventional managerial leadership emerged, most of which are Chinese businesses have diversified and grown into large enterprise and become more competitive. This study discusses findings from entrepreneurial leadership by experienced of Chinese entrepreneur, Dr. Lucio C. Tan, who successfully build a business empire from tough business challenges, where new generation of business leaders must exhibit a special brand of entrepreneurial to embrace success, to ensure survival is continuous and not a one time success story. Given their importance and business practices will boost the confidence of taking advantage of the crisis while starting and operating an enterprise to uplift nation's economy in today's global challenges.

As a number of authors have noted one of the characteristics of many technology start-ups nowadays is that they are "born global" (Oviatt and McDougall, 1997; Knight and Cavusgil, 1996). These are companies that internationalize quite early on, usually within 4 years of starting up. The process of internationalization in born global firms is usually contrasted with the internationalization process described by authors such as Johanson and Vahlne (1977) in which firms internationalize gradually from familiar markets to less familiar markets as they gain more experience. One question that arises in rapid internationalization is how born global firms manage to skip these learning stages. This paper compares the process of internationalization in five "born global" Australian companies in the chemical/biotechnology sector with that of a professional services company that internationalized more gradually from a learning perspective. First, it examines the different reasons why the firms internationalized. Second, it examines the different methods used to internationalize and the learning outcomes that resulted in each case. Our proposition based on an analysis of the cases is that born global firms do not learn any more or any faster than other startups; on the contrary, they use methods to reduce the amount of learning that is required while capitalizing on their areas of core competence. We discuss the methods used by the firms, implications for management of technology firms and entrepreneurship research.

Education in entrepreneurship is a relatively recent addition to the curriculum of institutions of higher education in Portugal in spite of its direct leveraging effect on a country's economic growth. The aim of this paper is to compare the developing phenomenon of entrepreneurship education with specific attention to how it is organized, its pedagogic methods, and the use of technology in Portugal with that of the more "longstanding" tradition of entrepreneurship education in the United States.

In spite of the differences between the two countries - in size, culture, and economic performance - the experience that the US has accumulated regarding entrepreneurship education and the possibility to determine its effects on its economy and society, may be of interest to countries like Portugal who are now embarking on the same voyage. A comparative study allows a critical look at the two realities being compared which may enrich the analysis and the understanding of both. Through a survey administered countrywide in Portugal this paper gathers extensive data on all entrepreneurship courses currently run in Portugal including content and teaching methods. A comparison is then made with the US and conclusions drawn.

This paper aims to address the issue of the relationship between creativity and entrepreneurship. Our intention is first to deal with the question whether creativity is general or domain-specific: is entrepreneurial creativity only a particular application of a " general creativity " -, or is it a specific phenomenon that needs its own concepts and theories in order to be observed, analyzed, and explained? Second, we intend to explore the particular characteristics of entrepreneurial creativity, in order to elaborate and implement an effective educational and training program for entrepreneurs. We conducted exploratory qualitative research (semi-directed interviews with 10 novice and 10 habitual entrepreneurs) in the Business Incubator of the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in order to test two main research hypotheses: first, we examine if we can legitimately distinguish between different types of creativity, depending on different sectors of human activity; second, we intend to cast some light on the particular characteristics of the entrepreneurial creativity, and its relationship to the identity reconfiguration of novice entrepreneurs.

With the developments in Asia, there is little doubt that entrepreneurship education would make it way across from the West to Asia. However, the form and manner it takes may differ because of the context and the definition of entrepreneurship adopted. With the differences in Asia and development of entrepreneurship policies adopted by the Asian policy-makers,entrepreneurship education has variations across Asia. This paper outlines one such development in a new university in Singapore, involving the university with an an industry alliance