Crisis Resilience of Startup Companies (The Case of Hungary among the Visegrad Countries with a Focus on the Pandemic)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The work "Crisis resilience of start-up companies (The case of Hungary among the Visegrad Countries with a focus on the pandemic)" presents an important topic of start-ups. Particularly interesting is an attempt to answer the question of how the crisis and pandemic affect the resilience of start-ups. The work is limited to the V4 countries with particular emphasis on Hungary. The authors failed to achieve their goals. I rate the work very poorly in methodology and content. The advantage of the work is a literature review and reference to research conducted by other authors. In its current form, the work is not suitable for publication.

I have included detailed notes below:

[In. 23], change dots to commas

[in.93] whether the second part of the study is a review of the literature, it should probably be a discussion of the results and confirmation of the conducted research. At the end of the introduction, I expect a clear definition of the purpose of the work.

[In. 80-82] Is this the aim of the work? How does this relate to the work title?

[Chapter 2.1] How is resilience about? It should be explicitly defined.

[v.112-117] of this part I needed help understanding for what purpose the authors write about it and what this paragraph is about.

[In. 119-127] as above

This subchapter does not contribute anything to the work. Only in [in 128-135] is reference made to the aim.

I don't quite understand how chapter 2.2 relates to the work on start-up resilience.

Figure 1 does not show the spatial diversity of start-ups, but only the percentage shares in global ecosystems.

[In. 196-197] What does the 30th place mean? This needs to be clarified.

Table 1 - Krakkow should be Krakow

[In. 217-219] this paragraph should have been earlier in the introduction. This would explain the appearance of Chapter 2.

[In. 220] This question it probably does not require research
[In. 221] too general a question
[In. 222] this question is correct

The hypothesis should be formulated differently:
Proposition: Hypotheses: resilience to crisis and shocks varies in Hungary and the V4 countries

'convergent parallel design' - too short description and explanation of the method

The problem in the analysis may be the considerable diversity in the number of surveyed start-ups (Slovakia = only 6, and in Hungary 47). Besides, we don't have enough experts.

[In. 314-321] The authors referred to the chi-square test, it needs to be added in the description of the methods, and I needed clarification on why it was used. There are no results for this test in the results.

[In. 322-354] I don't know where these conclusions come from. The results should include the results of the work. The authors refer to other works, which should be included in the discussion of the results.

[Table 5:] In my opinion is a mistake to group the countries (Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia). What descriptive measures are counted here?

Chapter 4.3 is a literature study. It should be in the literature review perhaps instead the chapter 2.
[In. 383-389] I did not understand it. How was it determined, since the results of the surveys are only in chapter 4.3

I believe that the number of experts is too small and the compilation of their answers does not allow for drawing conclusions

In the discussion, the authors raise doubts that disqualify the conducted analysis.

Discussion and conclusions are for improvement.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1!

Thank you very much for your suggestions. We accepted your suggestions, and updated our paper according to your guidance.

Response to Reviewer 1 Comments

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The work "Crisis resilience of start-up companies (The case of Hungary among the Visegrad Countries with a focus on the pandemic)" presents an important topic of start-ups. Particularly interesting is an attempt to answer the question of how the crisis and pandemic affect the resilience of start-ups. The work is limited to the V4 countries with particular emphasis on Hungary. The authors failed to achieve their goals. I rate the work very poorly in methodology and content. The advantage of the work is a literature review and reference to research conducted by other authors. In its current form, the work is not suitable for publication.

I have included detailed notes below:

 

 

Point 1: [In. 23], change dots to commas

Response 1: ok: “startup, innovative enterprises, resilience, economic impacts, Hungary, Visegrad Countries”

 

Point 2: [in.93] whether the second part of the study is a review of the literature, it should probably be a discussion of the results and confirmation of the conducted research. At the end of the introduction, I expect a clear definition of the purpose of the work.

Response 2: Hence, studying Hungarian startups in the Visegrad countries(V4) is relevant for these reasons:

• The research area is the V4, as these countries are, because of their historical past, tthe main reference group for comparative studies [13,14,15,16,17,18,19].
• The strengths of the Visegrad countries included the potential of startups, in addi-tion to internationalization and product innovation [20].
• Startups are very fragile and hard-to-find. This is particularly true in a post-socialistic Central and Eastern European country like Hungary, character-ized by a young startup ecosystem, where, unlike in the Western European and Anglo-Saxon ecosystems, long term time series are not available for studying startup businesses [21].
• Despite the fact that Hungary (4.5) according to Hungary National Entrepre-neurship Context Index (NECI) – characterizing the entrepreneurial ecosystem – ranks in the lower-middle segment of the business ecosystems in Europe (the Cen-tral and Eastern European region has an average score of 4.2) with Hungary’s en-trepreneurial ecosystem scoring the highest within the region [22], the Hungarian startup ecosystem has registered a decline in rank (Budapest, the capital of Hun-gary, decreased by double digits) based on the Startupblink report [23].
• The study presents the state of startups and the contemporary Hungarian startup ecosystem. It aims to explore the changes in innovative startups as a result of the crisis and to provide direction for the post-crisis economic recovery, which sup-ports innovative startup needs to contribute to the regional economy again with their positive results.

 

Point 3: [In. 80-82] Is this the aim of the work? How does this relate to the work title?

Response 3: The recent study explores the crisis and shock resilience of Hungarian startups, as well as the impact of the crisis caused by the coronavirus that was raging at the time of the research on startups. Hence, studying Hungarian startups in the Visegrad coun-tries(V4) is relevant for these reasons:

 

Point 4: [Chapter 2.1] How is resilience about? It should be explicitly defined.

Response 4: The aim of recent research on the crisis resilience of startups was primarily to explore the most characteristic parameters and features of Hungarian startups and the eco-system surrounding them.

 

Point 5: [v.112-117] of this part I needed help understanding for what purpose the authors write about it and what this paragraph is about.

Response 5: We explained in details:

Resilience in general is demonstrated after an event or crisis occurs [24] while business resilience enables organizations to quickly adapt to disruptions while main-taining sustainable business operations and protecting people, assets, and overall brand equity [25]. It also means the capacity for companies to survive, adapt and grow in the face of turbulent change [26].

A variety of research studies use and define the concept of resilience; however, the definition used varies depending on the focus of each article [12,27]. Several articles examine business resilience, but just a few papers focus on startup resilience [8,27,28,29,30].

 

Point 6: [In. 119-127] as above

Response 6: We explained in details:

“Resilience in general is demonstrated after an event or crisis occurs [24] while business resilience enables organizations to quickly adapt to disruptions while main-taining sustainable business operations and protecting people, assets, and overall brand equity [25]. It also means the capacity for companies to survive, adapt and grow in the face of turbulent change [26].

