I would like to thank my Professors at Hannam University to help me find the

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i 
Acknowledgement 
I would like to thank my Professors at Hannam University to help me find the 
right direction and eventually complete this research. 
I am especially grateful to my supervisor Professor Nigel Callinan for his 
unwavering commitment and guidance throughout the study. I have not been 
able to conduct this study without his immense patience, to put efforts in 
bringing clarity to research areas I was confused about. 
My heartfelt appreciation to my mother, for her unconditional love, prayers 
and encouragement throughout the research process. I am forever indebted 
to her. 

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ii 
Declaration 
I declare that this research project is my own work. It is presented to the 
Linton School of Global Business, Hannam University, in full compliance with 
the necessity for a Master's degree in Global Business. It was not presented 
in any other college for any degree or examination. I also declare that I have 
received the required authorization and approval to conduct this investigation. 
Faheela Muzaffar 
August, 2020 

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iii 
Table of Contents 
Acknowledgement 
…………………………………………………………
... i 
Declaration 
……………………………………………………………………
. ii 
Table of Contents 
……………………………………………………………
. iii 
List of Tables 
…………………………………………………………………
x 
Abstract 
………………………………………………………………………
xi 
Chapter 1: Introduction
………………………………………………………………………………
1 
1.1 Background of Study
……………………………………………………………………………
. 1 
1.2 Understanding of Immigrant Entrepreneurship 
…………………………
.. 1 
1.3 Research Gap 
……………………………………………………………………………………
. 2 
1.4 Research Problem 
……………………………………………………………………………
. 2 
1.5 Research Objectives 
…………………………………………………………………………
3 
1.6 Research Questions 
……………………………………………………………………………
4 
1.7 Thesis Structure 
………………………………………………………………………………
. 5 
Chapter 2: Literature Review
…………………………………………………………………
.. 7 
2.1 Overview
……………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 7 
2.2 Overview of Startups 
………………………………………………………………………
.. 7 

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iv 
2.3 Immigrant Entrepreneurs 
………………………………………………………………
8 
2.4 Necessity vs Opportunity Based Entrepreneurs 
………………………
. 9 
2.5 Characteristics of Necessity Immigrant Entrepreneurs 
……………
. 10 
2.6 Ethno Cultural Factors 
…………………………………………………………
.. 
………
.. 11 
2.6.1 Defining Ethnic Group and Ethnic Enterprise
………………………
. 11 
2.6.2 Ethnic Market Niche 
…………………………………………………………………
. 12 
2.6.3 Ethnic Social Network 
………………………………………………………………
. 14 
2.6.4 Ethnic Labor 
………………………………………………………………………………
.. 16 
2.6.5 Ethnic Emotional Support 
…………………………………………………………
17 
2.7 Financial Factors 
………………………………………………………………………………
. 17 
2.7.1 Startup Capital 
…………………………………………………………………………
.. 18 
2.7.2 Emergency Loans 
……………………………………………………………………
.. 20 
2.8 Managerial Factors 
…………………………………………………………………………
.. 20 
2.8.1 Education Level 
…………………………………………………………………………
20 
2.8.2 Previous Experiences 
………………………………………………………………
. 21 
2.9 Psycho-behavioral Factors 
……………………………………………………………
22 
2.9.1 Risk Aversion 
………………………………………………………………………………
22 
2.9.2 Commitment 
………………………………………………………………………………
.. 23 
2.10 Institutional Factors 
………………………………………………………………………
.. 24 

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v 
2.11 Immigrant Entrepreneurship and Korea 
…………………………………
.. 26 
2.11.1 Startup Ecosystem and Korea 
………………………………………………
26 
2.11.2 Korean Accelerator Program 
………………………………………………
. 27 
Chapter 3: Methodology 
…………………………………………………………………………
. 28 
3.1 Research Design 
………………………………………………………………………………
. 28 
3.2 Data Collection Techniques 
…………………………………………………………
.. 30 
3.3 Theoretical Model 
……………………………………………………………………………
31 
3.4 Propositions Based on Survival Factors 
……………………………………
. 
31 
3.5 Ethno Cultural Factors 
……………………………………………………………………
31 
3.5.1 Ethnic Market Niche 
………………………………………………………………
. 
31 
3.5.2 Ethnic Social Network, Ethnic Labor and Ethnic Emotional
Support 
…………………………………………………………………………………
. 
32 
3.6 Financial Factors 
………………………………………………………………………………
32 
3.6.1 Start-up Capital 
…………………………………………………………………………
. 32 
3.6.2 Emergency Loans 
………………………………………………………………………
. 32 
3.7 Managerial factors 
……………………………………………………………………………
.. 33 
3.7.1 Education Level 
…………………………………………………………………………
.. 33 
3.7.2 Previous Experience 
…………………………………………………………………
. 33 
3.8 Psycho-Behavioral Factors 
……………………………………………………………
.. 33 

