Investigating a neglected part of Schumpeter’s creative army: what drives new-to-the-market innovation in micro-enterprises?

Schumpeterian arguments related to creative destruction place small, entrepreneurial firms at the centre of the innovation process. The exclusion of micro-enterprises (with less than 10 employees) from most innovation surveys means, however, that we know relatively little about innovation among this group of firms. Here, using new survey data on a thousand micro-enterprises, we explore the determinants of new-to-the-market innovation, the basis for the Schumpeterian creative destruction (CD) process. Our results provide strong support for the interactive nature of micro-enterprise innovation and suggest the potential value of a model of interactive creative destruction (ICD). Contrary to some other recent evidence, market-based and supplier-based collaboration both prove important for new-to-the-market innovation. Our results suggest the importance of micro-enterprises as sources of new-to-the-market innovation and the potential value of including such firms in future innovation studies.