A variety of research studies use and define the concept of resilience; however, the definition used varies depending on the focus of each article [12,27]. Several articles examine business resilience, but just a few papers focus on startup resilience [8,27,28,29,30].”

 

Point 7: This subchapter does not contribute anything to the work. Only in [in 128-135] is reference made to the aim.

Response 7: We changed in the text: “Several articles examine business resilience, but just a few papers focus on startup resilience [8,27,28,29,30].”

 

Point 8: I don't quite understand how chapter 2.2 relates to the work on start-up resilience.

Response 8: We integrated 2.3 Where will the Hungarian ecosystem be in the international rankings in 2021 into 2.2 Startup ecosystem.

“2. Literature review

This section presents the main theoretical components regarding the impact of business resilience with a focus on startup enterprises, then the startups surrounding the startup ecosystem (the Hungarian ecosystem) and last but not least, business pro-tection measures in the V4 countries.

2.1 Business resilience with a focus on startup companies

2.2         The Hungarian startup ecosystem in the international rankings in 2021

2.3 Business protection measures in the V4 countries”

 

Point 9: Figure 1 does not show the spatial diversity of start-ups, but only the percentage shares in global ecosystems.

Response 9: We cancelled the figure 1. Spatial differences.

 

Point 10: [In. 196-197] What does the 30th place mean? This needs to be clarified.

Response 10: (30th rank amoung the examined hundred nations)

 

Point 11: Table 1 - Krakkow should be Krakow

Response 11: OK: “Krakow”

 

Point 12: [In. 217-219] this paragraph should have been earlier in the introduction. This would explain the appearance of Chapter 2.

Response 12: We changed the position of (in 217-219) and added to the introduction.

“The aim of recent research on the crisis resilience of startups was primarily to explore the most characteristic parameters and features of Hungarian startups and the eco-system surrounding them. On this basis, the following research questions have been formed:

• RQ1: What are the characteristics of Hungarian startups after the crisis?
• RQ2: How has the coronavirus crisis affected Hungarian startups?

The research aims to prove the following hypothesis:

H: Resilience to crisis and shocks varies in Hungary and the V4 countries.”

 

Point 13: [In. 220] This question it probably does not require research

Response 13: We cancelled RQ1: : Where does the Hungarian ecosystem rank in the global ranking?

 

Point 14: [In. 221] too general a question

Response 14: We changed the RQ2: What are the characteristics of Hungarian startups after the crisis?

 

Point 15: [In. 222] this question is correct

Response 15: Thank you. How has the coronavirus crisis affected Hungarian startups?

 

Point 16: The hypothesis should be formulated differently:

Proposition: Hypotheses: resilience to crisis and shocks varies in Hungary and the V4 countries

Response 16: Ok, proposition accepted: “Resilience to crisis and shocks varies in Hungary and the V4 countries.”

 

Point 17: 'convergent parallel design' - too short description and explanation of the method

Response 17: We extended the paper:

“In line with the exploratory nature of the research a mixed methodology was used, including what [70] is called a ‘convergent parallel design’, which consists of the re-searcher conducting quantitative and qualitative data collection and data analysis simultaneously and independently of each other, and only linking the two methodo-logical strands when interpreting the results [71-78]. The two parts of the research car-ried out using the two methods are independent of each other (Figure 1); neither serves as an input to the other, so that quantitative and qualitative data collection and analy-sis can be carried out simultaneously, without having to wait for the other to be developed [72].

Figure 2. The design of convergent parallel design

 

Source: own compilation based on Cresswell & Plano Clark [2011:69]

 

The purpose of the coherent parallel design is to better understand a given social phenomenon by using both approaches. As the two methods complement each other well, their strengths add up and compensate for each other's weaknesses; together, they can provide a more complex picture of the subject under study. In addition, the results from quantitative and qualitative methods can be used to complement, illus-trate and support each other, and can also be used for comparison [70,71,72].

The study first uses the methodology of qualitative research in form of an online survey (n=97) and then the quantitative phase in form of semi-structured in-depth interviews (n=22).

 

Point 18: The problem in the analysis may be the considerable diversity in the number of surveyed start-ups (Slovakia = only 6, and in Hungary 47). Besides, we don't have enough experts.

Response 18: We extended the paper:

“One hundred and fifty-two respondents participated in the survey but fifty-five contained only partial completions and were therefore disregarded. In total this re-sulted in a final questionnaire sample of 97 completions for startups under 10 years old with a ratio of 2.89 per cent. The completion rates were 2.27-3.53 percent of the final per country. Of the ninety-seven respondents 20 represented Czech (3,53 percent), 47 Hungarian (3.07 percent), 24 Polish (2.27 percent) and 6 Slovak enterprises (3.12 per-cent) (Table 3).”

 

Point 19: [In. 314-321] The authors referred to the chi-square test, it needs to be added in the description of the methods, and I needed clarification on why it was used. There are no results for this test in the results.

Response 19: We explained the methods in details:

“The questionnaire data were processed using Microsoft Excel (Microsoft, (2016), Redmond, Washington: Microsoft) and IBM SPSS (IBM Corp., 2016, IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.). Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the characteristics of the respondents, to compare startups in Hungary and other V4 countries. Chi-square, Fisher's exact tests and Mann-Whitney tests were applied. The Mann-Whitney U test (also known as the Wilcoxon rank sum test) tests for differences between two groups on a single, ordinal variable with no specific distribution. In con-trast, the independent samples t-test, which is also a test of two groups, requires the single variable to be measured at the interval or ratio level, rather than the ordinal level, and to be normally distributed [83,84]. The characteristics of the sample are pre-sented in Table 4.”

 

Point 20: [In. 322-354] I don't know where these conclusions come from. The results should include the results of the work. The authors refer to other works, which should be included in the discussion of the results.

Response 20: We explained the result of the survey in details:

“4.1       The result of the online survey

When asked how their business was affected by the pandemic, Hungarian busi-nesses and those in the other V4 countries - the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia - were equally moderately affected by the COVID pandemic and related measures (Fisher=1.65; p=0.82).

