Everything you need to know about the types entrepreneurship.

According to Peter Drucker, ‘Entrepreneurship is defined as ‘a systematic innovation, which consists in the purposeful and organized search for changes and it is the systematic analysis of the opportunities such changes might offer for economic and social innovation.’

Entrepreneurship is a process. It is not a combination of some stray incidents. It is the purposeful and organized search for change, conducted after systematic analysis of opportunities in the environment.

Entrepreneurship is a philosophy- it is the way one thinks, one acts and therefore it can exist in any situation be it business or government or in the field of education, science and technology or poverty alleviation or any others.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

Some of the types of entrepreneurship are:-

1. Intrapreneurship 2. Technopreneurship 3. Cultural Entrepreneurship 4. International Entrepreneurship 5. Ecopreneurship

6. Social Entrepreneurship 7. Entrepreneurship in Agriculture Sector/Agripreneurship 8. Transpreneurship 9. Commercial Entrepreneurship 10. Netpreneurship (E-Entrepreneurship/Cyberpreneurship).


Types of Entrepreneurship: Intrapreneurship, Technopreneurship, Ecopreneurship, Agripreneurship and a Few Others

Types to Entrepreneurship – Intrapreneurship, Technopreneurship, Cultural Entrepreneurship, International Entrepreneurship, Ecopreneurship and a Few Others

1. Intrapreneurship:

The term “intra-corporate entrepreneur” was introduced by Gifford Pinchot in 1973. It was later revised as “intrapreneur”. The term “intrapreneur” was officially recognized in 1992 with the definition given in the American Heritage Dictionary. Accordingly, intrapreneur is “a person within a large corporation who takes direct responsibility for turning an idea into a profitable finished product through assertive risk-taking and innovation.”

ADVERTISEMENTS:

Employees of an organization who are motivated to use their entrepreneurial talents and initiative to do something on their own, but who may not want to start their own business are known as intrapreneurs. Intrapreneurship, thus, means the establishment and fostering of entrepreneurial activity in large organizations either by improving the existing product or by branding new products. Intrapreneurs with their innovations and dedicated efforts are considered valuable asset by the organization.

Essential Elements:

Four elements are essential for the success of intrapreneurship:

i. There should be the right structural and strategic environment within the organization. Employees should have an atmosphere of freedom to interact with each other and share ideas, and promote their spirit of innovation.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

ii. A suitable work force of enterprising people should be built. Talents of the employees should be recognized, their skills should be trained, and they should be motivated.

iii. Employees should be encouraged to collaborate and network naturally, since each employee is interested in the bright future of the organization.

iv. Successful employees should be suitably rewarded, while they should not be penalised for their mistakes. If there is a work culture of sharing and trust, it will encourage the employees for further initiatives.

Intrapreneurship is more important in the fast changing world of today than ever before. Organisations are increasingly looking towards their intrapreneurs to create new business in new markets.

2. Technopreneurship:

‘Technopreneurship’ is a combination of two words ‘technology’ and ‘entrepreneurship’. Technopreneurship is entrepreneurship in a technology intensive context. It is a process of merging technological and entrepreneurial talents and skills. In the transformation of goods and services, technology is used as an integral part in technopreneurship.

Technopreneurship is a new breed of entrepreneurship. It involves coming together of people who are intelligent, creative, technology savvy and passionate and have an appetite for calculated risk. Unlike entrepreneurship, the success of technopreneurship depends on teamwork.

Meaning and Definition:

Technopreneurship is not a product but a process of synthesis in engineering the future of a person, an organization, a nation and the world. In a digital, knowledge based society, decision-making processes require professional development programmes and training. They will produce strategic thinkers who have the skills to succeed in a dynamically changing global environment.

Technology and entrepreneurial skills are leading many economies to prosperity. Bill Gates (Microsoft), Steve Jobs (Apple), Sergey Brin and Larry Page (Google), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Jack Dorsey (Twitter), Kevin Systrom (Instagram) are famous examples of technopreneurs.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

Technopreneur:

“A technopreneur is an entrepreneur who is technology savvy, creative, innovative and dynamic, dares to be different and takes the unexplored path, and very passionate about his work”. He takes challenges and strives to lead his life successfully. He has no fear of failure and hence takes failure as a learning experience, a stimulator to see things differently.

A Technopreneur undergoes an organic process of continual improvement and tries to redefine the dynamic digital economy. Technopreneurs make use of technology to come out with innovative products through a process of commercialization. Potential technopreneurs are equipped with both technical and business skills.

Significance of Technopreneurship:

ADVERTISEMENTS:

In a dynamically changing global situation, technopreneurship plays an important role due to the following features:

i. It generates employment

ii. It makes the best use of local resources

iii. It decentralizes and diversifies business

ADVERTISEMENTS:

iv. It promotes technology

v. It forms capital

vi. It promotes an entrepreneurial culture.

3. Cultural Entrepreneurship:

“Cultural entrepreneurs are cultural change agents and visionaries who organize cultural, financial, social and human capital, to generate revenue from a cultural activity”.

Cultural entrepreneurs create, produce and market cultural goods and services, generating economic, cultural and social opportunities for creators while adding cultural value for consumers. Cultural enterprises are diverse in nature and size. They range from micro, small and medium enterprises to large firms.

Cultural enterprises operate in traditional professions of artists, writers, musicians, actors, dancers, advertisers, architects as well as the newer professions of game developers, TV/music producers, bloggers and graphic designers.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

Cultural entrepreneurs have the goal of leveraging business for the betterment of society. They create and share cultural products like visual art, music and film, stories, and games that present new ways of understanding social problems. Cultural entrepreneurs who often rely on new media tools like twitter and kickstarter make use of persuasive communications and peer influence to change ideas, attitudes, beliefs and behaviour. Thereby they try to change the world for the better.

Cultural entrepreneurship is an economic as well as socio-cultural activity based on innovation, exploitation of opportunities and risk-taking behaviour. It is an innovative, strategic and visionary social activity. Cultural entrepreneurs cause social development through community engagement and positioning arts as a gateway to transformation.

Besides initiation, interpretation or application, it is the very nature of exploitation of cultural content by transforming ideas into marketable goods and services that excel successful cultural entrepreneurs. Cultural entrepreneurs strive to promote the preservation of cultures while becoming innovative. They aim at strengthening and making the world growing through self- determination and self-reliance. Thus, they bring value to creative economy.

