Tourism Startups: fresh evidence by a systematic review

Abstract

There has been a growing interest in start-up companies and their potential to disrupt traditional industries in recent years. At the same time, the spread of tourism and the new forms of its provision require increasingly innovative and disruptive business ideas. Therefore, it seems appropriate to cross the two topics of start-up and tourism. This paper aims to provide a systematic literature review (SR) on tourism start-ups through a detailed and replicable process for analysis to examine the role and impact of tourism start-ups in the global tourism industry. The review begins by exploring the definition and classification of tourism start-ups, highlighting their distinctive features and entrepreneurial skills. It then delivers the results of a subsequent SR that shows various theoretical and empirical frameworks that indicate the need for further study with on-field research. The review methodology of this work has two preparatory phases. The first phase concerns a generic look at the most evident literature to identify variables to implement a systematic review process through R Studio software. Through this investigation, the authors attempt to provide scholars and practitioners with signs of how start-ups are emerging in the tourist business and input for future research.