Technopreneurship: The New Breed of Entrepreneurs PDF

BM2217 TECHNOPRENEURSHIP: THE NEW BREED OF ENTREPRENEURS The Nature of Entrepreneurship What is entrepreneurship? The word “entrepreneur” came from the French word “entreprendre,” which means “to undertake.” Historically, during the Middle Ages or medieval period, merchants...

BM2217 TECHNOPRENEURSHIP: THE NEW BREED OF ENTREPRENEURS The Nature of Entrepreneurship What is entrepreneurship? The word “entrepreneur” came from the French word “entreprendre,” which means “to undertake.” Historically, during the Middle Ages or medieval period, merchants and artisans from other places would visit kingdoms to sell their goods or offer their services for a fee (Casson & Casson, 2014). Although the definition of entrepreneurship has not changed much over the years, the opportunities available to would-be business owners have advanced considerably. According to Ferreira (2022), the definition of entrepreneurship can be classified into basic and modern: The basic definition of entrepreneurship is seeking new sources for businesses and production opportunities, followed by setting up resources (raw materials, workforce, land, and capital) and managing a profitable business enterprise. In simple terms, entrepreneurship is all about starting your own business from scratch. The modern definition of entrepreneurship emphasizes changing the world by producing new or unorthodox solutions to complex issues, such as enacting social change or developing products that upturn the way we live our daily lives. What is an entrepreneur? Entrepreneurs are those who create new businesses, introduce innovation — new concepts, goods, and services — to the marketplace, and take on the associated risks and difficulties to make a profit. Usually, entrepreneurs think of ideas to captivate a certain market’s interest. It could be an innovative or a re- envisioned service or product. An entrepreneur is the type of person who spots a hole or an opportunity in any market, business, or sector. An entrepreneur turns those gaps into a good or service and then does market research to determine likely earnings or profits if the business is successful. One of the world’s most powerful influencers today is entrepreneurs. Whereas the normal individual only sees inconveniences and issues, entrepreneurs see opportunities and solutions. More people will be able to see the value added to the world if they have a better understanding of what an entrepreneur is. Nature of entrepreneurship Innovation. It means making a new market offering using a new method or technology, creating a new market, or creating a new type of organization to produce or improve a product or service. Running a business. A company pools resources to supply quality products or services that satisfy customers’ needs and wants. Taking a risk. Risk refers to the fact that it is impossible to predict how an entrepreneurial endeavor will turn out. Because of this, entrepreneurs must constantly deal with a certain amount of uncertainty and cannot predict the results of many choices they must make. As a result, many of the actions they take are mostly driven by their faith in the invention and their knowledge of the commercial context in which they work. 01 Handout 1 *Property of STI  [email protected] Page 1 of 5  BM2217 Defining Technopreneurship What is technopreneurship? Nowadays, the fancy term “technopreneurship,” which originated in the field of entrepreneurship, is used frequently in any content or topic related to business. It was in the year 1987 when the term technopreneurship was first used. However, very little is known about this word’s true meaning and significance. But because entrepreneurship is subject to rapid change, its meaning tends to change with time. The term technopreneurship gained popularity in the 2000s when many people began using the Internet. Technopreneurship, from the combined words technology and entrepreneurship, is a new kind of technology-related business that relies on different individuals’ ideas. It is a specific type of entrepreneurship that focuses on developing and commercializing new technologies, creating new businesses based on existing technologies, or using technology to improve an existing business. The influx of different technologies and the rise of e-commerce platforms like Lazada, Shopee, and Facebook Marketplace made buying and selling simpler. The following are some examples of technopreneurship: Grab – Made commuting easy and can accommodate documents, parcels, and food deliveries. It significantly alleviated the problem of long commutes. Facebook – Connects people in most parts of the world, is a venue for online retailing, and has become an important part of media. Netflix – Watching films has become