THE ROLE OF THE ENTREPRENEURIAL SUPPORT ENVIRONMENT ON BUSINESS PERFORMANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY OF STARTUPS IN BUFFALO CITY METROPOLITAN MUNICIPALITY

Startups offer important incentives for innovation, development, and employment creation. Unfortunately, sustainability suffers high failure rates, particularly in developing countries like South Africa. The aim of this study was to examine how Entrepreneurial Support Environments' construct of networking opportunities, entrepreneurial culture, skills, mindset, and availability of resources influence business performance and start-up sustainability in BCMM, Data were collected from 354 startup owners in the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality through an online questionnaire and analysed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) with the SmartPLS software. The results showed that all five hypothesized links between ESE constructs and business performance were positive and statistically significant. A positive and statistically significant relationship between networking opportunities and business performance was seen (t = 3.45, p < .001), while a positive influence from entrepreneurial culture on business performance was also observed (t = 2.87, p = .004). Entrepreneurial skills (t = 4.12, p < .001), entrepreneurial mindset (t = 4.56, p < .001), and access to resources (t = 3.76, p < .001) were also shown to impact positively and significantly on business performance. The study contributes to the field by confirming the mediating role of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in business performance, while providing useful insights for entrepreneur’s governments and institutions on ways to improve business performance and sustainability. In the modern global marketplace, the need to build on the strength of an entrepreneurial ecosystem cannot be overstated for the survival and success of regional economies.