Failure’s virtues: the seeding of an emerging entrepreneurial ecosystem in a peripheral region
以加拿大最不发达省份的一家失败科技公司为例，说明政府资助的企业即使倒闭，也能通过人才留存、技能积累和示范效应为当地创业生态系统注入活力，建议政策制定者容忍失败。
A key strategy of governments in economically-lagging regions is to provide financial support to innovative start-ups. Yet, if such businesses fail, governments are criticized for ‘wasting tax-payers money’. This paper challenges this narrative. It provides a case study of Consilient Technologies, located in St John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada’s most economically under-developed province. The company had developed technology for the emerging cellular-phone market. It received significant funding from the Federal and Provincial governments. It recruited talent who would have left the province to seek employment and attracted others back to the province. It provided its workforce with the opportunity to acquire new competences, experience and knowledge along with entrepreneurial learning. Following its closure, its employees either moved to other technology firms in the emerging local entrepreneurial ecosystem or started their own businesses. The company also had significant demonstration effects for aspiring technology entrepreneurs. The study demonstrates to policy-makers that businesses that they support but which subsequently fail can nevertheless have a positive impact on the ecosystem. Accordingly, they need to have need to a tolerance for failure.