The survey found that Czech, Polish and Slovak startups had more difficulties in growing (Fisher=11.64; p=0.02) and internationalizing (Fisher=9.12; p=0.06), while there were no differences in the other factors. There was a strong trend, but Hungari-ans had more trouble with sales (Fisher=8.4; p=0.06). Team development (Fisher=3.65; p=0.47), cash flow (Fisher=6.68; p=0.15), and profitability (maintaining stable income) (Fisher=2.82; p=0.6), were equally challenging in all V4 countries (Fisher=4.48; p=0.36). Internal processes within the company were equally challenging, as were financing (Fisher=2.81; p=0.6) and product or service development (Fisher=4.4; p=0.36). Attract-ing competent staff is quite polarized (Fisher=2.4; p=0.69). Furthermore, there was no difference in the financial barriers (Fisher=5.95; p=0.2) to startups with a presence in the V4 countries, such as too little capital, and difficulties in raising capital, which were significant obstacles to their development. Regulations (Fisher=0.82; p=0.96), bu-reaucracy and red tape (Fisher=1.68; p=0.83), and lack of access to knowledge (Fish-er=4.03; p=0.42) or networking (Fisher=2.84; p=0.61) and management skills (Fish-er=3.24; p=0.56) were not a barrier in any country. Attracting (Fisher=2.67; p=0.64) and retaining (Fisher=1.92; p=0.83) skilled human capital is a consequence of the crisis and, to a lesser extent, a barrier, as the willingness of workers to change jobs has declined [90].

V4 countries were on average satisfied with their growth rates (Fisher=1.94; p=0.78) thanks to a number of business support measures. They consider that they were moderately affected by the pandemic and related measures. Similar to the results of Juhász & Szabó [91], in addition to the negative effects of the crisis, a number of positive aspects were also uniformly mentioned, such as the time factor (more time to design the product (Z=-0.69; p=0.49), more time and opportunity to develop new ideas, features, etc. (Z=-0.62; p=0.53), increased time to design (Z=-0.46; p=0.65), opportunity to fine tune the schedule (Z=-0.75; p=0.45). The transformation of the market has also been accompanied by its expansion, which has in turn created new openings (in-creased market (Z=-0.35; p=0.73), new opportunities (Z=-0.22; p=0.82)). Opportunities to seek corporate partnerships (mentoring, assistance) have opened up, encouraging startups to work on further development (encouraged them to seek mentoring, assis-tance and corporate partnerships (Z=-0.61; p=0.54), encouraged them to seek potential development opportunities (Z=-1.52; p=0.13)).

Startup entrepreneurs in the study area also agree on the obstacles created by the crisis caused by the epidemic. In addition to the financial crisis (Z=-0.02; p=0.99), was the lack of travel opportunities (Z=-1.39; p=0.17), the difficulties of teleworking (Z=-0.24; p=0.81),which in the long term created a significant emotional burden (Z=-1.3; p=0.19), in addition to the need to constantly re-plan and often to lay off em-ployees (Z=-0.38; p=0.71) , and other circumstances (Z=-1.58; p=0.11) due to the con-stant uncertainty.

In terms of firms' plans to raise capital, foreign start-ups are more likely to con-sider raising domestic venture capital (Fisher=5.04; p=0.03), while there is no differ-ence in the extent to which most firms want to raise some capital (Khi-square=0.36; p=0.55), nor in the extent to which they know what capital they would raise (p=0.49). There was no difference in that almost no one would consider involving a domestic accelerator (p=1), bank (p=1), stock exchange (p=0.24), university incubator (p=0.49), local government office/municipality/local government (p=0.24), family and friends (p=0.24). There were no differences for Hungarian startups compared to other coun-tries, but slightly more people than above counted in the involvement of a foreign ac-celerator (p=0.78), local business angel (p=0.37), foreign business angel (p=1), commu-nity funding (p=1), strategic industry investor (p=0.39), European Commission e.g. Horizon 2020 (p=0.58) and foreign venture capital (p=0.79) (Appendix C). Table 6 shows the descriptive statistics of the responses to the survey questions on a Likert scale from 1 to 5 (standard deviation and mean values in Hungarian and further V4 breakdown).”

 

Point 21: [Table 5:] In my opinion is a mistake to group the countries (Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia). What descriptive measures are counted here?

Response 21: In the implications, Limitations and Future Research Avenues” we expained the reason, why we group these countries:

“The study concerns Hungary, which does not represent the entire V4 startup sec-tor. The population of startups surveyed by countries is not large enough to allow sta-tistical analyses to be conducted at an acceptable level of reliability divided by each country, so we concentrate on Hungary and the other V4 countries, which may not be methodologically satisfactory for many scholars. Perhaps this is an exciting area of re-search for scholars.”

 

 

Point 22: Chapter 4.3 is a literature study. It should be in the literature review perhaps instead the chapter 2.

Response 22:: We moved 4.3chapter to 2.3 chapter as a literature study.

 

Point 23: [In. 383-389] I did not understand it. How was it determined, since the results of the surveys are only in chapter 4.3

Response 23: We moved the 4.3 chapter as literature study to 2.3 chapter.

 

Point 24: I believe that the number of experts is too small and the compilation of their answers does not allow for drawing conclusions

Response 24.

We added more interviews to the analysis. So in total we analysed 22. interviews with startups.

Expert	Position	Startup location	Hungarian Sectoral Classification of Economic Activities (TEÁOR’08)
1	Founder	Balatonszárszó	2571 Manufacture of cuttlery
2	Co-founder	Budapest	6206 Computer operation
3	Founder	Budapest	Non-profit association for the development of the startup ecosystem
4	Founder	Budapest	6201 Computer programming
5	Manager	Budapest	6619 Other financial activities
6	Manager	Budapest	6201 Computer programming (Fintech)
7	Co-founder	Budapest	6201 Computer programming (Human Resource)
8	Co-founder	Budapest	5610 Restaurant and mobile food service activities
9	Co-founder	Budapest	6209 Other information technology services
10	Founder	Debrecen	7111 Architectural engineering
11	Founder	Győr	7112 Engineering activities. technical consultancy
12	Founder	Győr	7112 Engineering activities
13	Founder	Győrújbarát	6201 Computer programming (Sport)
14	Founder	Hédervár	7420 Photography
15	Founder	Hódmezővásárhely	7219 Other scientific and technical research and development
16	Founder	Lovas	9003 Creative arts
17	Founder	Mosonmagyaróvár	1624 Manufacture of storage wood products
18	Manager	Nagytarcsa	6201 Computer programming
19	Co-founder	Pannonhalma	1089 Manufacture of other food products
20	Founder	Pécs	6311 Data processing. web hosting activities
21	Co-founder	Solymár	6651 Wholesale of computers and software
22	Founder	Szeged	7112 Engineering activities

 

 

Point 25: In the discussion, the authors raise doubts that disqualify the conducted analysis.

Response 25: We improved the discussion and conclusion part of the paper.

“The study aimed to present the situation of startups in Hungary and other Vise-grad countries. First, it summarizes the concepts of startup resilience and the startup ecosystem, then it uses the international Startupblink ranking [29] to position the Hungarian startup ecosystem and sums up the business protection measures in the V4 countries. Then it presents the results of the questionnaire survey of startups in the Visegrad countries (N=97) and the in-depth interviews with Hungarian startup entre-preneurs (N=22).