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vi 
3.8.1 Risk Aversion 
………………………………………………………………………………
. 34 
3.8.2 Commitment 
…………………………………………………………………………………
... 34 
3.9 Institutional Factors 
……………………………………………………………………………
34 
3.10 Investigation of Theoretical Model 
……………………………………………
.. 35 
3.11 Research Evaluation 
………………………………………………………………………
35 
3.12 Ethical Considerations 
……………………………………………………………………
36 
Chapter 4: Results 
……………………………………………………………………………………
39 
4.1 Overview 
……………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 39 
4.2 Demographics of participants 
…………………………………………………………
. 39 
4.3 Restaurants and the Necessity Immigrant
’
s background
Overview
……………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 40 
4.3.1 Case 1 (India) 
……………………………………………………………………………
.. 41 
4.3.2 Case 2 (Pakistan) 
………………………………………………………………………
.. 41 
4.3.3 Case 3 (Nepal) 
……………………………………………………………………………
.. 42 
4.3.4 Case 4 (Tajikistan) 
……………………………………………………………………
.. 42 
4.3.5 Case 5 (Uzbekistan) 
……………………………………………………………………
. 43 
4.4 Results of Multiple Case Analysis 
…………………………………………………
. 43 
4.5 Ethnic Market 
……………………………………………………………………………………
.. 43 
4.5.1 Reasoning behind non-confirmation of Ethnic Market as

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vii 
survival factor 
……………………………………………………………………………
.. 44 
4.6 Ethnic labor and ethnic emotional support 
……………………………………
46 
4.6.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of ethnic Labor and
emotional support 
…………………………………………………………………………
. 47 
4.7 Startup Capital 
……………………………………………………………………………………
. 49 
4.7.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of Startup Capital as a
survival factor 
………………………………………………………………………………
.. 50 
4.8 Emergency Loans 
………………………………………………………………………………
51 
4.8.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of emergency loans
as a survival factor 
……………………………………………………………………
. 52 
4.9 Education 
……………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 53 
4.9.1 Reasoning of the confirmation of education as a survival
factor 
………………………………………………………………………………………………
54 
4.10 Previous Work Experience 
……………………………………………………………
55 
4.10.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of Work Experience as a
survival factor 
……………………………………………………………………………
56 
4.11 Risk Aversion 
……………………………………………………………………………………
57 
4.11.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of Risk Aversion as a
survival factor 
……………………………………………………………………………
58 

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viii 
4.12 Commitment 
………………………………………………………………………………………
. 59 
4.12.1 Reasoning behind partial confirmation of commitment as a
survival factor 
…………………………………………………………………………
.. 60 
4.13 Institutional Support 
…………………………………………………………………………
61 
4.13.1 Reasoning behind non-confirmation of Institutional support
as a survival factor 
……………………………………………………………………
. 62 
Chapter 5: Discussion and Analysis 
……………………………………………………
.. 67 
5.1 Ethnic Market Niche 
…………………………………………………………………………
. 67 
5.2 Ethnic Labor 
………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 68 
5.3 Ethnic Emotional Support 
…………………………………………………………………
. 69 
5.4 Startup Capital 
……………………………………………………………………………………
.. 69 
5.5 Emergency Loans 
………………………………………………………………………………
.. 70 
5.6 Education 
………………………………………………………………………………………………
. 71 
5.7 Previous Experience 
………………………………………………………………………
.. 72 
5.8 Risk Aversion 
………………………………………………………………………………………
72 
5.9 Commitment 
…………………………………………………………………………………………
. 74 
5.10 Implications of the Study 
………………………………………………………………
.. 74 
Chapter 6: Conclusion 
………………………………………………………………………………
. 77 
6.1 Summary of the Study 
………………………………………………………………………
. 77 

---

ix 
6.2 Limitations of the Study 
…………………………………………………………………
.. 79 
6.3 Recommendations for Future Research 
………………………………………
.. 80 
6.4 Contribution to the Research Area 
…………………………………………………
. 82 
References 
…………………………………………………………………………………………………
.. 83 
Appendix I: Interview Template 
……………………………………………………………
96 

