Investigating the factors fostering early-stage digital start-up survival during gestation in Nigeria market

Abstract

The challenge of failure is a well-known issue for many founders of digital start-ups during market entry. Unfortunately, sub-Saharan Africa has experienced a particularly high rate of failure for digital start-ups during early-stage development. Between 2010 and 2018, an average of 54.20% of digital start-ups failed on the continent. Globally, the survival rate during early-stage development is only around 10% to 20%, which means that roughly 80% of digital start-ups fail during market entry. To address this issue, it's critical to investigate the factors that contribute to the few successes, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. This study focuses on the behaviour of Nigerian founders whose digital start-ups survived during market entry. The goal is to explore how these founders overcame the various complexities and uncertainties that come with entrepreneurial activities in the Nigerian market. The researcher conducted a qualitative case study research, using enactment theory and effectuation theory to investigate the underlying factors that drive the actions and practices of founders to the early-stage survival of digital start-ups in Nigeria.

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