ISBE Presentation. Exporting by male & female entrepreneurs over the business cycle. ISBE2014. Jonathan Levie, Mark Hart . Karen Bonner

1. Exporting by Male and Female
Entrepreneurs over the Business
Cycle
Jonathan Levie; Mark Hart & Karen
Bonner
Enterprise Research Centre
mark.hart@aston.ac.uk

2. Background
• UKTI has recently tried to encourage more women
business owners to export, on the grounds that there
are relatively few women-owned businesses that
export.
• While UKTI acknowledge that this may in part be due
to sectoral differences between women- and men-owned
businesses, it is still determined to convince
more women business owners to export.

3. Objectives
• This paper explores the export propensity and intensity
intentions of nascent male and female entrepreneurs in the
UK
• ….. and contrasts these with the export propensity and
intensity of male and female new business owner-managers
and established business owner-managers over
the recent major economic cycle (from 2002 to 2013).
• In doing so, it demonstrates that some of the assumptions
behind the UKTI campaign may be misplaced.

4. Definitions
• We define export propensity as export activity, and
export intensity as the relative importance of
customers from overseas in the total customer base of
a firm.
• It is important to distinguish between these two
concepts because the contribution to economic growth
of a business that sells a significant proportion of its
output abroad may be significantly more than the
contribution of a business that sells a nominal amount
of output abroad (Hessels and van Stel, 2011)

5. Data
• We use the combined 2002 to 2013 databases from
the UK Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM).
• In keeping with GEM protocols, we split business
owners into three groups according to their stage in
the entrepreneurial process:
– Nascent entrepreneurs (0-3 months)
– New Business Owners (4-42 months)
– Established Business Owners (42 months and over)

6. Export Propensity
nascent
entrepreneur
new business
owner-manager
established
business owner-manager
accuracy of
prediction of
nascent
entrepreneurs
male female male female male female male female
2002-2004 47.9% 32.7% 32.0% 27.4% 24.1% 19.7%
2005-2007 46.1% 42.0% 33.2% 28.4% 31.0% 31.6% 69.3% 86.8%
2008-2010 57.4% 42.6% 38.9% 40.6% 41.4% 35.8% 84.5% 96.8%
2011-2013 56.4% 46.6% 47.9% 41.6% 50.1% 43.0% 83.5% 97.7%
average difference from male
11.0%
3.5%
4.1%

7. Export Intensity: more than
50% customers overseas
nascent
entrepreneur
new business
owner-manager
established
business owner-manager
accuracy of
prediction of
nascent
entrepreneurs
male female male female male female male female
2002-2004 23.9% 12.9% 11.9% 8.3% 8.2% 7.0%
2005-2007 16.6% 10.3% 11.5% 8.6% 6.4% 6.4% 48.0% 66.7%
2008-2010 18.2% 6.0% 13.9% 6.2% 8.2% 5.6% 83.7% 60.6%
2011-2013 17.1% 7.5% 12.6% 4.3% 8.7% 2.7% 69.4% 70.6%
average difference from
9.8% 5.6% 2.4%
male

8. Probing Further
• Logistic regression comparing the characteristics
of exporting versus non-exporting nascent
entrepreneurs confirmed that gender was not a
significant factor in propensity to export, after
controlling for a range of individual-specific and
firm-specific factors.
• In contrast, gender was a significant factor in
determining export intensity, and gender also
interacted with firm-specific factors including
industry sector and growth expectations.

9. Conclusions
• This study has important implications for export
promotion policy. It shows that a gendered view of
exports may be necessary to provide appropriate
assistance to male and female exporters.
• However, current emphasis on encouraging more
females to export may be misplaced, because they
export in approximately the same proportion as men.
• However, there is a gap in export intensity, and it is
growing. This is where UKTI should be concentrating its
efforts.

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