In the 2019 film documentary "They Say It Can't Be Done", an aspect of entrepreneurship that I found interesting is regulation. In the documentary, four innovative companies are shown and their stories of innovation and dealing with the regulations of today are all told to tie-in to the central idea of regulations and how they affect innovation. The first innovative company shown in the film is one that specializes in life saving 3D-printed organs. The second company that appears in the film is one that creates cultured meat from the cells of real animals, making real meat without having to kill the animal it comes from. The third company shown in the film is one that has developed a special type of "tree" made of plastic resin that can remove carbon from the atmosphere at an astonishing rate. The fourth and final company shown in the film is one that grows mussels and kelp in the ocean using no resources other than the ocean itself, providing an extremely cost effective and efficient food source.
What do all of these companies/entities have in common? They are all innovators and new ideas that are better and more efficient than the ways of the old, and they all aim to make the world a better place. This is why it is entrepreneurial. The problem is that the relationship between new entrants/innovations and the regulations that have always been in place is one that simply put does not work well enough. Regulations provide a framework for entrepreneurs to structure their ideas and innovations around, but a lot of the time they are too harsh and restrictive.
The reason why this aspect of entrepreneurship is so interesting is because of the affects regulations have on certain innovations: the 3D-printed organ company remains unable to bring their life saving innovation to the masses, the cultured meat company has not yet been approved, there is no regulatory framework for the carbon tree company "to market as a profitable venture", and the aquaculture company has to deal with regulations not designed for a venture such as it is. These are all astounding achievements that could be making a difference much sooner, were the regulations not so strict and complex.
How does this aspect of entrepreneurship affect society? Regulations affect society in both positive and negative ways. The positive affects that regulations have on society are that they keep standards in check: the food and the products that we buy are of a certain quality. Regulations help maintain a better overall society, by protecting the rights of the people and creating the rules which by everyone must follow. The downsides that regulations have on society are that they can also stifle the growth of it, by making it too difficult for new ideas to come to real fruition. As shown from the documentary, there are many amazing innovations that could literally help save the planet, and yet many of them are doomed to fail because regulations simply were not made with such innovations in mind, and it takes a lot of time to come up with effective regulations for some products to finally make it. How does society affect this aspect of entrepreneurship? Society can positively affect this aspect of entrepreneurship by pushing for changes in the regulations put in place. An example from the film that was also discussed in our class that goes hand in hand with this idea is the story of Uber and how ride sharing was basically completely illegal but was quickly changed after people realized the real value of a ride sharing service like Uber. The problem with this is that many times without taking such a risky move, people simply never see the value in your idea and it dies or gets bought out by a big company. What is the interaction between society and entrepreneurship like with respect to regulations? As the movie puts it, "a slow, complex process". There are often times multiple regulations stacked on top of each other that everyone has to follow, which can make for a very time consuming and pricey process of getting an idea to market. As stated in the film, big businesses actually love regulations, contrary to popular belief, because they mean that new entrants or competitors have a much harder time making it to the same level. New innovative companies are often absorbed by the giants, all because they simply do not have the size, capital, or resources as their big competition.
