Co-creative entrepreneurship: How do platform-dependent new ventures overcome the liabilities of newness and smallness?

Abstract

This study systematically investigates the strategic mechanisms through which platform-dependent new ventures (PDNVs) overcome the liabilities of newness and smallness to achieve rapid growth. Through an analysis of a longitudinal dataset, this research systematically explores the dynamic mechanisms underlying entrepreneurial co-creation among platform-dependent entrepreneurs (PDEs), digital platforms, and user communities. It makes two key contributions to the entrepreneurship literature. First, it conceptualizes how PDNVs strategically leverage co-creation processes to mitigate resource constraints and legitimate deficits. Second, grounded in value rationality, this research explains the psychological mechanisms underpinning the evolution of entrepreneurial co-creation behaviours; in particular, it illustrates how key users transcend their traditional roles to become strategically integrated into the entrepreneurial core. Consequently, agile evolutionary growth logic is separated from the traditional linear accumulation growth logic commonly posited in former entrepreneurship research. Finally, the strategic role of digital platforms as foundational entrepreneurial infrastructure and the importance for platform-dependent entrepreneurs to foster a value-rational, co-created entrepreneurial vision with key co-creators to accelerate venture growth are emphasized.

JEL Codes: L26, M13