Does entrepreneurial optimism affect business performance? Using a unique data set based on repeated survey design, we investigate this relationship empirically. Our measures of ‘optimism’ and ‘realism’ are derived from comparing the turnover growth expectations of 133 owners-managers...

This paper presents an empirical criterion for establishing privatization priorities for state owned enterprises. The approach uses firm performance as the basis for deciding the sequence in which firms are privatized. Sequencing is relevant because the order in which a group of state...

This paper presents a model of the joint venture that is grounded in the stylized facts we found from a sample of 200 joint venture contracts. The model incorporates the revenue-sharing contract into the incomplete contract frameworks of Grossman-Hart-Moore Property Rights Theory and the...

In this paper we analyze the evolution of firm financial efficiency in the Czech Republic. Using a large panel of more than 400,000 Czech firm/years we study whether firms fully utilize their resources, how firm financial efficiency evolves over time, and how firm financial efficiency is...

We use new firm-level data to examine the effects of spinoffs and privatization on corporate performance in a rapidly emerging market economy. Unlike the existing literature, which analyzes spinoffs almost exclusively in advanced economies, we control for accompanying ownership changes and the...

We extend agency theory to propose that structural reform positively impacts firm profitability in developing countries because the improvements in external monitoring that accompany structural reform decrease the agency costs faced by firms. However, we also argue that not all firms benefit...

There is no gender difference between success in establishing a business once both males and females have the same preference to self-employment and attempts towards establishing a new business. However, the gender gap tends to be huge when it comes to individual preferences and attempts to...

What is the interrelationship among formal institutions, social networks, and new venture growth? Drawing on the theory of institutional polycentrism and social network theory, we examine this question using data on 637 entrepreneurs from four different countries. We find the confluence of weak...

This article examines the contingent value of entrepreneurs' networks to survival likelihood of Internet ventures, and the dynamics of entrepreneurs' networks over time. The empirical data are composed of the longitudinal surveys of 94 Internet ventures in Beijing, China. The study found the...

Although the development of a new private sector is generally considered crucial to economic transition, there has been rather little empirical research on the determinants of startup firm growth. This paper uses panel data techniques to analyze a survey of 297 new small enterprises in Romania...