• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.193-207
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• 2024

Purpose - With the increase of non-face-to-face activities due to the spread of COVID-19, O2O industry has grown rapidly which reduces contact points between suppliers and consumers. O2O platform is now recognized as an indispensable channel of distribution, but the voice is getting louder that it is necessary to check how it contributes to the performance of suppliers or how its fee system or contract terms affects the expansion of O2O industry as the leading companies tend to monopolize the market. Design/methodology/approach - In this study, the scope was limited to the restaurant industry in which transactions are the most active among the O2O industry and a regression analysis was done on 775 businesses that had used guarantor service from the Seoul Credit Guarantee Foundation. Findings - Analysis on the impact of O2O platform system, information, and service quality on the business performance of the sole proprietors revealed that the system quality represented by ease of use and the information quality determined by level of timely, accurate and reliable information provided to the consumers have a statistically significant effect on the improvement of business performance. In addition, the effect of business performance on the loyalty measured by the likelihood of users continuing to use the service as well as recommending it to others was moderated by the satisfaction with contract terms, not by the fee system. Research implications or Originality - Although the number of O2O platform providers has increased manyfold, the membership rate is no more than 20%, which means that the small business owners are still struggling with digital transformation. In order for the O2O industry, which is now commonplace, to form a healthy ecosystem that satisfies both suppliers and consumers, the standard contract guidelines that are acceptable to both parties must be established and the O2O providers must offer services that help suppliers to improve performance.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.111-122
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• 2017

This study analyzes the current state of entrepreneurship education and start-up foundations by country in order to find ways to improve the domestic entrepreneurial environment and to promote the recognition of desirable entrepreneurship practices. It also investigates the relationship between entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial will, and the level of opportunity-based entrepreneurships, by using data from the 2016 Global Entrepreneurship Trend Report (GETR). First, the results show the urgent need for the expansion of entrepreneurship education in Korea. In the GETR category of 'experience of entrepreneurship education in elementary, middle and high schools', Korea was ranked very low (19th place), among the 20 countries. In the 'college' and 'lifelong entrepreneurship education' categories, it procured a mid-level ranking (15th). While entrepreneurship education for all ages is being promoted globally, entrepreneurship education for middle-aged individuals in Korea is relatively weak. This implies that the expansion of entrepreneurship education to lifelong education and education for employees and retirees is required. Second, the individual's entrepreneurial intention in Korea was 3.8 points, implying a mid-level ranking (15th), and it ranked the lowest in terms of opportunity-based entrepreneurship (20th). In comparison to China (4.55) and the United States (4.01), the entrepreneurial intention of Koreans was found to be low. The level of opportunity-driven entrepreneurship was also found to be very low, compared to China (4.35), Japan (4.04) and the United States (4.59). In general, the proportion of the level in opportunity-driven entrepreneurship, increases from the factor-driven and efficiency-driven, to the innovation-driven type. In Korea, the percentage of entrepreneurial ventures centered around involuntary entrepreneurship and small businesses is high. It is also interpreted that opportunity-based entrepreneurships are low in number because of this high proportion of involuntary start-up and small businesses. Last, the entrepreneurial intention in all types (factor-driven, efficiency-driven, and innovation-driven) was exceptionally high. It has been confirmed that exposure to all entrepreneurship education (elementary, junior high, university, and lifelong education) in innovation-driven countries, greatly increases entrepreneurial intention. In the case of Korea, which is an innovation-driven country, qualitative improvement based on quantitative expansion of entrepreneurship education is expected to be a major driving force for individuals' entrepreneurial intention to obtain a mid-level ranking (15th).

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.125-140
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• 2018