The research aimed to put the Hungarian startup ecosystem in the context of in-ternational competition. The Hungarian ecosystem is ranked third among the Visegrad countries in 2021 according to the StartupBlink [29] report. At the same time, despite the crisis, Hungary's position in the international competition has been further strengthened, with five Hungarian cities - Budapest, Debrecen, Pécs, Szeged and Székesfehérvár - now ranked among the top 1000 cities in the world for startup eco-systems. And the capital has been in the top 50 of the world ranking in education for years.

Similar to the results of Juhász & Szabó [91] and Nyikos, Soha & Béres [92], the research showed that the crisis, like the COVID pandemic, did not have a uniformly negative impact on startups. The winners of the economic crisis caused by the pan-demic are companies active in the IT sector, healthcare (Medtech and health tech), e-commerce and digital education. The big losers are startups in hospitality and tour-ism. In her study, Karsai [99] also assessed that "the persistence of significant state dominance, which catalyzed the emergence of the startup sector after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic and helped to counter its effects, may not only help but also hinder the development of the startup sector in the region, as the natural selection mechanism of the market is not able to operate purely”. However, in the present re-search the respondents considered the positive effect of the epidemic as a cleansing and natural selection of startups. The viable startups survived. To overcome their funding obstacles, startup support programs have been launched in the Visegrad countries, following the EU model, such as the Czech Rise up Program in the Czech Republic, the Hack the Crisis Slovakia competition in Slovakia, the Startup Poland Program in Poland and the COVIDEA Ideas and Startup Competition in Hungary. In addition, different business protection measures have been put in place in different countries. Such measures include non-repayable grants such as state, innovation and other business protection grants, as well as state loans and loan guarantees, and tax and contribution subsidies.”

Point 26: Discussion and conclusions are for improvement.

Response 26: We improved the discussion and conclusions and we added Implications, Limitations and Future Research Avenues. As Appendix we added the survey questions, the statistic analyis and the interview questions too.

5. Discussion and conclusion

The study aimed to present the situation of startups in Hungary and other Vise-grad countries. First, it summarizes the concepts of startup resilience and the startup ecosystem, then it uses the international Startupblink ranking [29] to position the Hungarian startup ecosystem and sums up the business protection measures in the V4 countries. Then it presents the results of the questionnaire survey of startups in the Visegrad countries (N=97) and the in-depth interviews with Hungarian startup entre-preneurs (N=22).

The research aimed to put the Hungarian startup ecosystem in the context of in-ternational competition. The Hungarian ecosystem is ranked third among the Visegrad countries in 2021 according to the StartupBlink [29] report. At the same time, despite the crisis, Hungary's position in the international competition has been further strengthened, with five Hungarian cities - Budapest, Debrecen, Pécs, Szeged and Székesfehérvár - now ranked among the top 1000 cities in the world for startup eco-systems. And the capital has been in the top 50 of the world ranking in education for years.

Similar to the results of Juhász & Szabó [91] and Nyikos, Soha & Béres [92], the research showed that the crisis, like the COVID pandemic, did not have a uniformly negative impact on startups. The winners of the economic crisis caused by the pan-demic are companies active in the IT sector, healthcare (Medtech and health tech), e-commerce and digital education. The big losers are startups in hospitality and tour-ism. In her study, Karsai [99] also assessed that "the persistence of significant state dominance, which catalyzed the emergence of the startup sector after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic and helped to counter its effects, may not only help but also hinder the development of the startup sector in the region, as the natural selection mechanism of the market is not able to operate purely”. However, in the present re-search the respondents considered the positive effect of the epidemic as a cleansing and natural selection of startups. The viable startups survived. To overcome their funding obstacles, startup support programs have been launched in the Visegrad countries, following the EU model, such as the Czech Rise up Program in the Czech Republic, the Hack the Crisis Slovakia competition in Slovakia, the Startup Poland Program in Poland and the COVIDEA Ideas and Startup Competition in Hungary. In addition, different business protection measures have been put in place in different countries. Such measures include non-repayable grants such as state, innovation and other business protection grants, as well as state loans and loan guarantees, and tax and contribution subsidies.

Implications, Limitations and Future Research Avenues

The research is based solely on the most comprehensive dataset of high-tech companies and investors in the US, Crunchbase, an internationally recognized data-base, according to Pisoni and Onetti [100]. There is no comprehensive, officially avail-able startup data collection in the region under study, i.e., neither in Central-Eastern Europe nor in the V4 countries. The quantitative V4 startup survey was a question-naire survey conducted by direct email to the companies filtered by the startup defini-tion based on Kollmann et al. [81]. The willingness to respond from the contacted startup enterprises was around 3 percent completion rate, due to the constantly changing environment, i.e., constant challenges and re-planning, as the interviewees stated.

The study concerns Hungary, which does not represent the entire V4 startup sec-tor. The population of startups surveyed by countries is not large enough to allow sta-tistical analyses to be conducted at an acceptable level of reliability divided by each country, so we concentrate on Hungary and the other V4 countries, which may not be methodologically satisfactory for many scholars. Perhaps this is an exciting area of re-search for scholars.

Another interesting topic that could be extended as a further line of research to the cities of the Central and Eastern European region is to examine which cities served as startup hubs before and after the pandemic in the region, and where and what measures supported the development of business communities, thus strengthening the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach, or were linked to industrial development, which would support the catching-up of the CEE region with its Western counterparts. Since, as Sass [101] has noted, the V4 countries are significantly below the EU-27 average, and this problem of economic catching-up has long been a crucial issue.

The results of the research can provide a basis for future startup entrepreneurs thinking about innovative solutions to a problem; for practitioners looking to develop their network of contacts; and for local leaders to consider what innovative startups, seen as drivers of the local economy, can be given space to join innovation support programs. After all, as highlighted in the OECD [102] study, innovation is as vital for rural areas as it is for urban economies. Their goals and challenges are the same: in-creasing productivity and improving the quality of public services [102]. It also pro-vides guidance to policy makers on how to identify and support these businesses, thereby increasing the competitiveness of the area. As a policy recommendation, we call for collaboration between municipalities, public and private partners, startups and investors to jointly develop a city startup ecosystem and associated smart regional hubs adapted to changing circumstances and local conditions.

Thank you very much for your support!