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x 
List of Tables 
Table 1: Profile of the Cases Analyzed (Template) 
…………………………
. 37 
Table 2: Results of Inter-Site Comparison (Template) 
……………………
. 38 
Table 3: Profile of the Cases Analyzed 
…………………………………………………
40 
Table 4: Results of Inter-Site Comparison of the Cases 
…………………
. 64 

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xi 
Abstract 
The growing trend of entrepreneurship has enabled individuals in all societies to grow and 
become independent. When it comes to immigrant entrepreneurship not all of them start their 
own businesses with the motivation to achieve something or to land extraordinary opportunities 
of growth. The necessity-based immigrant entrepreneurs may be a result of unfavorable 
conditions that push them into entrepreneurship. Those conditions can be discrimination, lack of 
job opportunities in host country or lack of human capital. The research on necessity immigrant 
entrepreneurship in the context of South Korea lacks enough literature. The purpose of this 
paper may fill this gap. It focuses on the factors that influence the survival or success of 
necessity-based immigrant entrepreneurs. The research method used in the study is qualitative, 
exploratory and semi structured interviews were conducted five informants who have been 
running restaurant across South Korea at various locations. The purposive sampling technique 
was used to conduct multi case analysis. This study seeks to contribute towards the better 
understanding of necessity-based immigrant entrepreneurship in the context of Korea. The 
findings of the study will equip immigrant entrepreneurs who are aiming to start businesses in 
Korea to get a better understanding and insights of Korean entrepreneurial ecosystem for 
immigrant entrepreneurs. This study will also unveil the hindrances and challenges that might 
affect the growth of immigrant business. This study shows that there are underlying survival 
factors other than those already stated in the theoretical model which was used to investigate 
survival factors of immigrant entrepreneurs in Korea. The findings show that lack of counseling 
or mentorship programs, lack of institutional support to fund small businesses and lack of Korean 
language ability are of high importance.
Keywords 
Immigrants, Entrepreneurs, Necessity based entrepreneurs, survival factors 
Entrepreneurs in Korea 

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1 
Chapter 1: Introduction 
1.1 Background of the Study 
The increase in international flow has contributed towards the increase in 
ethnic diversity that lead to attention on various subjects such as social 
cohesion, integration and social solidarity. This subject has been addressed 
by various publications, academic articles and books that specifically focus 
on ethnic diversity. Today the most important issue that is faced by 
immigrant entrepreneurs is to get a job in their host countries. The 
developed countries are mainly dealing with this dilemma because they have 
become popular destination for immigrants. Many immigrants have to face a 
lot of difficulties to get integrated into job market due to discrimination but 
most importantly, lack of human capital.
Therefore, the despair among immigrants due to failure of landing a 
job forces them to seek self-employment as a last resort to survive in their 
host countries. Entrepreneurship helps immigrants to overcome the 
challenges of not being able to land a job in their host country but at the 
same time, it also brings a lot of obstacles. As indicated by (P. Reynolds et 
al., 2005), necessity immigrant entrepreneurship usually takes place in the 
absence of other alternatives or choices
1.2 Understanding Immigrant Entrepreneurship 
“
Immigrant entrepreneurship
”
, discusses the type of entrepreneurship that is 
initiated by recent migrants in order to survive in their host countries(R. 
Chaganti & Greene, 2002). Waldinger, Aldrich, and Ward (1990) believe that 
it usually takes place among a group of people who share either similar 
background or migration experiences.(Freitas, 1991) emphasizes that in 

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2 
order to achieve social mobility and economic independence, immigrants turn 
to start their own business as an alternative to paid employment. The 
motivations behind entrepreneurship are usually ethnic resources and market 
disadvantages (Waldinger et al., 1990).
1.3 Research Gap 
For many years, the business researchers believed that immigrant 
entrepreneurs should be studied by sociologists and anthropologists. With 
the passing years, when the world has seen rising numbers of immigrant 
entrepreneurs many researchers has conducted studies on them in order 
closely monitor the effects they have been creating, globally. The vast 
majority of researches are conducted in Europe, USA and UK (I. H. Light & 
Rosenstein, 1995; McEvoy, Hafeez, & Keoy, 2010; Min, 2008) but there 
seems to be lack of research on immigrant entrepreneurship in Korea. The 
purpose of this research is to fill this gap and present findings in the context 
of Korea which has seen the growing numbers of immigrant entrepreneurs in 
the past recent years. 
Therefore, the primary method of this study will 
be qualitative research through
multiple case study, since this study 
aims to find a more in-depth understanding of immigrant businesses 
in Korea. 
1.4 Research Problem 
The success of necessity immigrant entrepreneurs can be measured by two 
types of indicators as per (Kalleberg & Leicht, 1991): Firstly, the survival 
indicators which includes both the profitability and age of the business and 
secondly growth indicators. Profitability here, means the small businesses 
are able to make a balance between their profit and expenditures. Growth 