4. International Entrepreneurship:

International entrepreneurship is the process of an entrepreneur conducting business activities across the national boundaries. It includes exporting, licensing or opening sales office in another country. The main purpose of international entrepreneurship is to satisfy the needs and wants of target markets.

International entrepreneurship is defined as “development of international new ventures or startups that from their inception engage in international business, thus viewing their operation domain as international from the initial stages of international operations”.

International entrepreneurship is beneficial when the sales of products of a company in the domestic market, is declining and the demand arises for the products from international market. Entrepreneur can sell his products it have reached the maturity stage of their life cycle in domestic markets, in foreign market and earn profit by their sales.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

Entrepreneur in the process of satisfying foreign customers have to produce products as per their quality expectation. He will not only produce quality product in international market, but also in national market. Thus, he can improve his entrepreneurial competitiveness and enhance reputation.

Importance of International Entrepreneurship:

i. Lower Manufacturing Cost:

International entrepreneurship can help to bring out products at lower cost. If the manufacturing cost of a product is high in home country, the same product can be produced in another country at a lower cost. Thus, the product can be made available at a lower price in the international market.

ii. Increased Sales and Profit:

International entrepreneurship helps to increase sales and profit. When demand for the product of an entrepreneur decreases in local market, he can sell his product in international market where life cycle of the product is in favourable condition. Thus, he can earn more profit.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

iii. Cultivating the Habit of Customer Relation Management (CRM):

Internationalisation of business will teach entrepreneurs how to cultivate habit of customer relation management. In the process of satisfying foreign customers, an entrepreneur has to produce products as per their quality expectations in national and international markets.

iv. Utilisation of Talent and Managerial Competence:

When businesses are not able to get required talented workforce in country, they can get the activity outsourced to a foreign country, or can hire employees and make use of managerial competence from there.

v. Opportunity for Growth:

International business is one of the primary platforms for expansion and diversification of any business. Successful entrepreneurs are always interested in expansion and diversification of their business activity. They get ample opportunities for growth in international business.

ADVERTISEMENTS:

vi. Advantages of Cheap Labour:

For every business, quantity and quality of labour is a major challenge. If the labour is cheap in foreign countries, the company can outsource its activity to those countries, where cost of labour is cheap.

vii. Expansion of Domestic Market:

International business causes domestic market to expand beyond national boundaries and market their products in international market. By using new technology and marketing efforts, entrepreneurs can have a brighter growth potential for the future.

viii. Globalization of Customers:

When customers in a country prefer purchasing foreign brand products than domestic products, companies have to go in for internationalisation of business. It will help the companies to keep in pace with competition to attract customers.

ix. Globalisation of Competitors:

International business increases the opportunity for the survival and growth of entrepreneurs. It also motivates companies to face competition from global entrants in market, which leads to growth of market, pursuing global standards.

x. Improves the Image of the Company:

International business improves the image of the company in domestic market and attracts more customers in domestic market and keeps them loyal to the company.

5. Ecopreneurship:

Ecopreneurship also known as ‘Green Entrepreneurship’ is most simply referred to as the development of enterprise through entrepreneurship, while incorporating an environmentally responsible perspective into the operations and goals of the entrepreneur.

The term ‘ecopreneurship’ began to be widely used in the 1990s. It is otherwise referred to as “environmental entrepreneurship”. Ecopreneurship is a term coined to represent the process of principles of entrepreneurship being applied to create businesses that solve environmental problems or operate sustainably.

Definition and Meaning:

Gwyn Schuyler – “Ecopreneurship, also known as environmental entrepreneurship and ecocapitalism, is becoming more widespread as a new market-based approach to identifying opportunities for improving environmental quality and capitalizing upon them the private sector for profit”.

Schuyler – “Ecopreneurs are entrepreneurs whose business efforts are not only driven by profit, but also by a concern for the environment”.

The definition of ecopreneurship and concepts defining the term have changed.

David Kainrath has defined ecoprenuership as the convergence of three main concepts, including:

i. Eco-innovation

ii. Eco-opportunity

iii. Eco-commitment.

Kainrath states that an ecopreneurial company is a company in which three ecopreneurship concepts manifest.

Importance of Ecopreneurship:

i. The entrepreneurial activities in case of ecopreneurship give less focus on management systems or technical procedures.

ii. It gives more focus on the personal initiative and skills of the entrepreneurial person or team to realize market success with environmental innovations.

iii. It adopts highly environmentally responsible business practices and values.

iv. It emphasizes a social perspective while considering an innovative solution through the commitment of ecopreneurs.

v. It replaces the conventional production methods, products, market structures and consumption patterns with superior environmental products and services.

vi. It is characterized by a high degree of creativity, collaboration and social orientation.

6. Social Entrepreneurship:

Prof. Muhammed Yunus – “Social entrepreneurship is any creative and innovative solution applied to solve social problems”.

Social entrepreneurship stands for recognizing a social problem and using entrepreneurial principles, processes and operations for effecting a social change. Social entrepreneurs have innovative solutions to the most pressing social problems. Creativity and innovation are their most important tools. Social entrepreneurship mobilizes the ideas, capacities, resources and social arrangements required for long-term sustainable social transformation.

Social entrepreneurship is a catalyst for social change. Social entrepreneurs are pioneers of innovations that benefit humanity at large. They are ambitious and persistent, and experts in tackling major social issues and offering new ideas for large scale change. The Grameen Bank of Prof. Muhammed Yunus of Bangladesh, Land Gift movement of Vinoba Bhave, Drishtee of Satyan Mishra, SEWA of Ela Bhatt of India are the prominent examples of social entrepreneurship practices.

Importance of Social Entrepreneurship:

i. Along with social problems, social entrepreneurship focuses on environmental or cultural issues.

ii. It plays the role of an agent for change in the society by adopting a mission to create and sustain social values.

iii. It is a process of continuous innovation, adaptation and learning.

iv. It means acting boldly without being limited by resources in hand.

v. Its success is measured not in terms of profit, but in terms of social welfare.

7. Entrepreneurship in Agriculture Sector/Agripreneurship:

Agriculture sector plays a formidable role in the sustainable growth and development of Indian economy. Developing entrepreneurship in agricultural sector is known as agripreneurship. Agripreneurship or agribusiness includes all operations involved in the manufacture and distribution of farm supplies.

It comprises activities relating to production, propagation and distribution of products and services relating to agriculture, floriculture, horticulture, sericulture, aquiculture, animal husbandry and biotechnology.

