Digital Entrepreneurship Policy in Korea, Japan, China, the United Kingdom, the United States, France and Germany, 2023

Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Policy Review (EEPR), 11(4) · March 2024

This report reviews the digital entrepreneurship policy that the governments of Korea, Japan, China, the United Kingdom, the United States, France and Germany set out from January to December 2023 in six domains — regulation and law, finance, culture, support, human capital and markets — and analyses it in its context, against theory and in practice. Generative AI organised the year’s policy: binding rules in China, an executive order in the United States, guidance in Japan and the United Kingdom, and a bill in Korea. The best measures offered small firms and start-ups computing power and AI services by selection, widened the Blue Card to IT specialists without a degree, opened a public market to SMEs or brought a platform owner under special abuse control; the worst offered digital culture only plans, surveys and announcements. Much of the year’s policy was a bill, plan or draft at its end, Korea cut public research, Germany proposed cuts to digital programmes and France to new broadband commitments, and governments reported outputs rather than effects.