From marginalized to integration: Entrepreneurial opportunity as an acculturation process

This paper conducts an inductive case study to further understand how acculturation process and opportunity creation process influences each other. Our study rests on four cases of immigrant entrepreneurs of Cameroonian, Lebanese, Mexican and Assyrian origin who founded their businesses in Sweden. We highlight how (a) being isolated, (b) ethnicization (c) group-based trust building, (d) adapting to the local customs and (e) developing a sense of belonging influences the process of (1) becoming entrepreneurs, (2) shaping entrepreneurial ideas and (3) refining entrepreneurial ideas. Our study show that immigrants still maintain connections to their home country while developing relationships with members of the native groups in the host country and adopt the host country’s values.