A typology of social venture business model configurations

Abstract

Purpose Social ventures are unique and important for society; yet, we know very little about their business models. The purpose of this paper is to: re-conceptualize extant business model frameworks so that they can analyze social ventures; identify the key characteristics of social ventures; and identify the typology of effective social venture business model configurations. Design/methodology/approach The paper uses resource dependence theory to make sense of extant business models and borrows from public administration literature to identify key characteristics and different configurations of social venture business models. Findings The paper re-conceptualizes business model frameworks as inter-organizational arrangements to cope with external resource dependence; this paper also identifies four key characteristics of social ventures, and develops a social venture business model typology based on these unique key characteristics and extant business model dimensions. Research limitations/implications The typology may guide further social venture research, e.g. research on social venture business model creation, on social venture business model innovation, and on social change. Limitations and boundary conditions are discussed in the paper. Practical implications The research may further help social entrepreneurs to develop effective business models that meet the social and financial objectives. Originality/value The paper offers a novel reconceptualization of traditional business model frameworks, a unique set of key characteristics of social ventures, and a theoretical typology of effective social venture business model configurations.

Sustainable Entrepreneurial Process: From Idea Generation to Impact Measurement

“…A common point is that both are able to solve problems not addressed by either the regular market or the public sector [8,9]. These ventures are increasingly lauded as catalysts for change in society by researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and the media [10][11][12][13].…”

“…Creating social value is about social impact [17]. The creation of positive economic, social, or environmental impact on society is considered a necessary condition for a social or sustainable entrepreneurship [3,4,7,8,11,12,18].…”

“…First, there is a gap regarding whether and how SEP might unfold [6,21]. Second, there is a gap in the literature regarding the emergence of venture ideas [12], the origin of entrepreneurial opportunities [15,22], and the influence of prior experience on the idea generation [16]. Third, the motivation of the entrepreneur also needs more attention [18], mainly related to its impact on opportunity recognition [9].…”

Balancing a Hybrid Business Model: The Search for Equilibrium at Cafédirect

“…This field demonstrates that a successful transition to more sustainable business practice requires a robust business model which targets integrated activities towards automatic spillover type triple-bottom-line value creation (Baumgartner and Ebner 2010;Bocken et al 2014). However, limited research has empirically explored organization set up with triple-bottom-line value capture at their core, such as social enterprises (Lüdeke-Freund et al 2017;Margiono et al 2017), and none explore hybrids with differentiated activities, or contingent value spillover .…”

“…However, the field of sustainable business models has also emerged to explore how organizations adapt their business architecture to address the creation of multiple forms of economic, social, and environmental values (Bocken et al 2014;Rauter et al 2015). Limited research, however, has attempted to integrate these two approaches, to investigate how hybridity manifests across business models to deliver multiple forms of value Margiono et al 2017).…”