Exploration of Process and Competitive Factors of Entrepreneurship in Digital Space : A Multiple Case Study in Iran

The purpose of this study is exploration of the process and competitive factors of entrepreneurship in digital space in Iran. In the last decades, the development and advancement of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the business innovations related to them have defined a new economy which is known as “digital economy”. Establishing and running businesses in this digital space means carrying out a kind of electronic commerce by exploiting the internet and other electronic networks. The new digital economy provides exceptional opportunities for many entrepreneurs to create new ventures in different business areas according to electronic commerce models. Given that researchers in Iran have not studied digital entrepreneurship and there is a great interest in digital entrepreneurship, further research is needed on this subject. According to a research in Canada by Carrier, Raymond, and Eltaief (2004) on cyber entrepreneurship, we used the same method and studied five cases that work in digital entrepreneurship in Iran. In this paper, we first review the literature of digital entrepreneurship- digital entrepreneurship framework that include a typology of digital ventures and their characteristics, characteristics of digital entrepreneurs, and the distinctions between digital entrepreneurship and traditional one. Then we surveyed five digital entrepreneurs in Iran to explore the process of their entrepreneurship and competitive elements applied by them. The most notable contribution of our research is our focus on the process of this type of entrepreneurship and the steps which were used by entrepreneurs. Unlike the traditional forms of entrepreneurship, the entrepreneurs in cyber space in Iran did not examine their feasibility of their projects. And also the identification of a business opportunity created business ideas. The other contribution of our research is entrepreneurs’ competitive elements. We found 10 factors as the internet-based entrepreneurs’ competitive elements in Iran. Also we found interesting results about characteristics of internet-based entrepreneurs. This paper provides an overview of internet-based entrepreneurship in Iran. According to collected information, we propose the process of internet-based entrepreneurship and its competitive elements, and establish a basis for future research