Title: ICT incidence on the entrepreneurial activity at country level

Authors: María Verónica Alderete

Addresses: Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales del Sur (IIESS), CONICET, Universidad Nacional del Sur (UNS), 12 de Octubre and San Juan Street, (8000) Bahía Blanca, Buenos Aires, Argentina

Abstract: This paper examines the explanatory factors of entrepreneurship with special emphasis on the information and communication technologies (ICT) development at country level. The ICT incidence on entrepreneurship is a recent field of research. A five period panel data analysis, 2007-2011, is estimated for 59 countries. By using the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) total entrepreneurial activity indicator as the dependent variable, we observe a positive and significant influence of the ICT development on entrepreneurship. The main contribution of this paper is identifying an important area in need of more research in the entrepreneurship literature, linking ICT development to entrepreneurial activity. Recent estimations show that while mobile telephony is becoming more affordable worldwide, fixed broadband internet is not affordable for the majority of the world's inhabitants. Hence, a future extension of the model could be to examine the effect of mobile broadband tariffs on the entrepreneurial activity.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; information and communications technology; ICT; mobile bandwidth tariffs; economic development; panel data; information technology; entrepreneurial activity.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESB.2014.059472

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, 2014 Vol.21 No.2, pp.183 - 201

Published online: 31 May 2014 *

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