Exploring Entrepreneurs Exit Strategies in Indonesian Small And Medium-Sized Entreprises

Entrepreneurial exit strategy is a critical component in entrepreneurial process, where a well-prepared strategy helps entrepreneurs to reduce the potential loss of their current business, prepare them to face the post-exit era, and improve the chance of re-entering business after quitting. While such benefits might be true in the context of developed countries, we are critical of their existence in the context of less developed nations. We enrich the entrepreneurial process literature by examining entrepreneur’s exit strategy and the factors influencing it in the novel context of the South-East Asian - with a focus on Indonesia. We interviewed 21 Indonesians small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) entrepreneurs with diverse backgrounds, and our findings suggest a framework for entrepreneurial exit that constitutes four major strategies, which are resignation, asset sales, business sales, and succession. In addition, our research finds several models explaining how the entrepreneurs select each of these strategies.