Best regards,

The authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The study examines the crisis resilience of startup companies in Hungary among the Visegrad countries as a result of the pandemic situation. It aims to provide guidance on what support is needed for startups in the post-crisis period to re-launch the economy and to contribute to the region's economy with positive results. Fascinating and physically meaningful subject. However, after reading this article carefully, I have some opinions and suggestions for the author's reference:

1.     The research gap in theory and practice is unclear; please add.

2.     Please correct the headings in table 5.

3.     Please correct the discussion section of the results. It should include your research results against similar research by other authors. Your discussion is the limitations of research and indicates what research should be in the future.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2!

Thank you very much for your suggestions and support. We made changes in our paper according to your guidance. Please, see attached.

Thank you very much in advance!

Best regards, 

The authors

 

Response to Reviewer 2. Comments

 

The study examines the crisis resilience of startup companies in Hungary among the Visegrad countries as a result of the pandemic situation. It aims to provide guidance on what support is needed for startups in the post-crisis period to re-launch the economy and to contribute to the region's economy with positive results. Fascinating and physically meaningful subject. However, after reading this article carefully, I have some opinions and suggestions for the author's reference:

 

 

Point 1:The research gap in theory and practice is unclear; please add.

Response 1: We extended the introduction:

“In the 21st century, the sudden changes in the external environment caused by COVID-19 or lately the Russian-Ukrainian war have had an unprecedentedly severe impact on the economy as well as civilization [2]. The crisis has caused significant economic damage worldwide [3]. Since WHO [4,5] announced the pandemic there has been increasing public attention paid to the dangers of economic and social crises [6 ]. Cities, counties and countries were placed under total lockdown in a matter of days or weeks. These lockdowns were measures on an unprecedented scale in comparison to those taken during previous pandemics, such as the Spanish flu [7].

Macroeconomic factors influence the development of startups globally [8]. Alt-hough all industries feel the consequences of crises like the COVID-19 epidemic, startups are among the most vulnerable and are currently still facing a number of un-expected challenges - reduced production and/or demand - from both a corporate and organizational perspective [9].

Resilience research is highly desirable as it addresses the urgency to investigate vul-nerable situations in which enterprises act [10,11,12]. As Aldianto et al. [3] stated, the concept of business resilience studies at startups is still limited. The recent study ex-plores the crisis and shock resilience of Hungarian startups, as well as the impact of the crisis caused by the coronavirus that was raging at the time of the research on startups. Hence, studying Hungarian startups in the Visegrad countries(V4) is relevant for these reasons:

• The research area is the V4, as these countries are, because of their historical past, the main reference group for comparative studies [13,14,15,16,17,18,19].
• The strengths of the Visegrad countries included the potential of startups, in addi-tion to internationalization and product innovation [20].
• Startups are very fragile and hard-to-find. This is particularly true in a post-socialistic Central and Eastern European country like Hungary, character-ized by a young startup ecosystem, where, unlike in the Western European and Anglo-Saxon ecosystems, long term time series are not available for studying startup businesses [21].
• Despite the fact that Hungary (4.5) according to Hungary National Entrepre-neurship Context Index (NECI) – characterizing the entrepreneurial ecosystem – ranks in the lower-middle segment of the business ecosystems in Europe (the Cen-tral and Eastern European region has an average score of 4.2) with Hungary’s en-trepreneurial ecosystem scoring the highest within the region [22], the Hungarian startup ecosystem has registered a decline in rank (Budapest, the capital of Hun-gary, decreased by double digits) based on the Startupblink report [23].
• The study presents the state of startups and the contemporary Hungarian startup ecosystem. It aims to explore the changes in innovative startups as a result of the crisis and to provide direction for the post-crisis economic recovery, which sup-ports innovative startup needs to contribute to the regional economy again with their positive results.”

 

 

Point 2: Please correct the headings in table 5.

Response 2: We corrected the headings in all tables.

 

 

Point 3 Please correct the discussion section of the results. It should include your research results against similar research by other authors. Your discussion is the limitations of research and indicates what research should be in the future.

Response 3: We corrected the discussion and conclusion parts and added limitations.

“5. Discussion and conclusion

The study aimed to present the situation of startups in Hungary and other Vise-grad countries. First, it summarizes the concepts of startup resilience and the startup ecosystem, then it uses the international Startupblink ranking [29] to position the Hungarian startup ecosystem and sums up the business protection measures in the V4 countries. Then it presents the results of the questionnaire survey of startups in the Visegrad countries (N=97) and the in-depth interviews with Hungarian startup entre-preneurs (N=22).

The research aimed to put the Hungarian startup ecosystem in the context of in-ternational competition. The Hungarian ecosystem is ranked third among the Visegrad countries in 2021 according to the StartupBlink [29] report. At the same time, despite the crisis, Hungary's position in the international competition has been further strengthened, with five Hungarian cities - Budapest, Debrecen, Pécs, Szeged and Székesfehérvár - now ranked among the top 1000 cities in the world for startup eco-systems. And the capital has been in the top 50 of the world ranking in education for years.

Similar to the results of Juhász & Szabó [91] and Nyikos, Soha & Béres [92], the research showed that the crisis, like the COVID pandemic, did not have a uniformly negative impact on startups. The winners of the economic crisis caused by the pan-demic are companies active in the IT sector, healthcare (Medtech and health tech), e-commerce and digital education. The big losers are startups in hospitality and tour-ism. In her study, Karsai [99] also assessed that "the persistence of significant state dominance, which catalyzed the emergence of the startup sector after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic and helped to counter its effects, may not only help but also hinder the development of the startup sector in the region, as the natural selection mechanism of the market is not able to operate purely”. However, in the present re-search the respondents considered the positive effect of the epidemic as a cleansing and natural selection of startups. The viable startups survived. To overcome their funding obstacles, startup support programs have been launched in the Visegrad countries, following the EU model, such as the Czech Rise up Program in the Czech Republic, the Hack the Crisis Slovakia competition in Slovakia, the Startup Poland Program in Poland and the COVIDEA Ideas and Startup Competition in Hungary. In addition, different business protection measures have been put in place in different countries. Such measures include non-repayable grants such as state, innovation and other business protection grants, as well as state loans and loan guarantees, and tax and contribution subsidies.

Implications, Limitations and Future Research Avenues

The research is based solely on the most comprehensive dataset of high-tech companies and investors in the US, Crunchbase, an internationally recognized data-base, according to Pisoni and Onetti [100]. There is no comprehensive, officially avail-able startup data collection in the region under study, i.e., neither in Central-Eastern Europe nor in the V4 countries. The quantitative V4 startup survey was a question-naire survey conducted by direct email to the companies filtered by the startup defini-tion based on Kollmann et al. [81]. The willingness to respond from the contacted startup enterprises was around 3 percent completion rate, due to the constantly changing environment, i.e., constant challenges and re-planning, as the interviewees stated.

