One of the oldest, and often most contested, debates in the world of entrepreneurship research concerns the most basic definition of the field: what, exactly, is meant by the term entrepreneur? In its original use by Jean-Baptiste Say, it was someone who undertook economic activities and capitalized on arbitrage opportunities. Joseph Schumpeter ushered in the modern way in which people typically use the term by equating it with newness--new products, services, combinations, business models, etc. Israel Kirzner saw entrepreneurs as those who targeted and eliminated disequilibria in the economy (for Schumpeter, entrepreneurs created those disequilibria).
By now, however, the word has come to be so overused as to potentially lose a great deal of meaning. Those who navigate the world of new technology companies that receive venture capital or angel money prefer "startup" to entrepreneur, or sometimes simply "venture." This often connotes a company that is aiming for scale or growth from day one. You can find "Startup (Anything)" these days, it seems, all over the world. A related term that has gained currency is "founder," used to distinguish individuals/teams and their ideas or businesses. And, of course, there is the constant tension between those who use "entrepreneur" to refer to small businesses that stay small and those who refer to small businesses that grow quickly or to larger sizes. On these points, Erik Hurst and Ben Pugsley delivered a useful discussion and taxonomy in their paper on the heterogeneity of the world of small business.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Growthology: The Spectrum of Entrepreneurship
