Search

Environmental sustainability has become one of the key issues for the future development of the European Union (EU). Estonia's startup entrepreneurship contributes prominently to innovative ideas in energy technology and information and communication technology (ICT) applications, essential for sustainability. Research and education are prerequisites for innovation in both fields. The gap in educational levels between Estonian women and men, favoring women, is among the largest in the EU. However, the proportion of women in entrepreneurship is significantly lower, even though the share of women in ICT personnel is among the highest in Europe. This study sought to determine women's contribution to sustainability (technology) startups in the context of these contrasting gaps. The article's dataset was based on sources such as the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, Ministry of Education and Science, Business Register, and Startup Ecosystem. It qualitatively analyzed the sustainability orientation of ventures and the gender structure of founders across nearly 1300 startups and clarified the share of selected startups' fundraising within the entire ecosystem. Through a simple regression analysis, we uncovered some short-term trends. Our findings indicate that 92% of the accumulated €4.46 billion in startup funding is foreign capital, and 171 sustainability startups account for nearly 63% of the ecosystem's total fundraising. Among the founders of top-invested startups, only 6% are women, whereas women constitute 23% of the founders of sustainability startups. Despite this, sustainability startups with female participation have secured only 2.2% of the total investments in the sustainability group, highlighting a drastic gender disproportion. However, the fundraising trend for women's sustainability startups founded in the last five years is more positive, reaching 24% of this group's investments. Although their overall share remains significantly lower compared with the entire startup ecosystem, this emerging trend is a promising sign of the breakthrough for female entrepreneurs in a traditionally male-dominated sector. The article's conclusion summarizes the study's results and suggests future gender-based research and development opportunities.

Entrepreneurship is a process that transpires over time. Every entrepreneurial journey is a unique process that is difficult to replicate in the exact way it happened. Entrepreneurial activities in an existing organization can, over time, form a specific staged process that allows a more structured way from generation to implementation of new ideas. Through its supporting structure, corporate entrepreneurship channels ideas through a process that helps people stay focused, systematic, and efficient in value creation. Entrepreneurship and innovation activities in this process are undeniably linked; however, the two disciplines do not address them uniformly. Therefore, the research describing the corporate entrepreneurial and innovation processes is not aligned. In this study, we aimed to analyze entrepreneurship and innovation process approaches comparatively in an existing business context and to propose the triple-bottom-line corporate entrepreneurial (conceptual) process model for innovation and business sustainability. We provided insight into the dynamics of the entrepreneurial process in the existing business over time: A roadmap to evaluate the enablers and the critical elements for the innovation to transform and sustain. We proposed a harmonized stage model of the corporate entrepreneurial innovation process, where stage output artifacts mark the progression of the process, making it measurable. We provided conclusions from the literature review, a generalized model, and propositions on critical aspects of the entrepreneurial innovation process to happen, transform, and sustain.

Based on the trust/commitment theory and the customer-based brand equity theory, this study aims to ascertain which of the brand equity drivers of A. Le Coq beer have an impact on attachment and its overall brand equity in the Estonian brewery market. In order to achieve this goal, an empirical study was conducted based on the 17 customer-based/consumer-based brand equity models: the 15 brand equity models, including the beer/beverage brand equity models, the 2 internal brand equity models, as well as 3 other related models. The study utilised a sample of convenience of 120 University of Tartu students. The questionnaire was placed on Google’s online survey administration service. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) through AMOS29 was used for testing the fit of the model and covariances (through AMOS29) were used for testing the hypotheses. Additionally, t-test analysis was used for the differences in the means between the demographic characteristics and the items of the model. The results show that brand meaning has a strong positive effect on attachment strength, which significantly influences relationship factors—commitment, trust, and satisfaction. Another major finding is that the relationship factors—commitment, trust, and satisfaction—play a significant role in the development of the brand equity of A. Le Coq beer. This study provides useful insights for brewery marketing managers by exploiting the strong positive relationships found between beer brand equity drivers, such as the strong positive relationships found within consumers of beer, i.e., the relationships between brand reputation and brand image, brand meaning and attachment strength, attachment strength and commitment, attachment strength and satisfaction, attachment strength and trust, satisfaction and brand equity, commitment and brand equity, and trust and brand equity. This finding contributes to the literature on brand equity related to the Estonian environment. Five differences in demographic characteristics seem to play a role in designing strategies by the management teams of different brands for increasing the consumption of their competing brands of beer. A replication of a model previously used for a non-product is part of the novelty of this paper. In addition, all the examined relationships are found to be positive and significant, which provides a contribution to the existing literature.

Recently, there has been increased discussion of entrepreneurship and innovation as process-based phenomena. However, research on the essence of dynamic entrepreneurial and innovation processes and their simultaneous interactions needs to be more cohesive and well-covered. This article critically reviews prior publications and explores the process approach to entrepreneurial and innovation processes. Structuration and equivalence theory, systems and design thinking, and pattern matching theory were implemented to structure and synthesise a converged operationalised dynamic process model. Exploring different approaches to entrepreneurial and innovation processes by screening 468 publications on entrepreneurship and 527 on innovation and a critical review of prior findings, the article identified only 17 and 13 dynamic process models, respectively. Six structurally comparable models covering both disciplines were selected for further analysis. Both disciplines’ dynamic process models can be structured into five harmonised stages, which can partly be divided into (sub)phases. The article’s primary contribution to the theory is systematically integrating process-based and design approaches in entrepreneurship and innovation. As a result, a streamlined and converged dynamic process model is developed, and the role of the process venue and the entrepreneur or innovator is discussed. As a practical implication, future directions for entrepreneurship and innovation educators, policymakers, and entrepreneurial/innovation ecosystem stakeholders are presented at the end of the article.