Iranian entrepreneurs in Malaysia: reasons for their migration

Abstract

This paper discussed the international migration studies and their shortcomings of entrepreneurs’ migration reasons, especially between two developing countries. The push and pull factors of migration decision were discovered with reviewing the literature. By interviewing five Iranian small business owners in Malaysia, it seems there is a new category of migrational reasons for immigrant entrepreneurs. Findings showed that the entrepreneurial reasons were effective in the migration decision of immigrant entrepreneurs besides the socio-economic and politic factors. In this paper, focusing on immigrant entrepreneurs in developing countries will help to provide a better understanding of both migration and entrepreneurship phenomena, so that could pave the way to demonstrate a new entrepreneurs’ migration model.