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New venture “startups” are financed via three standard methods: self‐funding, “friends and family” or possibly “angel” investors; seed capital from venture capitalists; and large corporations’ venture funds. Each of these financial structures has its own set of risk and reward trade‐offs. Corporate venture funding has been seen as the least risky funding method, but also the least likely to be available for the entrepreneur. Each of these funding methods is likely to engender a different kind of corporate culture that could impact the e‐commerce venture’s long‐term development. The self‐ or privately‐funded company must continuously scramble for scarce funds and may not be able to develop internally the necessary culture of knowledge creation. Companies supported primarily by venture capitalists may develop a culture that over‐focuses on quick return of capital to investors. Alternatively, the slow decision‐making processes of large corporations are often antithetical to Internet time.

This research explores how individual factors drive early-stage strategic entrepreneurship (SE) in Vietnam and Taiwan. The authors extend SE and integrate knowledge spillover theory to gain insights into the relationship between individual factors and SE. The research highlights the importance of a dual process, which involves advantage-creating by innovation, as value creation and capture, and advantage-leveraging by growth and international expansion, as value retention and capture.

Innovation-oriented SE (ISE), growth-oriented SE (GSE) and internationalization-oriented SE (ITSE) are identified as new measures of SE. There are six hypotheses containing the effect of six personal characteristics have on SE. The authors employed logit regression to estimate the effect of independent variables on SE based on a pooled cross-sectional dataset drawn from Global Entrepreneurship Monitoring (GEM) in Vietnam and Taiwan during 2013–2018.

Opportunity sensing, education, self-funding ability, startup knowledge and skills and startup experience are crucial to the engagement of at least one type of SE in Vietnam. In contrast, education, self-funding ability and start-up knowledge and skills are key factors in Taiwan.

This study contributes to the extension of SE at the individual level in the early phase of new venturing and the integration of knowledge spillover theory. In order to drive early-stage SE further, the authors recommend to prioritize learning from spillovers within and among organizations, industries and communities, as well as through quality institutions, in addition to the individual drivers.

This article summarises and provides commentary upon the case of Peters v East Midlands Strategic Health Authority [2009] EWCA Civ 71 and considers its likely effect on claims for future care in personal injury litigation. In future, there should be less impetus on case managers and deputies to pursue applications for state funding of care packages on behalf of injured claimants, where those claimants intend to claim the future costs of such packages from defendants. A state‐funded package is likely to be regarded as an interim measure pending the Court's final award of damages.

A three-year research study, funded by Innovate UK, Consumer Models for Assisted Living (COMODAL) aimed to support the development of the consumer market for electronic assisted living technology (eALT) products and services, particularly for people aged 50-70, approaching older age and retirement themselves or with caring responsibilities for family or friends. The purpose of the COMODAL study was to gain a greater understanding of their needs and behaviours relating to the acquisition of eALT and develop sustainable consumer-led business models that might address these needs and support business development within a consumer market (Ward et al., 2016). The purpose of this paper is to present a follow up study to explore how the market may have changed since the publication of the research findings.

An online survey was used to collect both qualitative and quantitative data from individuals working in the supply and distribution of assisted living technologies in the UK regarding how their businesses had developed in the past two years.

The results showed that since the publication of the COMODAL research there have been changes in the way that the consumer market for eALT is being approached, not only with more direct marketing focused on consumer’s needs but also in direct partnerships with local authorities that offer greater choice with an improved range of products.

This is the first paper in the UK to follow up the impact of the original COMODAL research and explore its influence on the development of the consumer market for eALT.

The purpose of this research is to explore whether the “pecking order hypothesis” (POH) applies to the capital finance preferences of start‐up businesses.

In‐depth interviews with 20 Scotland‐based entrepreneurs were conducted in order to reveal the subtleties of the capital finance preferences which applied to a sample of start‐up firms. To ensure reliability and validity, data was analysed using a systematic schema.

Consistent with the POH we found that entrepreneurs in start‐ups turn to internal sources first, that is, their own funds. In contradiction to the POH, however, evidence in this paper finds that where external funds are required, the main source is equity rather than debt. In the majority of cases, in depth interviews show that a bridged pecking order applies in that the businesses move from self‐funding to external equity in preference to, or instead of bank finance. Two reasons for this pattern can be established. First, entrepreneurs consider debt to be a personal liability as it invariably requires to be underwritten by personal guarantees. Entrepreneurs place a self‐imposed limit on the extent to which they are prepared to mortgage their assets. Second, entrepreneurs deliberately seek out equity investment as a means of obtaining added value over and above the finance invested. Rather than the external equity being viewed as expensive, it is viewed as good value as a well‐chosen investor can add business skills and social capital in the form of commercial contacts and access to relevant networks.

Entrepreneurs searching for investment should assess the post‐investment role they wish investors to play. Successful consideration of this issue will make it more likely that a start‐up business obtains external finance and that entrepreneurs achieve good “matches” with investors, and vice versa.

The value of this paper rests in its finding that a bridged pecking order may apply to start‐up firms in that entrepreneurs move directly from self‐funding to equity.

From 2006 to 2016, Brazilian agricultural cooperatives exhibited a sharp increase in sales. Since the operational cycle of these organizations demands a positive net working capital that is usually funded by debt, the authors examine whether this rise in sales was obtained at the cost of the short-term financial sustainability. As a matter of comparison, the authors conduct the same analysis for Brazilian agricultural public traded companies.

The authors employ the dynamic analysis of working capital method to measure the short-term financial sustainability of these organizations.

The authors find that the expansion of net working capital caused by the growth of the revenues of the sampled cooperatives was mostly funded by short-term debt, which rose by 31% in annualized terms. The authors also document that around 60% of these firms displayed a current capital structure that can be considered risky in terms of indebtedness, and that the majority of firms exhibited a non-sustainable growth in the period, what contrasts with the performance presented by Brazilian agricultural publicly traded companies, since only 16% of the firms from this group have shown a non-sustainable growth. This distinction seems to be explained by the lower capacity of agricultural cooperatives to provide resources from their operations.

The authors investigate the short-term financial sustainability of a unique dataset of 65 Brazilian agricultural cooperatives and provide insight for researchers analyzing the dual nature of these firms.

Using analytical and experimental methods, this paper examines the extent to which targeted self-funding lotteries described by Morgan ((2000). Review of Economic Studies, 67(234), 761–784) improve social welfare in an environment with multiple public goods. Social welfare improves relative to the Nash prediction, when a single lottery is used to support provision of any socially desirable public good. However, social welfare is maximized if the lottery funds only the most socially desirable public good. Experimental results show that a lottery can fund a less socially desirable public good, but that efficiency declines as lottery ticket purchases crowd out voluntary contributions made in the absence of lotteries.

Established as a pilot programme in 1994, the Architect in the Community Programme now covers the whole of Cuba, providing affordable technical support to households who are building or renovating their homes on a self-help basis. The programme is self-funding and has to date been used by over 500,000 households. The participative design approach that it uses provides households with skills and confidence as well as better living conditions. It has an international reputation for its work and the experience has been transferred to other countries in Latin America and beyond.

Older care home residents who are assisted financially by their local authority have to have their placements reviewed at least annually. Such reviews provide an opportunity for the older person and their relatives to comment on the care that they receive.One of the themes that emerged from a recent study into the care home review system in one local authority was that older people who self‐fund do not have this opportunity and that this was inequitable. This paper discusses the possible benefits of extending the review system to include self‐funders, together with some of the issues that this might raise.