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3 
indicators are evolutionary in nature and they include the number of 
employees, net profit and market share. Other growth indicators are return 
on investment, sales, assets and cash flow (Keats & Hitt, 1988; Muse, 
Rutherford, Oswald, & Raymond, 2005). 
However, the previous researches used the same performance 
indicators for small businesses by immigrant entrepreneurs and mainstream 
entrepreneurs. Chrysostome and Arcand (2009) argue that these two types 
of businesses are not similar in terms of their goals and challenges. The 
recent increase in immigrant entrepreneurship shows that it is unrealistic to 
use same performance indicators for different types of immigrant business 
owners. This study proposes that immigrant entrepreneurs are of two types: 
necessity and opportunity immigrant entrepreneurs.
1.5 Research Objectives 
The challenges immigrant entrepreneurs face may include the absence of 
startup capital by formal institutions due to insufficient credit history. Such 
situations leave them with no choice but to rely on the financial support of 
their family and friends. In most of the cases they are also unable to hire 
employees from the mainstream market because they are usually unable to 
pay the salaries as of defined by the legal system of the host country. They 
end up working long hours of work, which leaves them with no choice but to 
prioritize their business over social life. There are a lot of other obstacles 
that immigrant entrepreneurs have to deal with in order to survive in their 
host countries. The purpose of this study is to dig into the research area and 
find out, what obstacles are hindering the immigrant businesses growth and 
what can be done to overcome them. 

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4 
1.6 Research Questions 
Chrysostome and Arcand (2009) suggest that in order to measure the growth 
of necessity immigrant entrepreneurs their geographical expansion, number 
of employees and their market size cannot determine their survival. 
Necessity immigrant entrepreneurs have a concentrated market, which 
means their products are mostly for a specific ethnicity that doesn
’
t increase 
their market share with the passage of time. The number of employees can 
also be increased due to solidarity with co-ethnic community members but 
that doesn
’
t indicate the increase in profit. Moreover, necessity immigrant 
businesses are usually located in ethnic enclaves, which concludes that their 
geographical extension doesn
’
t promise the growth. Based on above 
arguments, age and profitability can be used as growth indicators but as 
suggested by (Chrysostome & Arcand, 2009) only the age of business will be 
used to measure the performance of the immigrant businesses in this study.
As a result of the above, the following research will be addressed in this 
study: 
1.
How the growth and performance of necessity immigrant businesses 
is affected by their extraordinary circumstances? 
2.
What are the factors that are contributing to the survival of necessity 
based businesses owned by immigrants? 
3.
What factors have more impact over the growth of businesses than 
others and what steps can be taken to make favorable situation for 
necessity immigrant entrepreneurs? 
In order to find answers of the above, previous literature will be studied to 
find theoretical explanations of the predetermined survival factors by 
(Chrysostome & Arcand, 2009) to find in depth explanations. 

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5 
1.7 Thesis Structure 
A brief overview of the study is presented below. This study is structured as 
follows: 
Chapter: 1 Introduction. This chapter provides the explanation of the 
research area and also lays the foundation of research problem 
Chapter 2: Literature Review. This chapter provides a detailed review of the 
existing literature and definitions relevant to the research area. It also aligns 
the study with the theoretical explanation of the predetermined survival 
factors and building up research propositions interpreted from previous 
literature 
Chapter 3: Research Design and Methodology. This chapter presents detailed 
description of the strategies and techniques that will be used to investigate 
the research area. It also justifies why a particular strategy is applicable and 
what role it plays in data collection, presentation and analysis. 
Chapter 4: Research Findings. This chapter presents the findings of the 
study in the form of tables, verbatim and narratives relevant to the research 
questions 
Chapter 5: Discussion and Analysis. This chapter presents the analysis of the 
findings of the study with supporting literature to answer the research 
problem. It also presents the implications of the study that can be derived 
from the results. It basically provides usefulness of the information created 
through this study
Chapter 6: Conclusion. This chapter provides the overview of the study and 
a reflection on what was aimed in the beginning and to what extent the 
answers to research questions are found. It also discusses the limitations and 
future recommendations for the researches interested in conducting research 

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6 
in the same area. This chapter also highlights the contributions this study has 
made in the research area