accessible and has documentaries that can be used as a tool for research. Traveloka – Provides airline ticketing, hotel booking accommodations, and recently expanded services such as car rentals and restaurant vouchers. Shopee – E-commerce platform which started in Singapore. In 2015, it expanded its operations in Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Indonesia. Gcash – A way to send money to individual accounts that is safe and secure and eliminates the fear of waiting in long lines at payment centers. What is a technopreneur? A technopreneur is a tech-savvy person who uses technology in doing business. They continuously seek improvement and never get tired of innovating new products or concepts that will disrupt the established or conventional working system. 01 Handout 1 *Property of STI  [email protected] Page 2 of 5  BM2217 Most technopreneurs work in various industries. These include biotechnology, electronics, and information technology (IT), among others. These people’s primary goal is to make an industrial process work as efficiently as possible. In an article published by Entrepreneur magazine last May of 2018, Dr. Balachandran stated that one particular characteristic of technopreneurship is that it is rarely a one-person show. A team of dedicated individuals with various skill sets and resources must collaborate for a technopreneurship start-up to succeed. It should also begin with the customer experience and work in reverse to determine the technology that can improve or enhance a negative customer experience. Both technopreneurs and entrepreneurs share a strong passion for their work. Both are creative, dare to be different, and follow unconventional paths. They both want to lead more successful lives by taking on challenges without fear of failure. The following are some examples of successful technopreneurs in the Philippines (Hanap.org, 2021): Diosdado Banatao. He worked for different tech companies and later excelled. He developed the first 10-Mbit Ethernet CMOS with silicone coupler data-link control and transceiver chip, the first system logic chipset for IBM’s PC-XT and the PC-AT, and the local bus concept and the first Windows Graphics accelerator chip for PCs. Orlando Vea. He is the co-founder of Smart Communications, Inc., CEO of PLDT Communications & Energy Ventures, Inc., CEO/Founder of Voyager Innovations Philippines, and Founder and CEO of Paymaya. Leandro Leviste. He started the 2 MWh Solar-Battery Micro-Grid project in Paulan, Oriental Mindoro, the first solar microgrid of that scale in Asia. Rachel De Villa. He co-founded Cropital, an agritech start-up that aims to provide farmers with sustainable and scalable financing through crowdfunding. Diane Eustaquio. He is the executive director of IdeaSpace, a non-profit accelerator program for early-stage tech start-ups in the Philippines. The following are examples of some of the wealthiest and most influential technopreneurs in the world (Garnier, 2021): Jeff Bezos. He is the CEO of Amazon, a huge online e-commerce platform. Today, it is one of the largest in the United States, and millions of people worldwide shop there every day. Elon Musk. He came up with the fully electric sports cars known as Tesla Motors. Musk is responsible for the popular online payment network PayPal. He put $80 million into SpaceX and $70 million into Tesla. Mark Zuckerberg. He developed the most popular social networking application named, Facebook. Initially, he created the platform for university fellows’ internal communication, which has recently become the most robust and popular social media network worldwide. 01 Handout 1 *Property of STI  [email protected] Page 3 of 5  BM2217 Larry Page and Sergey Brin co-founded and launched Google in 1998. Google got a real success in 2004 when it became the most searched engine utilized 200 million times a day. Bill Gates. He is known as one of Microsoft’s founders. Together with Paul Allen, he created and sold it to the first personal computer company, and he became very successful. Jack Ma. He co-founded Alibaba Group, a global technology conglomerate, and was its executive chairman. Additionally, he co-founded the Chinese private equity firm Yunfeng Capital. The following are examples of some of the new breeds of technopreneurs in the world (CEO Magazine Asia, 2021): Brian Chesky. He co-founded Airbnb, a room-sharing platform with 6 million listings in 100,000 cities and towns worldwide. Since its inception in 2008, the publicly traded company with headquarters in San Francisco has hosted more than a billion guests and reported revenue of $6 billion in 2021. Evan Spiegel. He is an American businessman, co-founder, and CEO of Snap Inc. Spiegel was the youngest billionaire in the world in 2015. Karlie Kloss. She