Conditions for Business Model Innovation in a Rural Community Hans Lundberg, Senior Lecturer, Linnaeus University Linnaeus University, School of Business and Economics, SE-351 95, Växjö, Sweden Tel: +46 772 288000; Cel: +46 709 994423; E-mail:
[email protected]; Web: Lnu.se Keywords: Space of Opportunities, Communicative Entrepreneurship, Business Model Innovation, Rural Entrepreneurship Abstract This paper departs from an interactive research project1 in three small rural communities in southeast Sweden aimed at promoting regional development through interaction between local stakeholders, academic researchers and undergraduate university students. Objective The objective with this paper is to analyse the conditions for business model innovation in the small rural community of Urshult, Småland, in Southeast Sweden. The theoretical concept of ‘space of opportunity’ is used to analyse two main types of context-sensitive conditions, historical-structural conditions and discursive-communicative conditions. Prior Work and its Relation to this Study The academic discourse on rural development is somewhat homogeneous both when it comes to definitions of problems and the suggested solutions (Johansson, 2011; Gaddefors, Johansson, Lundberg & Rosell, 2013). Business model innovation research is also somewhat homogenous as it focuses heavily on the re-configuring of existing (big) companies and the actions and concerns of top management (Bucherer, Eisert & Gassmann, 2012). Relative to prior work and with the objective outlined above, this paper