Born global and well educated: start-up survival through fuzzy set analysis

Although start-ups’survival has been widely investigated, only few studies have focussed on the impact of the combined effect of firms’ internal resources. Drawing upon the resource-based view (RBV), we selected four internal resources influencing start-ups’ survival (R&D activity, advertising activity, export activity, and human capital) and we applied the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to examine which interactions among the said internal resources affect start-ups’ survival. We used a unique dataset of 38 start-ups accelerated in Italy in 2013. Our findings suggest that, among the various combinations ofinternalresourcesconsidered,theinteractionbetween export activity and human capital is the only one that affects start-ups’ survival. On one hand, the interaction between these two resources amplifies the effect of the learning by exporting on start-ups’ survival. On the other hand, export activity provides the knowledge necessary to exploit the potential of qualified human capital.