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Company Founders

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Entrepreneurship in Theory and History

Abstract

The creators of large companies have carved a niche for themselves in the world of business history. They epitomize the very idea of entrepreneurship, whether one looks at their achievements — the emergence of a large company is usually the result of a major innovation — or at their personality and motivation — risk-taking, audacity, perseverance, but also luck, flair, vision, even creativeness: in short, a genius for business. Entrepreneurs are the heroes of business history, the ones who occasionally give it a romantic dimension. They have been celebrated, and their contribution to economic growth theorized by many an economist, beginning with the most famous of them, Joseph Schumpeter (Schumpeter, 1934).1

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Authors
  1. Youssef Cassis
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Geneva, Switzerland

    Youssef Cassis (Professor of Economic and Social History) (Professor of Economic and Social History)

  2. Athens University of Economics, Greece

    Ioanna Pepelasis Minoglou PhD (Assistant Professor of Economic History) (Assistant Professor of Economic History)

Copyright information

© 2005 Youssef Cassis

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Cite this chapter

Cassis, Y. (2005). Company Founders. In: Cassis, Y., Minoglou, I.P. (eds) Entrepreneurship in Theory and History. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230522633_7

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