Born to be alive? The survival of innovative and non-innovative French micro-start-ups

Based on French data describing the characteristics of entrepreneurs and their projects, this article studies the differences between the determinants of survival for innovative and non-innovative micro-enterprises. We show that the survival of innovative and non-innovative enterprises is linked to personal criteria such as age, gender, belonging to a minority, professional experience and financing sources. Our results also highlight the positive effect of not being alone in the start-up design phase, whereas being involved in a business network after the start-up period has no significant influence. The survival time of innovative enterprises, which is significantly lower than that of the non-innovative ones, seems adversely influenced by the entrepreneur’s previous management experience. Finally, when considering both innovative and non-innovative start-ups, there appears to be a type of “pecking order” as bank financing has a much more positive effect on survival than a personal one, although when focusing solely on innovative ones this difference does not exist. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014