This document summarizes a study exploring how entrepreneurial opportunities emerge in technology-based ventures through a constructivist lens. The study examines six case studies of tech entrepreneurs. The results show that opportunities were socially constructed through an iterative process of engaging knowledgeable peers to refine initial ideas and build consensus. Experienced entrepreneurs leveraged existing networks while novices relied on direct personal ties. All entrepreneurs strategized social exchange to gain feedback, assess technology, and make sense of markets, transforming perceptions until the opportunity became objective. The conclusions suggest promotion policies should support social construction processes that accelerate opportunity emergence.

1. A Constructivist Approach for
Technology-based Entrepreneurship
XXIII ISPIM Conference
Barcelona – June 20th
Ferran Giones (1), Zhao Zhou (2), Dr. Francesc Miralles (1), Dr. Bernhard Katzy (2)
(1) La Salle – Ramon Llull University
(2) CeTIM – Leiden University

2. Agenda
• Introduction
• Background
• Literature Review
• Method & Data
• Results
• Conclusions
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3. Introduction
• Technology-based entrepreneurship driver of economic
growth and social wealth.
• Dominant entrepreneurship models fail to provide reliable
guidelines for uncertainty-rich Tech-based entrepreneurship.
• Alternative theoretical perspectives for entrepreneurial
opportunities emergence aim to mitigate this gap.
• This research explores through the lenses of the constructivist
view how opportunities became objective in six case studies.
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4. Background
• Mechanisms to support entrepreneurial opportunities not
working well with tech-based entrepreneurship:
• Institutionalized view of how entrepreneurship works based on
industrial era assumptions (Honig & Karlsson 2004).
• Evidences of entrepreneurship promotion policies mixed results
(Shane 2009).
• What is different in Technology-based entrepreneurship?
• A priori technology-related uncertainty conditions entrepreneur
action (Teece 2010, McMullen & Shepherd 2006), in a process of plan
and action (Baker et al. 2003).
• Difficulties to clearly identify the objective opportunity.
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5. Literature Review
• Competing perspectives on opportunity identification:
• Discovery perspective: objective opportunities exist available to those that
can see them (Alvarez & Barney 2007).
• Alternative perspectives: propose that opportunities emerge through
entrepreneurs action in their social context (Klein 2008)
• The constructivist view as an alternative perspective (Wood
& McKinley 2010) to study opportunity objectification:
• Opportunity origin (initial idea) description combines elements from given
social context and individual perceptions.
• Consensus among knowledgeable peers drives to opportunity emergence.
• This research explores the social interaction processes in the
opportunity objectification following the constructivist view.
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6. Method & Data
• Method:
• Exploratory objective
• Inductive approach based on a multiple-case study with 6 technology-
based entrepreneurs.
• Sample:
• Cases in telecom (2), electronics (2) and software (2).
• Entrepreneur profiles: novice (4) and experienced (2), academic
researchers (2) and technology managers (4).
• Data collection & analysis:
• Interviews and secondary sources collected in 2009-2011.
• Stories: from first thoughts initial idea to the objective opportunity.
• Individual case stories and cross-case comparison.
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7. Results (1/3)
• Opportunity construction process in technology-based
entrepreneurship seen to combine structure and individual
elements (as suggested in Wood & McKinley 2010)
• Idea origin in a given social structure triggers a process of iteration
with knowledgeable peers using their pre-existent network.
“I’ve been many years doing research on asynchronous circuits…it has
began to be important as the mobile devices market has developed”
(Powchip founder).
• Regardless of potential mismatch between entrepreneur knowledge and
experience and venture idea (not explained by “discovery perspective”)
• Emergence explained entrepreneur’s social action (oriented
consensus building processes) as they perceive to have the ability to
make things happen (as described in “constructivist view”) :
“I started working from scratch for a new technological solution, changing
everything” (Winet founder).
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8. Results (2/3)
• Iteration with knowledgeable peers:
• Entrepreneur relies on already existing network of direct personal
ties (Newbert & Tornikoski 2010), without a planned peer selection
mechanism:
“talking with an entrepreneur in integrated circuits that I knew from prior
research projects” Winet Founder.
• Different patterns of action observed in experienced entrepreneurs:
• Pre-existent network includes both technology research and market
knowledge peers:
“it was my previous business partner that insisted on exploring together
the changes that internet and digital TV would produce” DigiTV Founder.
• Experienced entrepreneurs seen to be aware of the mechanisms
to accelerate idea refinement (in line with Dew et al. 2009 and
Politis 2008).
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9. Results (3/3)
• Consensus building
• Strategizing the social exchange (consistent with “constructivist
view”):
• Technology assessment: obtaining “encouraging feedback from the
conversations with colleagues and experts” (Hying founder).
• Market sensemaking (Weick et al. 2005): “You cannot get stuck in an idea
and stop listening to the or looking at the market” (DigiTV founder).
• Produces gains in social legitimacy (as in Tornikoski 2009) to further
advance in the consensus building process and mitigate stakeholders’
uncertainty perception:
“A third party evaluates the technology and raises the confidence level on
the idea” (Powchip founder).
• Resulting in a process of transformation where entrepreneurs and
stakeholders perceptions evolve together to reach opportunity
objectification (as suggested by Wood & McKinley 2010).
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10. Conclusions
• Institutionalized models of entrepreneurship do not hold well
with Tech-based entrepreneurship.
• Constructivist view (Wood & McKinley 2010) enriches the
opportunity “discovery perspective” uncovering the social
construction processes in the opportunity emergence.
• Results suggest the need for promotion policies that take into
account the “social construction” of opportunities:
• Provide support to iteration & consensus building processes.
• Consider the benefits of social construction processes as opportunity
emergence accelerator.
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