THRESHOLDS, NICHES AND INERTIA: ENTREPRENEURIAL OPPORTUNITIES IN THE STEAMSHIP INDUSTRY

Greg Clydesdale ()
Additional contact information
Greg Clydesdale: Lincoln University, Lincoln 7647, Canterbury, New Zealand

Journal of Enterprising Culture (JEC), 2012, vol. 20, issue 04, 379-404

Abstract: This paper seeks to increase understanding of the role the environment in the emergence of business opportunities, and how opportunities change as industries evolves. It explores the dynamics of entrepreneurial opportunity in the British steamship industry. It suggests niches are created when environmental thresholds are reached. Entrepreneurs who act before thresholds are reached fail. A complex relationship between inventors, innovators/entrepreneurs and higher order opportunities is revealed illustrating the difficulty of identifying 'higher order opportunities. Over time, variations in environmental forces changed niche size and carrying capacity. Causes of new niche formation were both exogenous and endogenous supporting both Kirzner and Schumpeter. Inertial forces inhibited the ability of existing players to seize opening niches and expanded opportunities for new comers.

Keywords: Entrepreneurial opportunity; thresholds; niches; higher order opportunity; steamships (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S0218495812500161
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wsi:jecxxx:v:20:y:2012:i:04:n:s0218495812500161

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from

DOI: 10.1142/S0218495812500161

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Enterprising Culture (JEC) is currently edited by Teck-Meng Tan

More articles in Journal of Enterprising Culture (JEC) from World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tai Tone Lim ().