New venture legitimacy and entrepreneurial support

Abstract

Many of today’s entrepreneurs opt for a period in an incubator in order to take advantage of the assistance, support and enhanced legitimacy that incubators offer. Yet these entrepreneurs do not all have the same expectations. To determine the characteristics that differentiate entrepreneurs in the new venture process, we crossed two complementary perspectives: neo-institutional theory and the opportunity-based approach. We developed a conceptual framework to take into account four key variables in the entrepreneurial process: the search for legitimacy, opportunity pursuit, role of networks, and new venture support. Our results showed that entrepreneurs can be differentiated on the basis of competitive and professional legitimacy. Our analyses further indicate that the degree of professional legitimacy possessed by the entrepreneur has an impact on expectations for the incubator.

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