The study concerns Hungary, which does not represent the entire V4 startup sec-tor. The population of startups surveyed by countries is not large enough to allow sta-tistical analyses to be conducted at an acceptable level of reliability divided by each country, so we concentrate on Hungary and the other V4 countries, which may not be methodologically satisfactory for many scholars. Perhaps this is an exciting area of re-search for scholars.

Another interesting topic that could be extended as a further line of research to the cities of the Central and Eastern European region is to examine which cities served as startup hubs before and after the pandemic in the region, and where and what measures supported the development of business communities, thus strengthening the entrepreneurial ecosystem approach, or were linked to industrial development, which would support the catching-up of the CEE region with its Western counterparts. Since, as Sass [101] has noted, the V4 countries are significantly below the EU-27 average, and this problem of economic catching-up has long been a crucial issue.

The results of the research can provide a basis for future startup entrepreneurs thinking about innovative solutions to a problem; for practitioners looking to develop their network of contacts; and for local leaders to consider what innovative startups, seen as drivers of the local economy, can be given space to join innovation support programs. After all, as highlighted in the OECD [102] study, innovation is as vital for rural areas as it is for urban economies. Their goals and challenges are the same: in-creasing productivity and improving the quality of public services [102]. It also pro-vides guidance to policy makers on how to identify and support these businesses, thereby increasing the competitiveness of the area. As a policy recommendation, we call for collaboration between municipalities, public and private partners, startups and investors to jointly develop a city startup ecosystem and associated smart regional hubs adapted to changing circumstances and local conditions.”

 

Thank you very much for your support!

Best regards,

The authors.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The article provides a comprehensive analysis of the crisis resilience of startup companies in Hungary in the context of the Visegrad countries and the COVID-19 pandemic. The author provides valuable insights into the challenges faced by startups in Hungary during the crisis and the strategies that they have adopted to respond to it. The comparison of the crisis resilience of startups in Hungary with those in other Visegrad countries is particularly relevant and highlights the unique challenges faced by startups in Hungary. Overall, the article is well-researched and provides a thought-provoking examination of the crisis resilience of startups in Hungary.

However, there are some areas where the article could be improved.

1. Methodology part: Sampling techniques and methods of data analysis need to be elaborated in detail. The proportion of the sample size is not the same and needs to be reasoned and in this case comparing the result would not be possible.

2. The structure of paper needs to be restructured. For instance, research questions are presented in methodology and the format of the table needs to be improved too.

3. Language editing is a must

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3!

Thank you very much for your review, it was very helpful for us to improve our paper. We accepted your suggestions and made the changes accordingly.

Response to Reviewer 3 Comments

The article provides a comprehensive analysis of the crisis resilience of startup companies in Hungary in the context of the Visegrad countries and the COVID-19 pandemic. The author provides valuable insights into the challenges faced by startups in Hungary during the crisis and the strategies that they have adopted to respond to it. The comparison of the crisis resilience of startups in Hungary with those in other Visegrad countries is particularly relevant and highlights the unique challenges faced by startups in Hungary. Overall, the article is well-researched and provides a thought-provoking examination of the crisis resilience of startups in Hungary.

However, there are some areas where the article could be improved.

 

Point 1: 1. Methodology part: Sampling techniques and methods of data analysis need to be elaborated in detail. The proportion of the sample size is not the same and needs to be reasoned and in this case comparing the result would not be possible.

Response 1: We extended the methodology.

“3. Materials and Methods

In line with the exploratory nature of the research a mixed methodology was used, including what [70] is called a ‘convergent parallel design’, which consists of the re-searcher conducting quantitative and qualitative data collection and data analysis simultaneously and independently of each other, and only linking the two methodo-logical strands when interpreting the results [71-78]. The two parts of the research car-ried out using the two methods are independent of each other (Figure 1); neither serves as an input to the other, so that quantitative and qualitative data collection and analy-sis can be carried out simultaneously, without having to wait for the other to be de-veloped [72].

Figure 2. The design of convergent parallel design

 

 

Source: own compilation based on Cresswell & Plano Clark [71:69]

 

The purpose of the coherent parallel design is to better understand a given social phenomenon by using both approaches. As the two methods complement each other well, their strengths add up and compensate for each other's weaknesses; together, they can provide a more complex picture of the subject under study. In addition, the results from quantitative and qualitative methods can be used to complement, illus-trate and support each other, and can also be used for comparison [70,71,72].

The study first uses the methodology of qualitative research in form of an online survey (n=97) and then the quantitative phase in form of semi-structured in-depth in-terviews (n=22).

3.1 The research area

The study examines Hungarian startups in comparison to the other Visegrad countries, which are also called the Visegrad Four or the Visegrad Group and have ex-isted since 1991. The group serves as a forum for dialogue and close cooperation be-tween three (later four, with the split of Czechoslovakia) Central European countries: the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia [74].

3.2 The online survey

The questionnaire survey was conducted online between June and November 2021 among startup entrepreneurs from the Visegrad countries. The questionnaire is part of the V4 Startup Survey 2021 (Section F, G) and aims to assess the crisis resilience of startups. The set of questions used in the questionnaire are validated questions based on the Design Terminal [29] study (Appendix A). Respondents rated the ques-tions on a Likert scale of 1 to 5, where 1=not at all affected; 5=very affected). The ques-tionnaire’s sample is based on the Crunchbase database, which has been cited by Block-Sanders [75], Waldner et al [76], Kemeny et al. [77], Breschi et al. [78] and Banerji-Reimer [79] as a reliable and comprehensive source of information on startup entrepreneurship. Crunchbase is the online startup database of the American startup news portal Tech Crunch; a database that brings together startups from around the world to help them operate. The database was founded in Silicon Valley in 2007 and has grown over the years into a virtual marketplace where investors and interested parties can search for startups. Thus, keeping the database up-to-date is the responsi-bility and interest of the registered startup companies. The database is modelled on online platforms [80]. As the study adopted the concept of Kollmann and colleagues [81] based on international scientific literature, the Crunchbase database was filtered for startups founded after 2011 with registered offices in the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia. Thus, the initial sample for the study was startups less than 10 years old, a total of 14610 enterprises.

All companies were contacted directly via email through the Lime survey website [82]. However, as the email availability of many companies was not working, the final sample consisted of a total of 3353 startups. The questionnaire was sent to the startups six times between 9 May and 15 December 2021. It contained, besides the basic demo-graphic questions, nine questions related to the topic: five closed and four open ques-tions. The information was measured on a 5-point Likert scale where a score of 1 indi-cated not at all important and a score of 5 indicated a very important responsibility.