According to statistics, it is shown that domestic SMEs rely on bank loans for the majority of fund procurement. From financial information shortage (Thin file) that does not provide information necessary for credit evaluation from banks such as financial statements. In order to overcome these problems, recently, in alternative finance such as P2P, using differentiated information such as demographics, trading information and the like utilizing Fintech instead of existing financial information, small funds A new credit evaluation method has been expanding to provide SMEs with small amounts of money. In this paradigm of environmental change, in this research, credit evaluation which can expand fund supply to SMEs by utilizing big data based on trade area information such as sales fluctuation, location conditions etc. In this research, we try to find such a solution. By analyzing empirically the big data generated in the trade area, we verify the effectiveness as a credit evaluation factor and try to derive the main parameters necessary for the business performance evaluation of the founder of SMEs. In this research, for 17,116 material businesses in Seoul City that operate the service industry from 2009 to February 2018, we collect trade area information generated for each business location from Big Data specialized company NICE Zini Data Co., Ltd.. We collected and analyzed the data on the locations and commercial areas of the facilities that were difficult to obtain from SMEs and analyzed the data that affected the Corporate financial Distress. It is possible to refer to the variable of the existing unused big data and to confirm the possibility of utilizing it for efficient financial support for SMEs, This is to ensure that commercial lenders, even in general commercial banks, are made to be more prominent in one sector of the financing of SMEs. In this research, it is not the traditional financial information about raising fund of SMEs who have basically the problem of information asymmetry, but a trade area analysis variable is derived, and this variable is evaluated by credit evaluation There is differentiation of research in that it verified through analysis of big data from Trading-area whether or not there is an effect on.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.167-187
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• 2020

Currently, Korea is changing into an ultra-aging society, and office workers retire at the age of 49.5 on average from their main jobs, and the national pension is delayed from 62 years old to 65 years old by 2034, so research is needed to prepare for the aging of office workers after retirement. The purpose of this study is to examine the factors affecting the intention to start a business after retirement and the mediating effect of another sense of success expectation on life after retirement, targeting office workers nationwide. Changes in individual attitudes and systematic institutional support are needed to prepare for a sustainable job until the age of 100 after retirement, that is, a start-up utilizing wisdom and experience in work life. As a result of the study, the ability to perform the goal as job performance, economic preparation for retirement preparation, preparation for external relations, and future anxiety have a positive effect on the entrepreneurial will, and the ability to use new technologies as job performance, and physical preparation for retirement. Preparation and preparation for internal relations were found to have no effect. In the influencing relationship between preparation for external relations and the will of start-up, and future anxiety and will of start-up, another sense of success was confirmed to have a partial mediation effect. In the relationship between economic preparation and willingness to start a business, the effect of complete mediation was confirmed. In order to increase the will to start a business after retirement, it was confirmed that another sense of expectation for success was an important variable. Introducing a government-sponsored education system in the company to reduce the government's financial burden due to super-aging and achieve corporate growth through employee training while potential founders, office workers, are employed, and entrepreneurship and goals for the three life goals of office workers By introducing a performance improvement program, we were able to get implications that would be a solution to the growth of individuals and businesses and reducing the government's financial burden.

• Journal of Venture Innovation
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.109-115
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• 2022

As the 4th industrial revolution progresses, foreign countries are promoting smart manufacturing innovation through digital transformation as a priority task early on to secure a competitive edge in the manufacturing industry. In response, the Korean government is also promoting a policy to enhance the competitiveness of small and medium-sized manufacturing companies by promoting digital transformation in the corporate sector to meet the global trend of the 4th industrial revolution era. Manufacturing powerhouses such as Germany and Japan see manufacturing as a key sector in digital transformation and are leading related policies, while emerging countries such as China are also promoting manufacturing innovation strategies such as building digital infrastructure and creating a digital innovation ecosystem. Korea is promoting the 'Korean-style smart factory dissemination and expansion strategy' by transforming Germany's manufacturing innovation strategy for smart factory supply to suit the domestic situation. However, the policy to supply smart factories so far has been conducted with support from individual companies under the leadership of the government, and most of the smart factories are at the basic level, and it is evaluated that there are limitations such as the lack of manpower to operate smart factories. In addition, while the current policy focuses on expanding the supply of smart factories in SMEs, it is necessary to establish a smart manufacturing system through linkages between large and small businesses in order to achieve the original goal of establishing a smart manufacturing system. Therefore, it can be said that from the standpoint of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), who are consumers of smart factories, it can be said that the digital transformation policy can achieve the expected results only when appropriate incentives are provided for the introduction of smart factories in a situation where management resources such as funds, technology, and human resources are lacking. In addition, it is judged that the uncertainty of the performance of digital investment always exists, and as long as large and small companies are maintained as an ecosystem of delivery and subcontracting, there is very little incentive for small and medium-sized manufacturing companies to voluntarily invest in or advance digital transformation. Therefore, the digital transformation policy of small and medium-sized manufacturing companies in the future has practical significance in that it suggests that there is a need to seek ways to attract SMEs' digital-related voluntary investment.