The Importance of Agripreneurship:

i. Agripreneurship employs entrepreneurial skills, models and innovative ideas to economically solve problems in the agriculture sector.

ii. It increases the profitability of the farming business.

iii. It solves the challenges related to information dissemination, farm management, capital availability, mechanization of farm and the agriculture supply chain.

iv. It provides an innovative solution to some of the critical agricultural issues like crop productivity and input cost for agriculture.

v. It solves the problem of wastage of crops caused by lack of storage facilities, and improper management of supply chain.

vi. Use of digital technologies such as Remote sensing, Geographic Information System (GIS), Internet of Things (IoT), coupled with data-driven decision making and analysis can improve farm productivity, minimize farm wastage and increase farmer’s income.

vii. Digital technologies together with data analytics in every stage of the agri-production life cycle make farm activity more insight- driven, potentially more productive and efficient.

viii. It helps to achieve progress regarding food security, accessibility and affordability.

ix. It generates employment opportunities and enables the use of local resources.


Types to Entrepreneurship – 5 Important Types of Entrepreneurship: Cultural, International, Social, Commercial Entrepreneurship and Transpreneurship

Type # 1. Cultural Entrepreneurship:

Cultural Entrepreneurship is difficult to define. It has a wide definition that includes ‘culture’ and a ‘way of life’ and also the ‘arts’ or the ‘creative industries’

Cultural Entrepreneurship is where entrepreneurs are cultural change agents and resourceful visionaries who organize cultural, financial, social and human capital, to generate revenue from a cultural activity. Their innovative solutions result in economically sustainable cultural enterprises that enhance livelihoods and create cultural value and wealth for both creative producers and consumers of cultural services and products.

The term cultural entrepreneurship applies to the creation of any product or service that primarily targets our tastes, whether it’s our taste in fashion, movies, music, stories, games, cuisine, or opinions. A newspaper is part of media; but a magazine like People or Vanity Fair would be part of the cultural industry.

Culture, more than almost any other industry, is almost always in the private domain; only in very unfortunate countries, is culture significantly done by the public sector. So, culture is produced by private individuals who spend effort creating it, marketing it, and try to make a living by selling it.

These industries are well set, though most run on low margins and the companies involved are primarily small, and universally cash-strapped. So, culture is a hotbed of entrepreneurship.

Definitions of Cultural Entrepreneurship:

(i) According to Aageson “Cultural entrepreneurship is the missing link between creative talents and the markets”.

(ii) According to Martin, & Witter “Cultural entrepreneurship is dif­ferent than social entrepreneurship since it is primarily focused on reimagining social roles and motivating new behaviours – often working with and in popular culture to reach the widest possible audience. It is about changing hearts and minds.

(iii) As per the views of Hagoortetal. “Cultural entrepreneurship is an organisational approach which has its starting point in a cultural mission directed towards the public, and which sees opportuni­ties in society for ensuring optimum funding for cultural business operations, ensuring that the organisation concerned becomes part of an open, accessible cultural infrastructure”.

(iv) According to Hernandez-Acosta, “Cultural entrepreneurship is treated as synonymous with arts entrepreneurship which includes the domains of visual arts, performing arts, music and publishing. An artist as the entrepreneur is central to this definition”.

(v) According to Hausmann, Cultural entrepreneurship is defined as “entrepreneurship in the cultural sector; where cultural sector comprises of architecture and design, music publishing, book pub­lishing, the media, the film industry, art marketing, art societies, art galleries, museums, libraries, theatre, opera and musicals; while it includes private sector it is mostly confined to the public and not- for-profit sector”.

Cultural Entrepreneurship in India:

India has had a few mature, advanced cultural sectors such as Film and music industries. These industries have grown to be world-class over a period of time. Restaurants were also universally present, along with iconic eateries in every city. The change that we are seeing now is the growth of new cultural sectors: an explosion in publishing, breakthroughs in animation, a revival in comics, a bit of growth in fashion, and very impor­tantly, a massive influx of recreation spaces which was led by the incredible growth experienced by cafes in the last decade.

Let us now understand children’s culture which is fast growing. Children are great cultural consumers, and it’s important to have great content for kids, because they learn much more through stories and plays, as compared to what they do by sitting through Geography and History classes. They certainly learn a lot of ethics through the stories they imbibe.

This opportunity exists. In fact, this is the industry which excites entrepreneurs the most, where they plan to start-a new business.

Type # 2. International Entrepreneurship:

International entrepreneurship is the process of an entrepreneur conducting business activity across the national boundaries. It may consist of exporting, licensing, opening sales office in another country etc. The young field of international entrepreneurship is rapidly expanding in scope and complexity, as increasingly more companies across the world compete to gain a larger global market share and attract consumers both at home and abroad.

Let us now understand the meaning of International entrepreneurship with the help of some definitions given below:

(i) International entrepreneurship is a way of carrying out business activities across national boundaries. It includes exporting, licensing, or opening a sales office in another country. When an entrepreneur executes his or her business in more than one country, international entrepreneurship occurs.

(ii) International entrepreneurship is defined as “the development of international new ventures or startups that from their inception engage in international business, thus viewing their operation domain as international from the initial stages of international operations”.

(iii) International entrepreneurship can also be defined as “the discovery, enactment, evaluation, and exploitation of opportunities across national borders for creating future goods and services”.

Type # 3. Social Entrepreneurship:

A Social Entrepreneur is a person who establishes an enterprise with the aim of solving social problems or effecting social change. Examples of social entrepreneurship include microfinance institutions, educational programs, providing banking services in underserved areas and helping children orphaned by epidemic disease. The main goal of a social entrepreneur is not to earn a profit, but to implement widespread improvements in society. However, a social entrepreneur must still be financially savvy to succeed in his or her cause.

Social entrepreneurship in modern society offers an altruistic form of entrepreneurship that focuses on the benefits that society may reap. In simple words, entrepreneurship becomes a social endeavor when it trans­forms social capital in a way that affects society positively. It is viewed as advantageous because the success of social entrepreneurship depends on many factors related to social impact that traditional corporate businesses do not prioritize.

Social entrepreneurs recognize immediate social problems, but also seek to understand the broader context of an issue that crosses disciplines, fields, and theories. Gaining a larger understanding of how an issue relates to society allows social entrepreneurs to develop innovative solutions and mobilize available resources to affect the greater global society. Unlike traditional corporate businesses, social entrepreneurship ventures focus on maximizing gains in social satisfaction, rather than maximizing profit gains.

