While answering the question: What are the opportunities for entrepreneurship? In this article, we will spend on identifying some of the core business and foundational elements of an entrepreneurial context. Specifically some classic definitions.
We'll also talk about some recent interpretations of the term, and also discuss some emerging opportunities.
Entrepreneurial opportunities
We are looking at identifying what entrepreneurial opportunities are, and this is an area that has been studied in research and mostly on campuses in the United States over several generations.
So this is by no means new to us. What we see in some of the early definitions are those situations in which new goods, services, raw materials, and methods of organization can be offered and sold at a cost greater than the cost of producing them.
While this definition may focus excessively on marketing concepts and ideas, it broadly gives you some ideas about what's new.
Then to the element of bringing something to the market and doing it where the economy makes sense, even if you're a nonprofit, corporation, or government, that there's an economic model that makes sense, in creating the delivery of new services. There are also other competing definitions.
There is the creation of new information, the invention, the exploitation of markets, and the reaction to transformations.
The main theme that we see here is that entrepreneurs are able to identify and act upon entrepreneurial opportunities, bring that to market, and make some fruit or success from it. Definitions vary, but the topics are generally similar.
Total wealth in billions of dollars for 2013
And with the resource revolution, there are names we know. There's software, retail, the internet, and the energy and automobile tycoons that have emerged in recent years. Gates, Waltons, Elon Musk, and other names we know do massive things.
They achieve great success in their projects and achieve their vision. They are not the first.
They're not the rich either, when we look at the urbanization that was happening largely in North America and the United States in the Gilded Age to look at oil and shipping and timber and railroads and things like that.
Huge amounts of wealth created by entrepreneurs and huge impacts on society to build that basic infrastructure.
We are seeing these opportunities begin to emerge as well in developing regions around the world.
They are, again, not the first. You can go back a century ago and look at mechanization, the industrial age.
What was happening in the manufacturing? What was happening in the banks and land?
What we're seeing here, again, is another generation of entrepreneurs who saw opportunities, realized themselves to bring something to the market and created entrepreneurship.
It has happened over and over again and we will learn from some of these individuals as we go through the course.
(GDP) Gross domestic product per capita
We also see that at the global level, there are huge changes taking place. We know this in a general context. But we may not know that in a quantitative context. One way to measure this is by GDP.
What this gives us is an idea of the emerging markets which are based in the countries this year. This creates whole new classes of citizens.
This creates not only a large upper class, but a very large middle class and upper middle class. This can buy things that were once unaffordable.
It can consume and participate in markets that previously were for others.
This brings a lot of western products and opportunities to new markets around the world. What does that mean for us as entrepreneurs?
First, if we are effective in recognizing that and being aware of that, we can achieve great things, often in partnerships with local people in that area.
Adoption rates in the United States
We can also see that the rate of adoption of new products and technologies has changed rapidly from the time of the early introduction of cars, washing machines, and the telephone.
It took decades to reach an adoption rate of 60 or 80% in the market, to the latest mobile, internet and computer technologies, which in a very short period of time reached 60, 80, 90% of the market options.
The rate of growth, the rate of adoption of new technologies is unprecedented. It also gives us insight when we look at these new areas and these new markets around the world, the curve will be everything.
And so, since we have ideas, we need to implement them. Lately, a good idea now would be a good idea for someone else later.
That way, when we talk about decision making, we'll think about how that happens inside of us, what we can do to enhance it, and what we can do to bring our ideas to market, perhaps more urgency.
To take advantage of the massive adoption that is happening of new technologies and new products.
Amazon is a great example of this, and Amazon is the company that we will look at as we write our content, as a mini case study of how we define and act on the activities of entrepreneurs. Amazon has been, for decades, a pioneer in print books, as well as in print and CD-based music.
It was a leader in movie sales and DVD sales. But today, 43% of their sales come from media, and digital goods are a growing part of that.
Amazon does not wait. They don't wait to see what happens to e-books. They don't wait to see what happens with online music.
This way, you'll see what's happening with your music, media, TV, video and movie streams by driving these graphics.
And what we see is some data that gives you some ideas about what that means, and what they did.
To enter and be a pioneer in the field, and not be comfortable being the incumbent.
Uncomfortable with the big company that used to be successful, but disappeared because they were too slow to respond.
Entrepreneurship and business opportunities
By all definitions, entrepreneurial opportunities are different from the general pool of job opportunities.
There are new, uncertain and dynamic relationships. There are new players involved.
There is a rapid race to bring evening products and technologies to market.
And what we want to do is by helping you understand that the opportunity definition piece is just a first step.
What we would like to do is help you improve your ability to see entrepreneurial opportunities to help you make more critical decisions.
To help you invoke these elements to be logical and intuitive and not have to choose one or the other. That you can make big decisions quickly and comfortably have serious consequences.
And that you can take the necessary steps to take advantage of the ideas and concepts that emerge.
Summary
So in short, when we look at entrepreneurial opportunities, it is a well-established and widely studied term.
We will provide you with information from the academic arena, as well as from the business landscape and our industry experience.
We'll talk about how new opportunities are emerging in the market, and what you can do to either check or expand on opportunities you might already be considering.
Or develop new opportunities that you may not have considered yet. And we want you to understand that decision-making is the foundation of entrepreneurial success.