The Importance of Networking to Entrepreneurship : Montreal's Artificial Intelligence Cluster and Its Born-global Firm Element AI

While international business and economics literature once viewed companies as atomistic, disconnected units basing decisions solely on market incentives, recent studies have highlighted the importance of the so-called relational aspect or ‘network embeddedness' (Andersen and Lorenzen 2007; Turkina, Van Assche, and Kali 2016). Businesses and business owners are embedded in a wide range of social relationships ranging from formal inter-organizational networks to informal networks such as friendships and family ties, all of which affect decision-making and business performance (Turkina, Van Assche, and Kali 2016; Turkina and Thi Thanh Thai 2013). Social networks stimulate business growth by reducing transaction costs, creating business opportunities, and generating knowledge spillovers. Conceptual and empirical research on the importance of networking to entrepreneurs is still rather limited, however. The purpose of this special issue is therefore to explore various aspects of network embeddedness and their implications for entrepreneurship and small business development