One hundred and fifty-two respondents participated in the survey but fifty-five contained only partial completions and were therefore disregarded. In total this re-sulted in a final questionnaire sample of 97 completions for startups under 10 years old with a ratio of 2.89 per cent. The completion rates were 2.27-3.53 percent of the final per country. Of the ninety-seven respondents 20 represented Czech (3,53 percent), 47 Hungarian (3.07 percent), 24 Polish (2.27 percent) and 6 Slovak enterprises (3.12 per-cent) (Table 3).

3. Table The sample of the V5 startup survey 2021.

Country of origin           CB registered startups (founded 2011-2021)       Sample startups               Responses         Response ratio (%)

Country of origin	CB registered startups (founded 2011-2021)	Sample startups	Responses	Response ratio (%)
Czech Republic	2893	567	20	3.53
Hungary	2137	1537	47	3.07
Poland	3973	1057	24	2.27
Slovakia	1099	192	6	3.12
Total	14610	3353	97	2.89

 

Source: Own compilation.

The questionnaire data were processed using Microsoft Excel (Microsoft, (2016), Redmond, Washington: Microsoft) and IBM SPSS (IBM Corp., 2016, IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.). Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the characteristics of the respondents, to compare startups in Hungary and other V4 countries. Chi-square, Fisher's exact tests and Mann-Whitney tests were applied. The Mann-Whitney U test (also known as the Wilcoxon rank sum test) tests for differences between two groups on a single, ordinal variable with no specific distribution. In con-trast, the independent samples t-test, which is also a test of two groups, requires the single variable to be measured at the interval or ratio level, rather than the ordinal level, and to be normally distributed [83,84]. The characteristics of the sample are pre-sented in Table 4.

4. Table Characteristics of respondents and their startups in Hungary and other

Visegrad countries (Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia)

 

	Chategory	Hungarian respodents	Other V4 (Czech. Polish and Slovak ) respondents	Total responses
		%	%	%
	Femal	21.3%	24%	22.7%
Gender	Male	78.7%	76%	77.3%
Age	21-29 years	17%	12%	14.4%
	30-39 years	27.7%	50%	39.2%
	40-49 years	42.6%	30%	36.1%
	less than 20 years	2.1%	0%	1%
	more than 50 years	10.6%	8%	9.3%
Education	Secondary school	23.4%	14%	18.5%
	College degree (BSc)	31.9%	36%	34%
	University degree (MSc)	34%	44%	39.2%
	Doctoral school (PhD)	10.6%	6%	8.2%
Management Studies	Yes	68.1%	48%	57.7%
	No	31.9%	52%	42.3%
Founded Startup before	Yes	27.9%	34%	28.9%
	No	72.1%	66%	63.9%
Number of Founders	1	15.8%	8.1%	12%
	2	26.3%	27%	26.6%
	3	42.1%	29.7%	36%
	4	2.6%	16.2%	9.3%
	5	7.9%	8.1%	8%
	More than 5.	5.3%	10.8%	8%
Sales revenue in 2020 (Euro)	100 001 -500 000 EURO	17.1%	25.7%	21.43%
	30 001 - 100 000 EURO	8.6%	5.7%	7.15%
	500 001 - 1000 000 EURO	5.7%	8.6%	7.14%
	Below 30 000 EURO	34.3%	34.3%	34.29%
	Over 1000 000 EURO	8.6%	5.7%	7.14%
	No sales revenue	25.7%	20%	22.86%

Source: Own compilation.

Based on the work of Kézai & Rechnitzer [85] respondents were grouped by their main activity according to the Hungarian Unified Sectoral Classification System (TEÁOR’08) into four groups of activities that are important for urban development. Of the respondents, 49.03% were engaged in science, research and development, 37.3% in market services, 9.3% in media and publishing and 4% in arts (design, creative economy or other artistic activities).

3.3 The semi-structured interviews

The qualitative data collection involved ten semi-structured interviews based on the work of Babbie [86]. The selection of participants was not based on mathemati-cal-statistical representativeness but rather on the richness of potential data and therefore subjects were selected using a snowball method. The selection of suitable in-terviewees was aided by presentations at local startup events in 2022. In-depth inter-views with experts were recorded on a Google Meet platform. Table 5 summarizes the interviewees and their main characteristics.

5. Table Respondents of the semi-structured interviews

 

Expert	Position	Startup location	Hungarian Sectoral Classification of Economic Activities (TEÁOR’08)
1	Founder	Balatonszárszó	2571 Manufacture of cutlery
2	Co-founder	Budapest	6206 Computer operation
3	Founder	Budapest	Non-profit association for the development of the startup ecosystem
4	Founder	Budapest	6201 Computer programming
5	Manager	Budapest	6619 Other financial activities
6	Manager	Budapest	6201 Computer programming
7	Co-founder	Budapest	6201 Computer programming
8	Co-founder	Budapest	5610 Restaurant and mobile food service activities
9	Co-founder	Budapest	6209 Other information technology services
10	Founder	Debrecen	7111 Architectural engineering
11	Founder	Győr	7112 Engineering activities. technical consultancy
12	Founder	Győr	7112 Engineering activities
13	Founder	Győrújbarát	6201 Computer programming
14	Founder	Hédervár	7420 Photography
15	Founder	Hódmezővásárhely	7219 Other scientific and technical research and development
16	Co-Founder	Lovas	9003 Creative arts
17	Founder	Mosonmagyaróvár	1624 Manufacture of storage wood products
18	Manager	Nagytarcsa	6201 Computer programming
19	Co-founder	Pannonhalma	1089 Manufacture of other food products
20	Founder	Pécs	6311 Data processing. web hosting activities
21	Co-founder	Solymár	6651 Wholesale of computers and software
22	Founder	Szeged	7112 Engineering activities

 

Source: Own compilation

In accordance with a constructivist approach to interviewing, active interviewing was chosen [87]. The interview subjects and the interviewer create meaning as equal partners, participating together in the creation of knowledge in a so-called travelling interview [87]. The interviewee has the opportunity to ask back and the interviewer, avoiding focusing on their own interpretation, has the opportunity to reinterpret on-the-spot answers that may not be clear [88].

The interview thread was structured around ten questions, which can be found in Appendix B. A transcript of the 45–60-minute online interviews were produced and the ad hoc analysis method from Brinkmann & Kvale [88] was used to analyze the transcript. Instead of a specific procedure we developed our own analysis method that fits the research topic. We interpreted the information given during the interview in the context of what was already known and what became known during the analysis i.e., the actors' perspectives met the interpretations of other interviewees and also those of the analyst [88].

We applied an intra coding approach to the analysis, carried out a one-by-one analysis and summary interpretation of the interviews, and then organized the inter-views according to eleven non-exclusive categories. The initial categories were derived from the interview questions, and some categories even emerged from the interviews. Finally, the directions were combined to search for and summarize the meanings [89].”