Social entrepreneurship in India is emerging primarily because of what the government has not been able to do. The government is very keen on promoting social entrepreneurship for taking up causes such as illiteracy, pollution, food and clothing for underprivileged etc. For example, in Mumbai alone, non-profit organisations educate more than 250,000 children on a daily basis. The government has not told these organisations not to do it. It is a voluntary service.

Meaning & Concept of a Social Entrepreneur:

This concept is being briefly discussed here so as to make a comparison with commercial entrepreneurship; Social entrepreneurs are individuals with innovative solutions to society’s most pressing social problems. They are ambitious and persistent, tackling major social issues and offering new ideas for wide-scale change. Rather than leaving societal needs to the government or business sectors, social entrepreneurs find what is not working and solve the problem by changing the system, spreading the solution, and persuading entire societies to take new leaps.

Social entrepreneurs often seem to be possessed by their ideas, committing their lives to changing the direction of their field. They are both visionaries and ultimate realists, concerned with the practical implementation of their vision above all else.

Each social entrepreneur presents ideas that are user-friendly, understand­able, ethical, and generate widespread support in order to maximize the number of local people and emerge as a mass recruiter of local change makers and a role model, proving that citizens who channel their passion into action can do almost anything.

Meaning of Social Entrepreneurship:

Social entrepreneurship, or entrepreneurial activity with an embedded social purpose, has been on the rise in recent decades. There has been a tremendous growth in the number of non-profit making organizations, which increased substantially. However, the dynamic is even more robust, as other forms of social entrepreneurship, beyond that occurring within the non-profit sector, have also flourished in recent years. Social entrepreneurship is still emerging as an area for academic inquiry and research.

Meaning, as perceived by various researchers, of social entrepreneurship ranges from broad to narrow. In the broad sense, social entrepreneurship refers to innovative activity with a social objective in either the for-profit sector, such as in social-purpose commercial ventures or in the non-profit sector, or across sectors, such as hybrid structural forms which blend for-profit and non-profit approaches.

Under the narrow definition, social entrepreneurship typically refers to “the phenomenon of applying business expertise and market-based skills in the non-profit sector such as when non-profit organizations develop innovative approaches to earn income”.

Common across all definitions of social entrepreneurship is the fact that the underlying driving force and key factor for social entrepreneurship is “to create social value, rather than personal and shareholder wealth and that the activity is characterized by innovation”, or the creation of something new rather than simply the running of existing enterprises or practices in a traditional manner.

The central driver for social entrepreneurship is the social problem being addressed, and the particular organizational form a social enterprise takes should be a decision based on which format would most effectively mobilize the resources needed to address that problem.

Therefore, social entrepreneurship is not defined by legal form, as it can be pursued through various vehicles. In fact, examples of social entrepreneurship can be found within or can span through the non-profit, business, or governmental sectors.

Type # 4. Transpreneurship:

The road to entrepreneurship, for some people, is not the same as it is for urban entrepreneurs. To change the perception that the ‘third gender com­munity’ are only beggars or sex workers, a volunteer group has found a new way to bolster them as entrepreneurs, ‘Anam Prem’, a Mumbai based volunteer group organized a two day ‘Tran and Hijra’ Entrepreneurship mela in Mumbai with 35 stalls. People from the said community, from over 12 States, set up different stalls.

Despite the fact that, most of the members from Transgender and Hijra community did not have even bank accounts, they are entering into small scale business activities such as food, artificial flowers, artificial jewellery etc.

Urmi Jadhav, a performing artist from the community, invested rupees one lac, out of her own savings for her designer sari business.

Madhuri Sarode, another member started a jewellery business the same way, without much funds and support.

With the help of NGOs, this entrepreneurship is also catching up in a big way and soon the members of this community would emerge as entrepreneurs.

Type # 5. Commercial Entrepreneurship:

It is viewed as having profit as its main motive:

Although the concept of entrepreneurship was first defined more than 250 years ago, many have held it as one of the mysterious forces of human nature. The practice of entrepreneurship is, of course, as old as trading between tribes and villages. Earlier view of entrepreneurship focused on either the economic function of entrepreneurship or on the nature of the individual who is “the entrepreneur,” whereas in recent years, the focus has shifted on the various dynamics of the “how” of entrepreneurship which is defined as “The pursuit of opportunity beyond the tangible resources that one can currently control”.

Characteristics of Commercial Entrepreneurship:

(i) The entrepreneurial organization focuses on opportunity, not resources.

(ii) Entrepreneurs must commit quickly, but tentatively, to be able to readjust as new information arises. If information is not used timely, the result can be adverse on profits.

(iii) The process of commitment becomes multistage, limiting the commitment of resources at each stage to an amount sufficient to generate new information and success, before more resources are sought.

(iv) The entrepreneurial organization uses the resources that lie within the hierarchical control of others and, therefore, must manage the network as well as the hierarchy very well so that decisions are taken in favour of the entity are taken.


Types of Entrepreneurship – Intrapreneurship, Technopreneurship, Netpreneurship, Ecopreneurship, International, Culture and Social Entrepreneurship

I. Intrapreneurship:

It is the practice of entrepreneurship by an employee in an established organization to convert a lucrative idea in to a business opportunity. Intrapreneurs can be either the employees or even leaders in an organization riding high on self-motivation, creativity, and innovation while assuming risk without being asked to do so.

The term Intrapreneur was first defined by Gifford Pinchot in 1984. He defines intrapreneurs as “dreamers who do. Those who take hands on responsibility for creating innovation of any kind without being asked to do so”.

Definition of Intrapreneurship:

According to American Heritage Dictionary an intrapreneur means, “A person within a large corporation who takes direct responsibility for turning an idea into a profitable finished product through assertive risk-taking and innovation”. Intrapreneurship is also known as Corporate Entrepreneurship, where formal structures for promoting intrapreneurship lead to greater possibility of profitability and growth.

Many a times, nearly 80% of any organization’s employees feel discontented and demotivated to pursue the structured activity with a predefined systems and processes. They strongly experience the need to innovate either the mechanism, or product or processes to either redo or undo or outdo the earlier ways of doing the business.

If not properly stimulated and encouraged, such employees may leave the organization and start new entity of their own. But when properly nurtured, these employees provide cutting edge to the organizations by coming out with more cost effective ways of doing the erstwhile tasks or innovating altogether a novelty. Such Intrapreneurs while drawing from organisation’s resources, become exceptional at leading the teams and make quick decisions to seize the opportunity.

