The entrepreneurial effect of digital infrastructure development: micro evidence from China

Binhui Wei, Chunkai Zhao, Wenjun Cai, Boou Chen and Yufeng Lu

Information Technology for Development, 2025, vol. 31, issue 3, 604-634

Abstract: According to the Resource Dependence Theory (RDT), this study examines the entrepreneurial impact of digital infrastructure development on households in China. Drawing from a quasi-natural experiment of the Broadband China strategy, we applied the staggered difference-in-differences method. Our baseline results show that digital infrastructure development increases the likelihood of household entrepreneurship. Moreover, we found that this positive effect may be explained by information advantage, social network expansion, and financial constraint alleviation. Additionally, further analysis indicates that digital infrastructure development enhances household entrepreneurial performance and shows inclusive characteristics that are more conducive to promoting entrepreneurship among disadvantaged groups; through entrepreneurship, digital infrastructure development further promotes household economic welfare. Our research not only broadens the applicability of RDT within the digital economy domain but also significantly contributes to the information technology for development literature.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/02681102.2024.2403143

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