is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and supermodel. She also started Kode With Klossy, a program to get girls interested in coding, after being encouraged to go to a coding boot camp by friends who were entrepreneurs. Michelle Sun. She established the Hong Kong-based K-12 coding school First Code Academy, which taught children ages four (4) and up how to code and create mobile applications. Zhang Yiming. He is a Chinese internet entrepreneur who created the news aggregator Toutiao and the video-sharing platform TikTok, formerly known as Musical.ly, in addition to founding ByteDance in 2012. Anthony Tan. He is the CEO and co-founder of Grab, the leading mobile technology company in Southeast Asia that aims to liberate transportation. Technology Ventures Technology business ideas do not require a lot of capital, so anyone can start small and expand over time. However, it is vital to have some technical expertise to launch a successful business. The best tech business ideas are listed as follows (Nerdwallet, 2021): 3D prints Web design / Web quality consultant E-commerce Virtual reality technologies Customer experience management Portable device inventions Content creation Mobile application development Artificial intelligence Search engine optimization consultant Streaming service Video Production 01 Handout 1 *Property of STI  [email protected] Page 4 of 5  BM2217 Videogame development Cybersecurity Device repair and maintenance Online Storage Service Economic Impacts of Technopreneurship As the adage says, “necessity is the mother of all inventions.” This quote is accurate for technopreneurs who devise and think of ideas on how to live easily. More governments protect small and medium enterprises (SMEs) such as those being put up by technopreneurs. For most countries, SMEs could be keys to improving economic growth. In her article, Camposano (2014) noted that SMEs accounted for 99.6% of total registered enterprises, meaning these registered businesses have paid taxes and dues and provided jobs for other people. She also noted the late senator Edgardo Angara’s statement that SMEs are the real backbone of the Philippine economy. It is because SMEs provide opportunities or, at the very least, inspiration to those who could not start a business. Technopreneurial enterprises create jobs and build healthy competition among other industries. Also, this type of enterprise has the potential to attract international investors. This is why there are laws protecting such businesses as RA 9501 or the Magna Carta for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), RA 10644 or the Go Negosyo Act, and RA 8289 or better known as the Magna Carta for Small and Medium Enterprises. The Magna Carta for Small and Medium Enterprises is an act to promote, develop and assist small and medium-scale enterprises through the creation of a small and medium enterprise development (SMED) council and the rationalization of government assistance programs and agencies concerned with the development of small and medium enterprises, and for other purposes. References Balachandran, B. V. (2018, May 03). The next big thing in the start-up ecosystem - technopreneurship. Retrieved on February 13, 2019, from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/312888 Camposano, J. (2014, January 20). SMEs seen as major economic growth driver. Philstar. https://www.philstar.com/business/business- as-usual/2014/01/20/1280682/smes-seen-major-economic-growth-driver Casson, M. & Casson, C. (2014). The history of entrepreneurship: Medieval origins of a modern phenomenon. Business History. 56(8), 1223-1242. doi:10.1080/00076791.2013.867330. Garnier, M. (2021) 8 Successful Technopreneurs in the World. https://solutionsuggest.com/successful-technopreneurs-in-world Gietu (2021) Technopreneurship: an emerging field of Entrepreneurship. https://www.giet.edu/post/technopreneurship-an-emerging- field-of-entrepreneurship/ Jamaluddin, A. (2021) 10 Influential Tech Entrepreneurs You Should Know https://www.hongkiat.com/blog/serial-entrepreneurs- companies-create/ Jude (2021) Most Successful Filipino Technopreneurs. https://hanap.org/most-successful-filipino-technopreneurs Medina, R. (2014). Entrepreneurship and small business management. Quezon City: Rex Bookstore. Nerdwallet (2021) 25 Tech Business Ideas for 2022. https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/small-business/tech-business-ideas Nicholas, K. (n.d) Entrepreneurial Management. https://boisestate.pressbooks.pub/typesofent/ Tatler Asia (2022) Tatler Asia’s Most Influential https://www.tatlerasia.com/list/ami/sg?industry=all&region=all&year=2022&page=1 The CEO Magazine (n.d.) The Ceo Magazine Cover https://digitalmag.theceomagazine.com/ 01 Handout 1 *Property of STI  [email protected] Page 5 of 5