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Charlotte Blatg

Case study 1 :
Cognitive Foundations of Entrepreneurship: Creativity and Opportunity Recognition

NearSpace is a company located in Northern California who has created a mobile


tool allowing mobile workers/users to use facility maps on their mobiles devices such
as trade shows maps and conference time and place. This company was created by
the same entrepreneurs of Autodesk who saw an opportunity into translating
architectural maps from Autodesk into simple models that suited NearSpace
companys needs. The CEO of NearSpace, Creighton Hoke, went through four
different steps while thinking about his company : first he figured out what he was
pretty good at doing, secondly he looked out in which domain/industry he would be
able to create something in, thirdly he figured out his niche and the opportunity the
market was offering him and finally he convinced highly motivated people to help him
reach this goal. He also describes his creative and opportunity recognition with
Aha ! moments as he says, the first aha ! moment came to him during a
presentation in Las Vegas where he figured probably no one in the room had an idea
of where they were in relation to other stands, exbitions. Afterwhat, additional
aha ! moments followed when he realised that millions of people are carrying a
whole lot of information every day in different environment. He finally came to the
conclusion that what was needed was indoor information as the outdoor information
(highways, roads etc) was already fulfilled by low-cost data map such as Google
maps.

Entrepreneurship in itself seeks to undersand opportunies to create something new.


They arise and are mainly discovered by specific persons called entrepreneurs, who
then exploit those ideas which eventually could turn into new ventures.1 Cognitive
perspective can definitely help entrepreneurs answer the most basics why
questions such as why some people are better than others at recognizing
opportunites for a new venture ? such as Creighton Hoke in the case study. I think
being an entrepreneur can arise from different issues such as a social factors
because a member of your family was an entrepreneur for instance, as well as
http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2014/02/our-schumpeter-columnist
(accessed 20th October 2014)
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cognitive factors which is the way some people reach decisions or their perception of
risk. As we know, entrepreneurs tend to be willing to accept risks more easily than
other people due to the fact that they see challenges as more managable.

Creighton Hoke states that his inspiration for his company came from Aha !
moments which evokes the question is entrepreneuring always a matter of
precipitous discovery ?
In my opinion, they are important questions an entrepreneur should ask himself
before entering and following his precipitous discovery because I do not think
entrepreneuring is always a matter of precipitous discovery. You might think this is a
very profitable opportunity until you look at all the costs it engenders and the
feasibility of the new venture. Are you ready to take in all the social pressure about
your new idea ? is one important question an entrepreneur should ask himself. If you
start to care too much about the opinion of other people, you will spend all your time
trying to prove to others that you have or will succeed instead of concentrating
yourself on your society. Have you got strong enough kidneys to hold at least a
year ? Success is going to come slowly and your money will be spend very quickly,
you have to be smart. How do you define success ? People define success in
different ways, for some money is the most important asset, for others it will be the
social and professional success. Depending on how you define success, the
difficulties you will encounter creating your new society will vary. The entrepreneurs
that succeed are not necessarily the ones that invest millions, but we should not
forget that there is one in a million.

Personally, I never had such Aha ! moments that resulted in me trying to inspire
entrepreneurial businesses, I obviously did have new ideas about new products like
everyone does throughout their life but there has always been this feasibility
analysis 2 coming forward, is it feasible for me ?. Apart from that, other important
areas need to be fulfilled for an entrepreneurial venture to arise. High achievement
motivation is one key factor in my opinion, this is what is driving entrepreneurs to
face all the challenges they have to go through. Like Hoke states in the case I was
able to convince a few talented, experienced and (as it turned out) exceptionally
2http://www.gis.geo.uj.edu.pl/Teaching_tool_on_knowledge_transfer/eng/wydruki/pdf

/Feasibility%20analysis.pdf (accessed 20th October 2014)

stubborn people () 3. Even though those high achievers spend most of their time
trying to figure out solutions to potential problems. Again, risk-taking is definetly the
key to successful ventures because those entrepreneurs have the ability to face
challenges as Knight states entrepreneur is an individual who is prepared to
undertake risk and the reward-profit-is the return for bearing uncertainty, which is an
uninsurable risk. The opportunity for profit arises out of uncertainty surrounding
change. If change is perfectly predictable then no opportunity for profit exists. 4
Entrepreneurs, if able to manage the risk successfully, can transfer this risk into
opportunities. Entrepreneurs are always ready to take in the challenges, because if
they do not take the chance, they will always wonder what they could have achieved
by taking it.
Furthermore, opportunity recognition plays a big role in the successful launch of an
entrepreneurial venture, as times are changing very fast the consumers demand is
changing as well therefore it is becoming more difficult and vital for entrepreneurs to
identify all the profitable opportunities in the market. If we look at the point of view of
Kirzner entrepreneur is a decision-maker whose entire role arises out of his
alertness to hitherto unnoticed opportunities

This perfectly describes what

Creighton Hoke excelled at, he noticed that there was a profitable opportunity for
something that didnt exist before (or was very limited) and he took this opportunity.
More than that, he realized that with this company and new tool he would be able to
target different market segmentation such as businessmen with the trade shows but
also in the military markets as well as the medical market with hospitals.
This, in my opinion proves that Hoke makes a good entrepreneur as he definitely
took a risk and saw a niche within specific markets as he was surrounded by highly
motivated people. Moreover, innovation is the typical characteristic needed in an
arising entrepreneurial venture like NearSpace and the company spot it on with the
help of technological supporting and the entrepreneurs hard work and patience. And
Baron, A. R (2008) Entrepreneurship : A process Perspective , Thomson Learning.
PP. 97
4 Knight, F.H (2009) Risk, uncertainty and profit, Reprint edition, Beard Books,
Washington, D.C..PP.53-98
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Gunning, J.P (2000)[0nline], Israel Kirzner's Entrepreneurship, Available
at:http://www.constitution.org/pd/gunning/subjecti/workpape/kirz_ent.pdf (accessed
20th October 2014)
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finally, having a clear vision before the creation of a new venture is importantly
needed due to the fact that it will help entrepreneurs know how to contribute and
reach their goal in their future company. I think NearSpace was able to deliver a clear
vision to all its employees which was to make easy access to information for mobile
workers who are on the move as stated in the case In fact, mobile workers in these
spaces are cut off from the information they need to work effectively. (). That
doesnt need to be the case. The information surrounds them, if only they could get
to it. NearSpace would help them 6

Baron, A. R (2008) Entrepreneurship : A process Perspective , Thomson Learning.


PP. 97
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