• Journal of Venture Innovation
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.43-60
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• 2023

Although the importance of starting a business is being emphasized, it is not easy for a start-up to survive. Therefore, it is necessary to come up with a plan to strengthen startup satisfaction and improve the survival rate of startup companies. In this study, we examined the impact of start-up motivation, start-up capabilities, and start-up passion of start-up companies on start-up satisfaction, as well as the moderating effect according to the founding type of general start-up companies and startups. Entrepreneurship motivation was divided into self-actualization motivation and pro-social motivation. Entrepreneurship capabilities were divided into marketing capabilities and experience capabilities. Entrepreneurship passion was divided into harmonious passion and obsessive passion. Empirical analysis was conducted by receiving surveys from 361 managers of general and startup companies within 7 years of founding their businesses online and offline. As a result, self-actualization motivation, pro-social motivation, marketing competency, experiential competency, and harmonious passion had a significant positive (+) effect on startup satisfaction. However, obsessive passion did not have a significant effect. In addition, the magnitude of influence on startup satisfaction appeared in the following order: harmonious passion, marketing competency, self-actualization motivation, pro-social motivation, and experiential competency. The moderating effect according to the type of founding of general start-ups and startups was found in pro-social motivation, experience competency, and passion for harmony. However, there was no significant moderating effect between self-actualization motivation, marketing competency, obsessive passion, and entrepreneurship satisfaction. This study presented academic implications that harmonious passion and marketing capabilities are important factors in improving startup satisfaction. In addition, practical and policy implications were presented, including the need for programs to support the psychological stability of startup business owners, strengthening startup capabilities through experts, and strengthening startup education programs that can foster self-actualization motivation and pro-social motivation.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.103-117
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• 2022

The recent corporate economy, such as the COVID 19 pandemic that has spread all over the world since the beginning of 2020, the acceleration of the 4th industrial revolution, and supply chain management risks triggered by the US-China conflict and the Ukraine crisis, is more serious than ever before. CEOs who have started and managed small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are more concerned than ever about the sustainability of their businesses in this reality. Nevertheless, there were few empirical studies on the factors that influence the intention of SME CEOs to discontinue business. In this study, the perception of the business environment of SMEs (intensity of competition in key business areas, difficulty in manpower management), corporate competency (employee competency, company product or service competitiveness, supply chain and consumer relations, digital competency and technical expertise), and CEO's competency(trust between employees and the CEO, management competency and perceived health status of CEO) on CEO's intention to discontinue business was discussed. As a result of the study, the intensity of competition in the main business field, and the difficulty in manpower management had a positive (+) effect on the intention to discontinue the business, and the employee competency, product (service) competitiveness, digital competency of the company, and the CEO's Health status had a negative (-) effect on intention to discontinue business. The relationship between these influences was found in the order of CEO's health status, product competitiveness, employee competency, digital competency, competitive strength in the main business, and difficulty in manpower management. It was analyzed that supply chain and consumer relations, trust between employees and the CEO, and management capabilities did not significantly affect the intention to discontinue business. On the other hand, business confidence has a mediating effect between the intensity of competition in the main business field, the difficulty in manpower management, product or service competitiveness, digital competency, trust between employees and the CEO, and the management capability and intention to discontinue business was tested. This study had academic significance in that it empirically analyzed factors related to intention to discontinue business targeting small and medium-sized business CEOs. In practice, as it has been found that business environment awareness, corporate competency, managerial competency, and business confidence are factors that influence the intention to discontinue business, if an action ideas that can reinforce this part can be found, SMEs can achieve sustainable growth or it may help CEO find an meaningful exit.

• Journal of Venture Innovation
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.45-63
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• 2024

