The Requirements of Successful Market Entry for Startup Knowledge-based Companies (Case Study: ICT Companies in Tehran)

Evidence shows that the commercialization and market entry by start-up companies are not very promising. The complexity and importance of this issue notably increases in the case of advanced technologies that have unique features such as high speed of knowledge production, short life cycle of technology and short distance from research time to product launch. This study is aimed to determine startup knowledge-based companys' requirements to enter the market. This study adopts a practical and descriptive-survey approach and uses the information collected through distribution of questionnaires among 86 successful ICT companies (located in Tehran Science and Technology Park, Modares Science and Technology Park and Shahid Beheshti University Technology Incubator). Further, in order to investigate the dimensions of the studied variables and construct validity, the confirmatory factor analysis and to test the research hypotheses the Structural Equation Modelling was used.  According to the research results, the requirements for successful entry of these companies into the market are organizational dimensions, environmental and individual factors, respectively. Also, component rankings show that in organizational dimension, components of strategic capabilities, marketing and sales capability and human resources are of high importance; in environmental dimention, supportive components, social, economic, political and technological factors are more significant; and in individual dimension, the manager's individual mentality, individual personality and interpersonal character are among the most important components.