Effect of business opportunity recognition on entrepreneurs’ market perception

• Main Author: Riuttanen, L. (Laura)
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: University of Oulu 2015
• Subjects: Marketing
• Online Access: http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:oulu-201506111856; http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:fi:oulu-201506111856

To be able to act efficiently and productively on a certain market, an entrepreneur must have a perception and understanding of the driving forces and critical factors of the market. Prior research has found two business opportunity recognition manners, which are opportunity discovery and opportunity creation. Discovered opportunities are based on existing markets with an existing demand or supply. Created opportunities on the other hand are based on entrepreneurs’ own interests and the entrepreneur has to create both supply and demand for these innovations. This study aims to add understanding on how the business opportunity recognition manner affects the entrepreneurs’ market perception. Market perceptions are studied through market elements, which describe the market from a market actor’s perspective. As the aim of this study is to better understand a certain phenomena, a qualitative research method is used. The empirical research is conducted as a case study and the data is collected through semi-constructed interviews. There were in total eight entrepreneurs acting on an eHealth market, who were interviewed for this research. According to the empirical results of this study, the business opportunity recognition manner does have an effect on the entrepreneurs’ market perception. For both discovery and creation entrepreneurs, the demand and supply factors are in the core of their market perception, which both entrepreneurs can identify well. In general, the discovery entrepreneurs have a better understanding on market and its driving forces compared to creation entrepreneurs, who tend to struggle with finding their place on the market. This study helps entrepreneurs to understand how their business opportunity recognition manner affects their business. Entrepreneurs who have created their business opportunities need to accept that since they have not started their business based on an existing demand, they have to work harder to understand who their customers are and how they can serve them compared to discovery entrepreneurs. The results of this study should not be generalized unconditionally to other markets, but this study brought interesting insights to the opportunity recognition discussion.