Annals of the University of Petroșani , Econo mics, 19 (1), 201 9, 1-3 1 [618721]

Annals of the University of Petroșani , Econo mics, 19 (1), 201 9, 1-3 1

ANALYSIS OF THE ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM
FROM ROMANIA

AMALIA FURDUI *

ABSTRACT: The economic growth and well -being of a country are influenced by
various factors, including access to resources and the quality of human factors, access to
technolo gy and innovation capacity, etc. The increase of the rate of SMEs in the total number of
enterprises and their contribution to the Creation of the GDP determined the researchers to
analyze the impact of the entrepreneurial activity of the population on the economic growth. At
the same time, the intensity of entrepreneurial activity is determined by a multitude of factors,
which are taken together, which make up the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Recent studies show
that countries with a balanced entrepreneurial ecosystem are characterized by high rates of
economic growth. The purpose of the article i s to highlight the impact of the quality of the
entrepreneurial ecosystem on the economic growth in terms of its impact on the intensity of the
entrepreneurial activ ity.

KEY WORDS: entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial ecosystem, entrepreneurial
culture, entrepreneurial education, entrepreneurial initiative
..

JEL CLASSIFICATIONS: L26,C38

1. Introduction
Entrepreneurship began to receive attention with the proble ms brought about
by the global economic and financial crisis, and entrepreneurs became "heroes"
capable of giving impetus to fragile economies. Entrepreneurship cannot be precisely
defined, and the multidimensionality and homogeneity of the concept make it very
difficult to generalize the conclusions. There are also many empirical analyzes based
on the correlation of the entrepreneurial activity and the economic growth, and most of
the specialists in the field formulate conclusions regarding the impact of
entrepreneurship. economic based on the correlation of the number of new businesses
created with the share of the labor force employed by SMEs, with the income
generated by the SMEs in a certain branch or even with the GDP . More analysis on the

*Ph.D. Student: [anonimizat], Romania, iulia_amalia @yahoo.com

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macroeconomi c impact of entrepreneurship are made by the in ternational consortium
Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM). [9]
In the classical sense, entrepreneurs are people who start businesses, employ
labor, mobilize resources and ensure that their operational activity continues and
works. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) This
defines entrepreneurship as: Entrepreneurs have those persons (business owners) who
seek to generate value, through the creation or expansion of economic activity, by
identifying and exploring new products, processes or markets. (OECD, Paris,
2012 .)[2].
The main characteristics of entrepreneurship are: innovation, proactivity and
risk taking, and the positive effects are associated with entrepreneurship, directly or
indirectly: sustainable development, overall growth of business performance and
economic efficiency, creating new jobs, improving competitiveness. regional and
national, more efficient management of economic crises, recognition and exploitation
of opportunit ies. (Ratten, 2011 ). [3]
The objective of this article is to carry out a comprehensive analysis of the
Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem and of the factors that have the power to
stimulate it, thus allowing the design of effective policies for the developm ent of the
Romanian entrepreneurship.

2. Analysis of the Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem

In the specialized literature various definitions for the term entrepreneurial
ecosystem can be found, all of which are summarized in the fact that it encompasses
the social and economic e nvironment that affects the entrepreneurial activity. There are
many definitions of what the entrepreneurial ecosystem is and how it works. The
concept of entrepreneurial ecosystem emphasizes the collective and systemic nature of
entrepreneurship, and this means that in order to stimulate entrepreneurial activity in a
particular country, it is necessary to facilitate the creation of an ecosystem favorable to
entrepreneurship. The quality of the ecosystem differs from one country to another, or
even in diffe rent regions of the same country, the development potential of countries
and / or regions is different. At the same time, the ecosystem having a rigid character
makes the measures aimed at stimulating the entrepreneurial activity i n certain
countries or re gions with a low impact, which determines a low impact of the efforts
made by the authorities in order to ensure the economic growth .
The process of developing an ecosystem that allows entrepreneurship to
develop has attracted the attention of: governments, development agencies such as:
GSM Association, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD),
World Bank and World E conomic Forum etc. They have developed comprehensive
diagnostic tools for assessing and monitorin g ecosystem development .
The approaches regarding the diagnostic tools for the development of ecostems
vary widely and can be classified according to: the geogra phical unit of analysis, the
level of detail and their sectoral or domain concentration. For e xample, some
approaches, such as the OECD Entrepreneurship Measurement Framework, the World
Bank's "Doing Business" ranking, and George Mason University's Global

Title of the paper (TNR , 11 points, italic ) 3

Entrepreneurship and Development Index are nationwide and can be used to make
cross -country co mparisons. Instead, the Rainforest Bluesrint Innovation Plan is for
competitiveness and specifically targeted at local ecosystems. The ecosystem project
and Kolta i Six + Six can be used at national or subnational level. One of the most used
models was deve loped by Daniel Isenberg. According to him, the entrepreneurial
ecosystem consists of six areas: politics, finance, markets, human capital, support and
culture (I senberg, 201 1) [4].

