The German Research Foundation is funding our project "The originality of entrepreneurs along the life cycle of firms: Understanding the attributes of entrepreneurial decision making".
It is widely accepted that new ventures – particularly in the high-technology industry – spur growth of national economies. In these firms, founders are perceived to be eminently influential as their “talent, experience, actions […] are particularly influential when complex technological advancements play a critical role in the venture” (Beckman, Eisenhardt, Kotha, Meyer, & Rajagopalan, 2012: 203). However, research so far has rarely studied the implications of founder involvement in research and development (=R&D) for firms’ innovativeness and success. In the project , we aim to shed light on the mechanism of founders’ idiosyncratic influence by disentangling entrepreneurial decision making in the context of R&D. In order to do so, we will investigate how the individual situation of founders – e.g., founders’ ownership share, their managerial responsibility, and their technological and entrepreneurial expertise – influences inventing activities on the patent level.