How does late-career entrepreneurship relate to innovation?

In this paper, we present an explorative study that develops our understanding of the relationship between late-career entrepreneurship and innovation-driven business activity. Based on observations of 2903 solo founders of new ventures in Germany in 2008–2017, we offer first and robust evidence that late-career entrepreneurs (~50 years and above) are more likely than younger founders to introduce product/service innovations that are ‘new to the market’. Our explorations specifically reveal that older founders who draw on personal financial resources and combine their innovation orientation with prior managerial experience are most likely to generate the types of innovations that bring new products or services to the market. We conclude by discussing how our study's insights contribute to the research agenda on innovations in late-career entrepreneurship. •Older founders (~50 years and above) are more likely to introduce new products/services to the market than younger founders•The most likely are older founders who combine an orientation to innovate with personal wealth and managerial experience•The findings are based on an explorative study on 2,903 solo founders in Germany between 2008 and 2017•These findings offer the first robust evidence of the innovation potential in late-career entrepreneurship