Figure1 – The entrepreneurial ecosystem
Sursa Isenberg’s ecosystem domai ns, Scale up™ Ecosystems for Growth
Entrepreneurship

According to the model presented in figure 1, in the center of the ecosystem is the
entre preneur, who, in fact, carries out the entrepreneurial activity, but his activity is
accelerated or on the contra ry, restrained by the ecosystem. Each of the 6 domains

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forms the ecosystem and generates favorable or unfavorable factors for
entrepreneurship. At the same time, the quality of the entrepreneurial ecosystem
directly influences the intensity of the entrepre neurial activity, and indirectly the
welfare of the company .

2.1.Performance of the entrepreneurial ecosystem
In this subchapter we will analyze entrepreneurial activities and attitudes
towards entrepreneurship based on three sources :Global Entrepreneuri al Monitor
(GEM) , a recent study published by the Romanian Executive Agency for Financing
Higher Education, Research, Development and Innovation (UEFISCDI) and the results
of a study by EY / Impact hub ("barometer") on the Romanian start -ups.[8]
According to the country profile 7 of Global Entrepreneurship (GEM) for
Romania, there are several notable trends, namely:
– the rate of early -stage entrepreneurial activity in Romania in 2014 is 11.35% of
the working -age adult population. Entrepreneurial activity in i ts early stages consists of
those entrepreneurs who started a business less than three months and those who
worked more than three months, but less than three year and a half (42 months). This
rate is slightly higher than it was in 2013 (10.1%) and is high er than the rate recorded
in Croatia, Hungary and Poland and is sim ilar to that in Lithuania.
– the share of newborn entrepreneurs fell to 5.33% in 2014, from 7.94% in 2013.
This rate is similar to Croatia, Hungary, Lithuania and Poland. The share of young
business entrepreneurs increased to 6.17% in 2014, from 4.20% in 2 013, which is the
highest value among the efficiency -based economies in the European Union.
– The activity rate in the early stages, ie the rate of those who claim to act,
because there is a go od opportunity and it is not necessary, increased to 7.96% in 201 4,
compared to the rate measured in 2013 (6.8%). This value is higher than the rate in
Croatia, Hungary and Poland, but lower than Lithuania (9.01%). The rate of
entrepreneurship in the early phase determined by necessity is 3.28%, similar to the
rate regi stered in 2013.
– the typical Romanian entrepreneur is a man, between 25 and 44 years old, has
a secondary or post -secondary level and a household income mainly in the third higher
level .

Figure 2 – The evolution of the entrepreneurial activity in Romania
Source: Global Entrepreneurial Monitor

Title of the paper (TNR , 11 points, italic ) 5

In Romania, the entrepreneurial activity from the beginning stage seems to be
more oriented towards the transforming sector ( 31.31%) 8, followed by the extractive
sector9 (26.89%). Only 15.57% of them early stage entreprene urs use the latest
technology, while 25.82% of the technology nine. Most early stage entrepreneurs
(62.0%) employ between one and five employees.
Following the study carried out by the Romanian Executive Agency for Higher
Education, Research, Development a nd Innovation Financing (UEFISCDI) on the
Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem, a high social status has been given to
entrepreneurship in general. A large pe rcentage of adults intend to start a business
(entrepreneurial intentions), and the attention paid t o the media for entrepreneurship is
high. A weakness of the culture is the tendency towards employment, rather than self –
employment (entrepreneurship), due to the lack of opportunities to finance a business.
There is also a low risk rate and only a small n umber of opportunities -oriented
entrepreneurs. The study also established a global index of the Romanian
entrepreneurial ecosystem where Romania obtained a 4.5 out of 10, which suggests
that the Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem is poorly developed. Accor ding to the
study, ordinary Romanian entrepreneurs tend to be are self -sustaining and are not
encouraged or supported by the ecosystem. Most respondents to the survey said they
were encouraged and supported by family and friends in starting their activity, while
only a few felt that they were recommending others to enter the field of
entrepreneurship. The networks established between entrepreneurs were not st rong
enough to lead to a supportive environment .

3. Research methodology

The first stage for conduct ing the study involved a complete analysis of the
Romanian entrepreneurial ecosystem using the data provided by the Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM ), this analysis providing an overview of the current
situation and how it can be intervened. The next s tep was to identify the factors that
have the potential to positively or negatively influence the entrepreneurial ecosystem in
a particular r egion. These factors were identified after studying the literature on
entrepreneurship. The main factors that have the potential to influence the situation of
entrepreneurship were identified as: the competences and abilities of the entrepreneur,
access to financing sources, taxes and other administrative barriers, the existence of
networks and connections, the culture and the entrepreneurial capital, the
entrepreneurial education and the public policies. Each of these factors was analyzed to
see what its c urrent stat us is and to provide recommendations on how it can be
improved.

