An examination of entrepreneurial oriented behaviours in the Australian wine industry regional clusters.

Abstract

Interest in regions has gained a forefront position in the economic development policy agenda. The cluster concept is the most widely adopted tool by governments in the pursuit of regional economic development and is increasingly a focus of academia for its cultivation and nurturing of firm entrepreneurship. However, the research on the entrepreneurial oriented behaviours of firms located in clusters is scarce, especially empirically, due to conceptual, theoretical and methodological limitations. The existing limited entrepreneurship and cluster research, which has mainly focussed on the agglomeration dimension of clusters and new firm creation function of entrepreneurship, often offers conflicting research outcomes. Drawing upon the resource based view, social network theory and entrepreneurial strategic orientation, this research offers a new and dynamic perspective to investigate the impact of clusters on entrepreneurial behaviours of firms. This research aims to address unanswered questions in the literature. First, what are the resources shared in clusters from a social network perspective and what are the relationships among those shared resources? Second, how does the dynamic entrepreneurial process contribute to the market performance of firms located in clusters? Third, do the shared resources of firms contribute to the entrepreneurial process and if so, how? To answer these questions, this research identifies types of shared resources in clusters, investigates the entrepreneurial process of firms, and advances a theoretical model and empirical research to explain the dynamic relationships between clusters and entrepreneurial oriented behaviours at the firm level. This research uses a set of relational resources occurring in clusters, including institutional support, government support, trusting cooperation and external openness. The research adopted Entrepreneurial Orientation (EO) as a measurement of entrepreneurial oriented behaviours at the firm level. EO is defined as decision-making practices, managerial philosophies and strategic behaviours that are proactive, innovative, risk taking, competitive aggressive and autonomous in nature. Entrepreneurial opportunities consist of opportunities to make breakthrough improvements, such as introducing new products/services, entering new geographical markets and applying new raw materials. This research used the cross-sectional data collected from the Australian wine industry to test the hypotheses. Through empirical examinations, this research finds the unique characteristics associated with individual shared resources in clusters as well as their influence paths on the entrepreneurial process. This research ends with implications for academics and policy makers and suggestions for further research. By addressing an important topic and issue, this research evokes new thinking and perspectives in the research on entrepreneurship, clusters and the relationships between the two. It contributes to the ongoing debate on how entrepreneurial firms leverage regional cluster resources to enhance performance in the entrepreneurship and strategic management literatures. As a result, the research methodologies and outcomes of the research contribute to the theoretical building and the practical implementation of entrepreneurship theory, cluster theory and the intersections between the two.