The success of a company in the market is linked to the value it delivers to its customers. However, that value is not always constant. As the environment changes, so do customer experiences and requirements, and eventually the value they seek also evolves. Thus, a timely, clear, and effective value proposition, along with the associated benefits, becomes the functional, psychological, and economic foundation of a business. Therefore, the customer value proposition is crucial in terms of Product-Market Fit (PMF), establishing competitive differentiation, and delivering consistent messaging. Despite this, the most widely known and utilized model related to the Customer Value Proposition (CVP) in general businesses is the Value Proposition Canvas (VPC) by Osterwalder and Pigneur. Apart from that, there are only a few other models used by scholars and experts. In this paper, I selected the VPC model, which is widely used by business practitioners globally, and two other major CVP models well-known to experts. I conducted a detailed analysis of these models and derived the essential elements and key features of a customer value proposition. These were then combined with the Lean Startup methodology, which is frequently used for innovation today, to design an integrated CVP model that startups can easily utilize. The framework proposed in this study is a comprehensive CVP model that incorporates the strengths, weaknesses, characteristics, and commonalities of the three existing CVP models. It is designed to flexibly adapt depending on the business direction or strategic characteristics of the company by comprehensively considering all circumstances of the entire company or a specific product/service. Additionally, it systematically manages the contents of customers' wants & needs, strategic focus, and growth horizons, even after application. The Integrative-Lean CVP Model, designed for easy use by startups, is expected to help them with limited funding and marketing capabilities identify value proposition elements for timely PMF, fostering the creation of a new startup ecosystem.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.1-12
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• 2014

It is essential factor for business operation to raise funds effectively. However, in Korea, many start-ups and small businesses have difficulties in fund-raising. In recent years, crowdfunding, a new method for funding a project of individuals or organizations by raising monetary contributions from a large number of people, has been growing up simultaneously with diffusion of social media. Crowdfunding is on early stage in Korea, and the majority of projects are focused on cultural or art categories. There is high proportion of projects that have social value in start-up sector. Crowdfunding in Korea has great potential because success rate of it is much higher than its of advanced countries, although market size is much smaller than them. The purpose of this paper is to propose success strategies of crowdfunding for start-up through case study. 5 crowdfunding platforms of Korea and Kickstarter, the platform of United States were investigated. Then we checked the figures related to the operation of the whole Korean projects on start-up. Finally, we made comparison between the cases of success and failure by analyzing 8 project characteristics. The study shows that it were the differences in trustworthiness and activeness of project creator, value of reward and efforts for interactivity that have great effects on success of the project. Whereas there was no significant influence of societal contribution and sponsor engagement. The thesis provides success strategies of crowdfunding for start-up as follows. Firstly, creator of the project should make support base by enthusiastic activites before launching funding project. Secondly, there should be contents that can easily show the process of business development in the project information. Thirdly, there must be appropriate design of rewards for each amounts of support money. Finally, efforts for interactivity, such as frequent updates, response for comments and SNS posting, should be followed after the launch of the project.

• Journal of Korea Technology Innovation Society
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.1-33
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• 2017

In the last decades, technology-oriented small firms, i.e. venture businesses, have been increasingly engaged in R&D collaborations with external parties as strategic means for technological innovation. Despite ample evidence on the benefit of such collaborations for the firms, there has been less attention to examining whether and how the firms' social interactions with cooperating partners and their managerial characteristics contribute to that benefit. Drawing on the theories of social capital and entrepreneurial orientation, this study is to remedy this gap. The theory of social capital, referring to a sum of the value and potential resources embedded in social relationships of collectives, provides an integrated view of social factors among cooperating partners, e.g. strong ties, network stability, trust, reciprocity, shared vision and value. It categorizes these factors into structural, relational, and cognitive dimensions of social capital. Entrepreneurial orientation theory captures firms' managerial characteristics as a combination of innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking. This addresses firms' managerial process to utilize and combine internal and external resources for wealth creation and opportunity realization. Against this background, this study investigates what roles social capital among cooperating R&D partners and entrepreneurial orientation of the collaborating firms play for collective performance improvement in R&D collaborations. In terms of the collective performance, this study adopts two indicators: technological competitiveness and business performance. Technological competitiveness refers to the contribution of a technology developed by a cooperative R&D project to competitive advantage of a firm while business performance is defined as the financial and economic outcome of a collaboration. Using a sample of 218 Korean ventures engaging in R&D collaboration with external parties, the author finds the significant effects of social capital (i.e. structural, relational, and cognitive dimensions) and entrepreneurial orientation (i.e. innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking) on both of the technological competitiveness and the business performance. Further, the higher the social capital among R&D partners, the more likely it is to foster the entrepreneurial orientation at firm-level. Most importantly, the entrepreneurial orientation at firm-level is an significant mediator of the relationship between social capital and collective performance. Beyond these novel empirical findings, this study contributes to the literature on R&D collaboration. The findings' implications for management and policy are deeply discussed in the conclusion.