Quiet often the presence of Intrapreneurs are rewarding for employees as well as for the organization as they chalk out the strategy to convert unconventional, out of the box ideas into viable and lucrative business models. For example, at a reputed company Lockheed Martin, a passionate employee, Kelly Johnson, came up with the idea of creating Advancement Development Program (ADP), popularly named as “Skunk Works”, to build P-80 fighter jets. Skunk Works, formed in 1943, developed one of the most innovative aircrafts models, is still in operations today.

The team members could come up with such valuable Innovation, only when they were allowed to operate with great flexibility while drawing resources from the organisation.

When organizations develop an ecosystem to nurture intrapreneurship then it is also referred as Corporate Entrepreneurship. Now Corporate Entrepreneurship has become a full-fledged management discipline and widely practiced by umpteen companies across the globe.

Noted global companies like Google, Intel, 3M and Siemens are some of the companies that promote intrapreneurship within their organizations, allowing their employees to spend a certain percentage of their time on innovative ideas that are not related to their normal jobs.

For example, animation world was swept by its feet when employee of Microsoft, Robbie Bach J Aallrd and his team invented Xbox, Gaming Console. It would not have been possible without millions of money funded by Microsoft for encouraging the same. Even consultancy companies like Accenture, Barclays and Deloitte have devised formal programmes to motivate their employees to innovate. Closer home Indian companies like Infosys, TCS and Kinetic

India have also created new products and utilities through the innovations developed by creative employees.

As intrapreneurs are required to act pro-actively, often they go beyond the organizational bureaucracy and defined processes to visualize and formalize the opportunity. If the innovative and radical strategies are stifled in an organization, then the business has to look outside for entrepreneurship. In the 21st century organisation should nurture conducive environment, flexibility and healthy policy frameworks to bolster creativity, self-assumed responsibility and risk taking amongst employees.

Importance of Intrapreneurship:

By inculcating intrapreneurship in an organisation, while companies gain and develop a competitive edge for themselves in the industry, employees also find necessary infrastructure processes and funds for crystallizing their ideas in to reality.

The Importance of Intrapreneurship in an organization can be described as below:

1. Identification of opportunity – The first task of an intrapreneur is to identify the lucrative idea. He needs to test whether idea is user friendly, market adaptable and in consonance with the specified goals and strategies of the organization.

2. Idea presentation – The intrapreneur clearly presents the idea to other members of organization and takes their feedback and suggestions for improvement.

3. Ideas implementation – To implement the discussed proposals, the intrapreneur forms a team which puts the idea in action and converts the idea into an enterprise.

4. Strategy and Planning – Effective intrapreneurial strategies always help the entrepreneur/organization to win over their competitors and grab every lucrative opportunity.

5. Expansion of the enterprise – The ultimate goal of Intrapreneurship is to create that kind of entrepreneurial mindset and infrastructure which are needed to support growth in an organization.

6. Fostering Innovation in the organization – Intrapreneurship fosters organizational growth while strengthening employee morale and productivity. Intrapreneurship primarily thrives on the innovation and creativity of employees. Intrapreneurship and innovation are so closely intertwined that often it is difficult to imagine intrapreneurship without innovation.

7. Leadership – Last but the utmost task of an intrapreneur is to be the leader and drive other employees within his team and then the organization towards sustainability and realization of innate talent of staff.

Drivers of Intrapreneurship:

During the recent years, there has been growing interest in intrapreneurship owing to following factors:

1. Urgency to harness an environment to support and sustain innovation.

2. Need to engage and nurture the best and brightest talent in the organization

3. Introduction and penetration of change successfully and effectively in the business.

4. Ever increasing pressure to improve overall productivity and profitability.

5. Need to generate new businesses facilitating growth.

Identifying and Cultivating Corporate Entrepreneurs:

As intrapreneurs are crucial for success as well as for transformation of organizations, organizations must carefully identify its individual intrapreneur among its employees. Those exhibiting entrepreneurial traits like vision, passion, willingness to take risks and demonstrated leadership skills should be properly trained as well as encouraged to experiment and innovate to add value to the business.

A company should develop a complete model of corporate entrepreneurship by clearly defining how the flow of creative ideas will be addressed and resultant innovations will be supported by the company.

What organization should do to promote intrapreneurial environment?

1. Top management should be receptive and welcome with open arms innovative ideas.

2. Adequate and timely allocation of resources to strengthen innovation.

3. 360 degree of communication to facilitate two way communications between employees and senior management level to voice and illustrate ideas and suggestions.

4. Orientation towards creating value rather than wealth.

5. Timely recognition and reward system for nurturing intrapreneurship.

II. Technopreneurship:

It is the application of entrepreneurship in a technology intensive context to develop new products, processes and or services for self, organization or society. When an entrepreneur combines his talent with a high cutting edge technology to come out with novelty, he is said to be technopreneur.

A technopreneur is an entrepreneur who is technology driven, innovative and risk taker to assume unexplored path. A technopreneur enjoys both technology and business skills to capture high growth opportunity. He uses technology to arrive with new products utilities or services through a process of commercialization. Technopreneur constantly remain engaged in either finding new or refined way of completing a task or solving a problem while armed with technology based solutions.

Some of the iconic technopreneurs like Bill Gates (Microsoft), late. Steve Jobs (Apple), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Sergey Brin and Larry Page (Google), have innovated some of the most marvelous innovations for human kind. By combining their technical and intellectual knowledge with commerce, these technopreneurs have created highly appreciable products, utilities and services for society and wealth and repute for themselves.

These inventions by visionary entrepreneurs have led large scores of people to experiment, adopt and finally engage in new forms of businesses, offering myriad services in diverse business fields like B2B,B2C, B2G, G2C and even now the most concurrent, M2M (Machines to Machines).

Machines to Machines is a subpart of drive called as Internet of things, initiated by our Honorable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. Internet of things is the drive to electronically connect machines to machines over large geographical spaces to enable speeder and effective communication between people and devices across different networks.

Now various websites like Alibaba(dot)com, Myntra(dot)com, Naukri(dot)com, Du(dot)ac(dot)in, Mygov(dot)in, Linkedln, Health(dot)com and so on facilitate people to manage businesses, do shopping, search jobs , gain education, comply with Government norms, socialize with society and also take care of their health while being online.

As nothing comes free of cost, too much invasion and dependence on technology has once again enslaved humankind, but this time to technology. The increasing addiction to technology has swept away people from reality meanwhile also highlighting the need to re­orient entrepreneurs towards more socially, environmentally sustainable business models.

