The identity of social impact venture capitalists: exploring social linguistic positioning and linguistic distinctiveness through text mining

Toschi, Laura; Ughetto, Elisa; Colladon, Andrea Fronzetti

doi:10.1007/s11187-022-00655-0

Cited by 9 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 186 publications

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“…Case study on first mover advantage attained by purpose-driven businesses serving the marginalised and bottomof-the-pyramid community Using an innovative method of text mining analysis to examine how social venture capitalists communicated their missions and actions with different external stakeholders Toschi et al (2023) Using a comparative approach to analyse how different impact investors and investees behaved and communicated in the social impact investment arena to build their unique identity.…”

Section: Our Suggestionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact investing: Scientometric review and research agenda

Singhania,

Swami

2023

Business Ethics Env & Resp

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Innovations in aligning investment with sustainability led to impact investing, enabling investors to achieve conventional financial returns and measurable social and environmental returns. Since its inception in 2007, it has grown manifolds, with significant efforts being made to create a global ecosystem. However, due to limited academic literature, the theme is yet to garner the scholarly interest it deserves. In this study, we analyse and visualise a knowledge map of the impact investment research field through a comprehensive bibliometric analysis by employing a research corpus of 421 studies sourced from Web of Science and Scopus. We identify the growth trajectory, geographical concentration, productive and influential authors, journals and significant articles and examine the inter‐disciplinarity of the field. The major research themes interlinked with impact investing included; social entrepreneurship, social innovation, social finance, impact investment market, innovative financial instruments, financialisation of essential services and impact reporting. To drive the field forward, future research needs to develop an impact investment ecosystem, address behavioural issues, stakeholder management and institutional context in impact investment theme, develop and diffuse innovative financial instruments, develop a framework for standardised accounting and reporting practices to measure financial and non‐financial dimensions, tackle impact washing by fund managers, address lack of financial access to the third sector and develop the legal and regulatory framework for third sector organisations.

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Section: Our Suggestionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact investing: Scientometric review and research agenda

Singhania,

Swami

2023

Business Ethics Env & Resp

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Distinctiveness from whom? Evaluation of startups' distinctiveness from multiple referents in angel investment platforms

Shen,

Zhang,

Zhong

et al. 2024

Strategic Entrepreneurship

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Research SummaryOptimal distinctiveness can enhance firm performance, but we know little about how startups can achieve optimal distinctiveness when faced with multiple referents. This study investigates the strategic positioning of startups relative to two interdependent referents—incumbents and peer startups. Analyzing data for 3266 business plans from an angel investment platform in China, we find that a startup's distinctiveness from incumbents positively influences angel investors' evaluations. However, the positive effect is weakened by the startup's distinctiveness from peer startups within the same platform category. Economic signals emitted by the startup can mitigate the negative interaction between distinctiveness from both referents. Our findings suggest that startups can use a nuanced approach to attain optimal distinctiveness by aligning with peers while differentiating themselves from incumbent firms.Managerial SummaryHow can startups use their business plans to differentiate themselves from competitors and attract angel investors? Using data from business plans submitted to an angel investment platform in China, we find that a startup's distinctiveness from incumbent competitors helps attract angel investors, but this advantage diminishes when its distinctiveness from peer startups is also high. Nevertheless, startups can alleviate the negative interaction by presenting economic signals, such as financial records. Overall, our study suggests that startups can achieve optimal distinctiveness by aligning with peers while distinguishing themselves from incumbents, with economic signals acting as a legitimacy buffer to enhance their acceptance by investors.

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