3.1. Data analysis and interpretation

For a complete analysis, a questionnaire was created in which each of the
analyzed factors was represented by a number of observable indica tors that the
respondents evolved on a Likert scale with values from 1 to 5.

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The questionnai re was distributed online between February and June 2019 the
entrepreneurial communities in Romania and had 200 respondents, and its results are
important because all the re spondents (although not all entrepreneurs) are people who
understand the Romanian e ntrepreneurial ecosystem and the answers have been
analyzed. from the qualitative and quantitative point of view. All 200 questionnaires
were completed correctly, these bein g the subject of a statistical analysis. For data
processing, the program used was the statistical package for social sciences – SPSS,
one of the most used programs in the statistical analysis of data. All measured
indicators were analyzed by cal culating a rithmetic averages and squared mean
deviations. In addition, the responses were com pared between different age groups and
between entrepreneurs and those who have not yet taken the first step to understand
what the differences in perception are d etermined by demographic factors.

3.2.Result
Following the application of the questionnaire of th e 200 respondents it was
proved that: 40% of the respondents are entrepreneurs and 60% (they are not
entrepreneurs).
The entrepreneurs answered what were t he motivations that were the basis of
their own business in order to be able to identify quantitative ly, how many of them
chose to start on the road because they saw an opportunity, and how many of the
necessity.
They were asked if entrepreneurship was the ir only option when they chose to
start a business on their own and were offered two alternatives: “I don't have had other
alternatives "or" Yes, I could have done other things, but I chose to be an entrepreneur
". The results of the study were surprising: only 25% of the entrepreneurs said they had
to start their own business, the other 75% said they could have chosen something else,
but they chose to be entrepreneurs. Respondents who did not start their own businesses
were ask ed to evaluate the likelihood of starting a business in the following years on a
scale of 1 to 5, where 1 represents the least likely situation and 5 represents the
certainty of starting a company. This indicator represents the entrepreneurial
inclination of the population, defined as the probability of becoming entrepreneurs in
the future.
The average entrepreneurial inclination of the respondents registered a value of
3.8 and a mean square deviation of 1.5, showing the high tendency of the population to
develop their own businesses i n the medium term. Romania has a strong
entrepreneurial culture where entrepreneurs are appreciated and initiatives are
supported. The moderate -negative perception of failure and the negative influence of
teachers, parents and family have a negative impact on the entrepreneurial behavior of
young people. This problem can be solved by educating these categories of influence
and developing their entrepreneurial spirit, while promoting the right models, events
and competitions for start-ups, etc.
Public polic ies instead of contributing to the development of the Romanian
entrepreneurial ecosystem, public policies are a major impediment. To understand how
people perceive the measures taken so far at government level, respondents were a sked
to assess on a scale o f 1 to 5 whether public policies encouraged them to become

Title of the paper (TNR , 11 points, italic ) 7

entrepreneurs, if the Romanian state has an adequate policy for entrepreneurship. and if
they are aware of government initiatives to promote and support entrepreneurship.

Figure 3 -Politici publice
Source : Datele colectate prin intermediul che stionarului

The result was that more t han 70% of the respondents considered the
legislative framework as an impediment in their choice to become entrepreneurs. The
necessary measu res can be taken both at public and private level. As a result of the
study results and discussions with important representatives of the business
environment, we believe that there should be a clear division of responsibilities.
In conclusion, the public and private sectors have the power to make a
significant contribution to the development of the Romanian entrepren eurial
ecosystem.

CONCLUSIONS

The economic growth of a country is dependent on the extent of the
entrepreneurial activity, which, in turn, depends on the quality of the entrepreneurial
ecosystem. The entrepreneurial ecosystem comprises a large area of community life,
which makes it r igid in relation to measures aimed at optimizing it. For this reason, the
development of economic development strategies for a country or region must start
from the evaluation of the entrepreneurial ecosystem and the identif ication of
opportunities for its improvement .
The measures needed to improve entrepreneurship can be taken at both the
public and private lev els. As a result of the study results, we believe that there should
be a clear division of responsibilities. Thus at the governmental level the state should
focus on improving the quality of entrepreneurial educa tion programs and in this sense
there should be a link between school and the business environment, and the
curriculum should be adapted to market conditions. On the other hand, the private

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environment can make a significant contribution to the development of
entrepreneurship by implementing quality programs, training sessions, events and
competitions for entrepreneurs at the beginning of the road, mentoring and support
programs for start -ups or information sessions on existing funding opportunities.

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