III. Netpreneurship (E-Entrepreneurship/Cyberpreneurship):

The virtual world of internet has opened sea of opportunities for scores of individuals, organizations, society and nations. Through a personal computer, now even through a mobile phone one can buy/sell/use or reuse a product or service available online. Now businesses in particular startups have also noted the influence and the outreach of internet and have moved from brick and mortar to online business to witness as well as gain the rewards of technology.

Meaning of Netpreneurship:

Netrpreneurship is the process of identifying and pooling bunch of resources to convert a promising opportunity in to a viable business venture online. It is the internet based entrepreneurship that works through online domain only.

When a person matches his ‘intellectual capital’ with’ ‘connectivity’ to offer goods and services online, he is referred as a Netpreneur or e-preneur. These kinds of netpreneurs are also known as Self Employed Netpreneurs (SENs), employing other employees for carrying online services. A Netpreneur can be a self-employed individual or one who predominantly employs several virtual employees

Definition of Netpreneurship:

The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English defines “net-pre-neur”, “as someone who has started an Internet business”. A Netpreneur is a person who creates, delivers products and services through online mode.

Netrpreneurship enables the businesses and in particular startups to identify engage and retain consumer through social or company based portals for exchange of goods, services and ideas. The escalating costs, complexity and the saturated markets in brick and mortar mode has led many entrepreneurs find an alternative business model in the form of netrpreneurship. Netpreneurship is comparatively an affordable business proposition to begin with.

Some of the world’s most influential companies began their humble steps through netpreneurship only. For e.g. the world’s leading company Google was started by its founders in late 1990 as a start-up only that too in a garage. Other similar companies include e-bay(dot)com, amazon(dot)com, paytm(dot)com, Flipkart(dot)com, monster(dot)com and so on.

Now days, with the advent of internet-based technologies like email, Web, VoIP (voice over internet protocol), and remote access software to communicate with global employers, has made working from home much easier and enjoyable for large number of self-employed people. A home office is a good choice for professionals who operate their own service-based small business (i.e., real estate, pet care, legal services) and for some Internet-based business including email marketing services, consulting services or e-commerce services.

Those entities that mainly operate in virtual world and engage into some offline services or resources for marketing or order fulfillment purposes are known as ‘Small and Home Office’ (SOHO) establishments. Due to rise in the number of these entities, various web based services and business software’s are created to cater to these kinds of netpreneurs who thrive their businesses through the internet medium.

As we research and experiment further between zero and one (language understood by computers), Netrpreneurship will be the face of future business, holding unimaginable potential for meteoric growth of not only businesses but also of people and their respective nations.

However, the business should also remain wary of the pitfalls of running online business. Online business may involve cyber-crimes like hacking, phishing, morphing and so on.

IV. International Entrepreneurship:

It is the process by which a startup/ venture or an established firms while capitalizing on creativity, risk taking and innovativeness, internationalize their operations across national boundaries. Through international entrepreneurship, an entity identifies an opportunity, configures its value chain, finalizes the geographical domain to be internationalized and finally picks the ways to reach the end customers in international markets.

International entrepreneurship (IB) bolsters the growth prospects of a firm by pooling physical, financial, human, technological and capital resources across allied foreign markets meanwhile milking the economies of scale and also warding off the stiff competition at home as well as abroad.

Some of the prerequisites for international venturing may include factors like financial strength, global experience, Research and development expenses, age of the firm, size of the firm, network relations and global visions along with much needed environmental scanning.

The main difference between a domestic entrepreneurship and international entrepreneurship is seizing of opportunity at different geographical spaces. Though through both the processes, the entrepreneur riding high on his innovativeness and risk taking aims to create, recreate and finally deliver a product or service yet the orientation is different in both forms of entrepreneurship.

In case of international entrepreneurship, networking across foreign partners in terms of institutions or organizations is paramount to the success rate of such ventures. While in domestic entrepreneurship, the entrepreneur leverages his innate talent, skills by pooling resources with in local settings.

This process of internationalization can be pursued by both new firms, i.e. by startups or even by established firms. When startups pursue it, they are known as ‘Born global firms’. These startups right from the stage of inception harbor international orientation and begin their operations at international level.

For example, Logitech, the computer peripherals company, manufacturing even PCs today, has international orientation right from the beginning and expanded very rapidly after starting operations and R&D from California and Switzerland.

Definition:

According to renowned researchers, Oviatt and McDougall (2005), International entrepreneurship is the discovery, enactment evaluation and exploitation of opportunities— across national borders—to create future goods and services.

International entrepreneurship includes various outlets through which a small yet competitive firm can enter the foreign shores, including exports, licensing, international franchising , international cooperative alliances, counter trading and bartering as firm adapt themselves to not only survive but also grow in the backdrop of cut throat competition. For example companies like Adidas, PepsiCo. KFC, Starbucks etc. have international operations all over the world.

Further it will also include new joint venture, IPO, when entrepreneurial activities require networking and resources to further penetrate and act as ‘Local while being Global’.

However as per the life cycle and internationalization theories, “a firm enters international markets successively starting from exporting and then gradually maturing towards stages like franchising, contract manufacturing and finally relocation of production to overseas location (FDI)”.

Therefore, to begin with large number of start-ups may resort to exporting before leapfrogging their way in international market by gradually embracing FDI. Especially for Small and Medium size enterprises, exporting is promising opportunity through which they can gain knowledge of international markets, marketing scenario, relevant rules and regulations and later leverage their learning and experiences to relocate their production to overseas locations also.

Difference between Domestic Entrepreneurship and International Entrepreneurship:

Domestic Entrepreneurship:

1. Orientation – Domestic

2. Format of entry – Registration of entity under relevant domestic laws

3. Ease of business – Fairly convenient

4. Technological adaptability – Relevant for the specific industry / business confined to a single country

5. Cultural sensitivity – Understanding of local culture

6. Government Policy – Compliance with domestic country relevant rules and regulations

7. Economic system – Understanding of local system

8. Growth possibilities – Limited to market size

9. Risk and reward – Limited

International Entrepreneurship:

1. Orientation – International

2. Format of entry – Registration under domestic and international laws

3. Ease of business – Complex and dynamic

4. Technological adaptability – Technological advancement and adaptability of different operations in different countries

5. Cultural sensitivity – Specific and close understanding of cultural diversity among customers and employees

6. Government Policy – Multi Governments rules and regulations for entry, operations and exit

7. Economic system – Understanding of different economic systems and various markets

8. Growth possibilities – Unlimited opportunities

9. Risk and reward – High and unlimited

Factors to be Considered While Entering Foreign Markets:

A careful analysis of following factors have to be done before the entrepreneur can decide to venture into international market:

1. Country Specific Factors:

i. Political factors

ii. Business related policies and environment

iii. General laws and regulations

iv. Host of benefits and protection available to foreign firm

v. Legal framework

vi. Cultural factors including the customers profile

2. Industry Specific Factors:

i. Demand and supply dynamics

ii. Ease of entry and exit

iii. Specific industrial norms

iv. Type and intensity of Completion

3. Firm Specific Factors:

i. Availability of internal resources

ii. Ease, cost and availability of external resources

iii. Relative experience of the firm including its age

iv. Technological prowess of the firm

v. The unique selling proposition of the firm

4. Project Specific Factors:

i. Size of the project

ii. Availability of various kinds of resources

iii. Type and stage of project being undertaken

Modes of Entry into International Market:

An entrepreneur can resort to various modes of entry in to international market starting from the basic form of exporting to more challenging one like FDI.

Following is the sequential guide to different modes of entry in International market:

1. Exporting:

The process through which goods and services manufactured in one country are sold in to another country/ies.

It may involve two sub-parts:

i. Direct exporting – where the concerned company is solely responsible for selling directly its goods to the consumers in their respective country through various agents.

ii. Indirect Exporting – where the manufacturer hands over his products to another domestic producer/exporting agent/to sell the goods to end consumers in other countries.

2. Licensing:

In this mode of entry, the manufacturer of the home country leases the right of intellectual properties, i.e., technology, copyrights, brand name, etc., to a manufacturer of a foreign country for a predetermined fee. The manufacturer that leases is known as the licensor and the manufacturer of the other country that gets the license is known as the licensee.

3. Franchising:

In this mode, an independent firm called the franchisee does the business using the name of another company called the franchisor. In franchising, the franchisee has to pay a fee or a fraction of profit to the franchisor. The franchisor provides the trademarks, operating process, product reputation and marketing, HR and operational support to the franchisee. For example international eateries brands like McDonald’s and Pizza hut have resorted to franchising mode to enter the foreign markets.

4. Specialized Entry Modes:

i. Contract Manufacturing:

In this arrangement either the entire or some part of the job is transferred to a third party in the country due to low cost of manufacturing including cheap labour. For e.g. in recent years India and China have emerged as manufacturing hub for many tech sector companies due to their low cost of technology. For instance, IBM outsources manufacturing of it subparts to Chinese firms and then later assembles the final product in U.S.

ii. Management Contract:

It is an arrangement between two companies from two countries where one company agrees to provide managerial, technical, personnel and operational services for the agreed period in return for fees.

iii. Turn Key Project:

Turnkey refers to sum service or facility that is ready to use by just turning the key. In this arrangement, the owner of the plant assigns the task of building industrial plants / unit from scratch to the final operational stage for a fee. The person / entity so hired is responsible for designing, constructing and then also training the staff to carry out the transfer of its technology or other processes to another company.

Depending upon the extent and the stage of completion of the project, these projects can be of following types:

a. BOT, Built owned and transfer

b. BOLT, Built owned leased and transfer

c. BOOT, Built owned operate and transfer

5. Foreign Direct Investment:

When a company decides to relocate its production, marketing and other operational services in another country then, such an operation is known as Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). It can do so either through Green field investments – establishing all together new entity by setting up new plant, creating productive capacities and also substantiating investments through transfer of knowledge and technical knowhow.

Brown field investments- when equity state is bought in an already established entity, meanwhile investing in capital, technology and other resources of such an enterprise. It comes in the form of joint venture between two corporate entities, institutions or even Government organizations. The intent behind joint venture is to capitalize on the synergies between two entities.

However, before foraying in the international markets, the entrepreneur should carefully assess the ownership advantages, locational benefits and the process through which he wish to internationalize. This assessment is paramount for the success of the entrepreneurial venture.

V. Ecopreneurship:

The adoption of environmentally responsible and sustainable business practices while launching and operating an enterprise is called ecopreneurship. Ecopreneurship is seen as an offshoot of Social Entrepneurship only, which among various societal problem, specifically looks after ecological problems.

Ecopreneurship or green management or environmental entrepreneurship as it may be alternatively known, is a comparatively new and under researched concept. It derives its root from the integration of entrepreneurship and environmental business management.

Hence when an Entrepreneurship venture is being carried out while maintaining sustainable development at the core of all the activities, then it becomes an ecopreneurship.

As per the OECD definition, sustainable development means a, “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.

The entrepreneurs who conceptualize, organize and run these kinds of entities are known as ecopreneurs. In the book Merging Economic and Environmental Concerns through Ecopreneurship, written by Gwyn Schuyler in 1998, ecopreneurs are defined as follows –

“Ecopreneurs are entrepreneurs whose business efforts are not only driven by profit, but also by a concern for the environment. Ecopreneurship, also known as environmental entrepreneurship and eco-capitalism, is becoming more widespread as a new market- based approach to identifying opportunities for improving environmental quality and capitalizing upon them in the private sector for profit.”

Through Ecopreneurship those products or services are offered, that do not harm environment or it makes use of those technology/processes or business practices/policies that are environment friendly and sustainable. Ecopreneurship while developing sustainable business frameworks also offers opportunities for business to create new products/services/processes using innovative means.

Depleting natural resources and mounting environmental problems like pollution, dwindling water reservoirs, endangered flora and fauna, ever growing effect of greenhouse gases, have underlined the impressing need to address these issues at the grass root level.

Though some efforts to control, mitigate and reverse the process of environmental degradation has been already started by large and small organizations alike in various parts of the world.

Sustainable and environment friendly practices like earning carbon credit for reducing pollution, Triple bottom line accounting- integrating social and environmental benefits with the accounting profits, cradle to cradle approach for product design- minimizing product waste and carving an environment friendly disposable product, System thinking- studying the effect of a problem on society, environment along with the organization, have already found their ways in various organization.

Global Corporation like Munich Reinsurance Group, IBM, IKEA, British Telecom, Hewlett Packard, Philips Electronics, Johnson and Johnson, Nike, yahoo and Dell employ sustainable business practices and processes.

Closer home, even in India, various ecopreneurial ventures have undertaken to solve ecological problems by providing innovative solutions.

Underlining the need of the hour, even our Honorable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has launched his flagship Program of ‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyan’. It is a campaign by Government of India to clean the streets, roads and infrastructure of the country’s 4041 statutory cities and towns. It is India’s largest cleanliness drive ever, with 3 million Government employees and especially school and college students from all parts of India, participating in this campaign.

VI. Culture Entrepreneurship:

It is the practice of creative and innovative business practices by enterprises including startups in the culture and creative industry. Culture Entrepreneurship while offering varied expressions of different artistic forms, enables an entrepreneurial activity to be profitable as well as sustainable.

Different art forms like dance music, painting and architecture creative designing, have held the imaginations of human race since the time immemorial. But for very long, artists survived and later earned the fame through their own capital without much recourse to public funding.

As culture and society progressed and developed in-depth interest towards growing forms of art, an impressing need was felt to make these expressions wide spread and everlasting. Through culture entrepreneurship, the world of art gets united with the commercial world. This union paves the way for proliferation of art throughout the world, making culture industry a lucrative one. Culture entrepreneurship has led many artists to become entrepreneurs or to support artist, so that the art form can be brought in the main frame.

When the celebrated and iconic entrepreneur, Walt Disney innovated cartoon characters like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck on the big screen, the film industry entered the new pedestal of animation. It was the entrepreneurial vigor of Walt Disney, which rewrote the culture of watching movies especially with cartoon characters. Movies like Cinderella, Pinocchio, Sleeping beauty, Alice in the Wonderland are still able to hold the viewers by awe.

It is through culture entrepreneurship only that today we marvel, astonish, relish and praise artistic expressions in various forms of art. Some of the world’s most iconic monuments like Taj Mahal, Eiffel Towers, Statue of Liberty etc. have been the fruits of culture entrepreneurship, offering a treat to human ingenuity and excellence.

Today we witness umpteen example of culturally enriched and equally amusing master pieces around the world, thanks to culture Entrepreneurship. For e.g. museum of Madam Tussad (London, Hongkong, and now in India also), Opera House (Australia), Burj Khalifa (Dubai), Petronas towers (Malaysia) are all example of sustainable and lucrative business propositions capturing the human marvel around the world.

Various musical forms like classical, pop, karnatic, western and dance forms like Salsa, Zumba, contemporary, classical etc. have penetrated down to households through culture entrepreneurship only.

Around the world, yet investments in the culture entrepreneurial venture is done with skepticism as the success depends upon the taste/flavor of consumers/audience. Consumers/audience taste can be very unpredictable and erratic, making the entrepreneurs shriek at the first go.

However, high tech technology has opened the flood gates for experimentation as well as commercialization of culture gully by adding multiple new dimensions in tech enabled fields like gaming, animation, publishing, comics etc.

Mostly Culture Entrepreneurship thrives on the shoulders of individuals due to lack of Governmental and institutional support. Now, it is high time that venture capitalist as well as angel investors look beyond high-tech and e-tailing sectors to proliferate the culture industry to its true potential.

VII. Social Entrepreneurship or Creative Response to Social Problems by Entrepreneurship:

It is the practice of solving social, cultural and environmental problems with viable and innovative business ideas while employing business principles and practices. Social business was first defined by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus in his book ‘Creating a world without poverty’ as businesses, “that are created and designed to address a social problem, it is a non-loss non-dividend company” i.e., it has financial sustainability and its profits are reinvested in the business itself.

Social enterprises are those businesses that are run by individuals whose goal is to create and sustain social value. Social enterprises’ main cause of existence is serving to the society while being economically and financially successful and growing.

Social entrepreneurship finds its way in organization of all types, size and industry underlining the prime belief that business can exist and thrive only with the presence and approval of the society. The callous and profit orientation of business over the several decades, has led to creation as well as accumulation of problems like pollution, unemployment, indifference to elders, oppression and neglect of children, atrocities towards women and so on.

Through social entrepreneurship, an entrepreneur contributes to the society by figuring out eco-friendly and human friendly solutions to these kinds of pertinent issues in the society. Many a times social enterprise forges a relationship of trust between Government, business and civil society by making business much more empathetic and conscious toward its own actions as well as towards society.

For e.g. Mohammed Yunus Khan, a Bangladeshi social entrepreneur was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for founding the Grameen Bank and pioneering the concepts of microcredit and microfinance. Yunus along with Grameen banks’ network have shown that even the poorest of poor people can be brought in the mainstream by arming them with the right financial aid and education.

Social enterprises can be structured as non-profit or for profit entities having volunteers as well as executives even from Fortune 500 companies, who capitalize their business acumen and experience to solve social problems in an entrepreneurial fashion.

The business philosophy of social enterprise may involve three things primarily:

1. The extent and the manner in which it produces goods and services,

2. The extent to which it defines its raison de etrer, i.e. the motive for existence and the way it accomplishes it, and

3. To extent to which it democratically shares human, financial and social capital among various stake holders.

In India, a social enterprise may be a registered as a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), incorporated either as a Society under Indian Societies Registration Act, 1860 or as a Trust registered under various Indian State Trust Acts or a Section 8 Company under Companies Act 2013.

In some of the countries like U.K., Italy, Korea and Singapore, the agenda for social enterprise is being largely driven by Government and large private enterprises (especially Korea), however in India, journey into the world of social entrepreneurship has been primarily led by the vision and enthusiasm of remarkable individuals.

In India, examples of social enterprises include some of the noted entities like Redcross, CRY (Child care and You), Helpage India as well as newer ones like, Husk Power system (installed 60 mini-power plants that power Rs.25,000 households in more than 250 villages and impact lives of approximately 150,000 people in rural India.), ITC-echoupals (in 2011 there were 6,500 e-Choupal installations reaching 4 million farmers across 40,000 villages in 10 states), Eko Financial services (served nearly a million customers through its network of 1,300+ retail outlets across three states) and the number is still growing.

Benefits of Social Entrepreneurship:

It has been demonstrated through research that, with the help of social entrepreneurship, following benefits can be obtained:

1. As social enterprises are primarily driven by the motive of creating welfare, they plough back larger part of their profits back in business, thus promoting capital formation and economic development in a country.

2. By facilitating means of livelihood, these enterprises also nurture self-confidence and self-esteem among the downtrodden local people.

3. Through innovation and experimentation, it fills the gaps in existing economic system and services that cannot or will not be delivered by the public and private sectors.

4. Various outreach programme encompassing training and employment, create opportunities for socially deprived people to learn, earn and come in the mainstream.