 

Point 2: 2. The structure of paper needs to be restructured. For instance, research questions are presented in methodology and the format of the table needs to be improved too.

Response 2: We proved the structure:

“The first part of the paper summarizes the different interpretations of business re-silience with a specific focus on startups. It then presents the study area, the Hungari-an startup ecosystem based on the Startupblink international ranking [23] and the business protection measures in the investigated area. The second part examines the crisis resilience of startups through an online survey of startup entrepreneurs in the Visegrad countries and in-depth interviews with experts (N=22). The study concludes by identifying future research directions based on the findings of the research. The main finding of the paper is that the crisis resilience of startups shows fundamental sectoral differences. The crisis has brought about a cleansing among startups.

The paper is structured as follows: the second part of the study is a literature re-view. Section 3 presents the study area and the research methodology, and Section 4 presents the results of the survey, the in-depth interviews. Section 5 provides the dis-cussion and presents the conclusion, with several research suggestions.”

 

Point 3: 3. Language editing is a must

Response 3: We have used native language edition, to correct the article.

 

 

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you very much for your support. We made changes according to your suggestions.

Best regards,

The authors.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

In my opinion, the revised version of the work is unsuitable for publication. Although the authors tried to refer to my comments, they did not succeed in every case. I have not received answers to the questions in points 2, 3, 4, and 5. The authors write something, but it does not answer the questions posed. I believe that the work is descriptive, not research. Therefore, I think the work in its current form is unsuitable for publication in a scientific journal.

Author Response

Reviewer 1_2^nd round review

Dear Reviewer 1!

Thank you very much for time and effort, to support us, to correct our paper. We accepted all your comments and suggestions, and kept developing our paper according to them. We added additional literature review on the topic ‘startup resilience’, added a few more recent scientific literature, clarified the aim of the research and corrected all mentioned suggestions.

Thank you very much for your kind support in the entire procedure. Here you find your previous comments and our overworked and extended answers to each point:

Point 2: [in.93] whether the second part of the study is a review of the literature, it should probably be a discussion of the results and confirmation of the conducted research. At the end of the introduction, I expect a clear definition of the purpose of the work.

Response 2/2.

Our aim with this study has not changed but we would like to say thank you to highlight some points that need to clarify. We would like to make the change in the following way. Hopefully, it can make to understand the purpose of the paper:

„Since entrepreneurship is one of the most crucial factors of economic development [1], the latest research on entrepreneurial ecosystems has gained strength, but it has barely been applied to the Visegrad countries. This research sheds light on the crisis re-silience of startup companies in Hungary. It is crucial to stimulate innovative startup activity in Hungary to increase the countries’s long term visibility and competitiveness in long term in the Central-Eastern European region [2].

In the 21st century the sudden changes in the external environment caused by COVID-19 or lately the Russian-Ukrainian war have had an unprecedentedly severe impact on the economy as well as society in general [3]. The crisis has caused signifi-cant economic damage worldwide [4]. Since WHO [5,6] announced the pandemic in-creasing public attention has been paid to the dangers of economic and social crises [7]. Cities, counties and countries were placed under total lockdown in a matter of days or weeks. These lockdowns were measures on an unprecedented scale in comparison to those taken during previous pandemics, such as the Spanish flu [8].

Thus, macroeconomic factors influence the development of startups globally [9]. Although all industries feel the consequences of crises, startups, that are younger than 10 years, feature highly innovative technologies and/or business models and strive for significant employee and/or sales growth [10], are among the most vulnerable among economic actors and are currently still facing a number of unexpected challenges - re-duced production and/or demand - from both a corporate and organizational perspec-tive [11]. They strongly feel the negative consequences of the recent events and were exposed to the strong external and unexpected pressures for which they were not pre-pared [12,13]. These enterprises must also currently face the negative consequences on national economies, caused by what seems to the worst geopolitical crisis in recent history [14].

Thus, resilience research is highly desirable as it addresses the urgency to investigate vulnerable situations in which enterprises act [15,16,17] and as Aldianto et al. [4] stated, the concept of business resilience studies in startups is still limited. As Saad [17] calls for more research related to this topic utilizing survey-based methods, to provide more generalizable empirical evidence and to help to create more clarity on blurred issues.

Therefore, recent studies explore the crisis and shock resilience of Hungarian startups, as well as the impact of the crisis caused by the coronavirus that was raging at the time of the research on startups. Hence, studying Hungarian startups in the Visegrad coun-tries(V4) is relevant for these reasons:

• Startups are very fragile and hard-to-find. This is particularly true in a post-socialistic Central and Eastern European country like Hungary, character-ized by a young startup ecosystem, where, unlike in the Western European and Anglo-Saxon ecosystems, long term time series are not available for studying startup businesses [18].
• The research area is the V4, as these countries are, because of their historical past, the main reference group for comparative studies [19,20,21,22,23,24,25]. The strengths of the Visegrad countries included the potential of startups, in addition to internationalization and product innovation [2].
• Considering the high failure rate among startups [26] and the atmosphere of the Hungarian startup ecosystem, as well as the economic crisis in recent years, many entrepreneurs starting their business face failure or serious crisis. Thus, investi-gating the dimensions of entrepreneurs’s resilience and its nature among Hun-garian startups is vital.
• Despite the fact that Hungary (4.5) according to Hungary National Entrepre-neurship Context Index (NECI) – characterizing the entrepreneurial ecosystem – ranks in the lower-middle segment of the business ecosystems in Europe (the Cen-tral and Eastern European region has an average score of 4.2) with Hungary’s en-trepreneurial ecosystem scoring the highest within the region [27], the Hungarian startup ecosystem has registered a decline in rank (Budapest, the capital of Hun-gary, decreased by double digits) based on the Startupblink report [28].
• The study presents the state of startups and the contemporary Hungarian startup ecosystem. It aims to explore the changes in innovative startups as a result of the crisis and to provide direction for the post-crisis economic recovery, which sup-ports innovative startup needs to contribute to the development of the regional economy again with their positive results.”

Point 3: [In. 80-82] Is this the aim of the work? How does this relate to the work title?

Response 3/2.

Thank you very much for your suggestion and helping questions. We changed and reworked the entire introduction, literature review and disscussion & conclusion parts, so we hope now it can make to understand the purpose of the paper:

„•           The study presents the state of startups and the contemporary Hungarian startup ecosystem. It aims to explore the changes in innovative startups as a result of the crisis and to provide direction for the post-crisis economic recovery, which sup-ports innovative startup needs to contribute to the development of the regional economy again with their positive results.

The focus of the research in on the crisis resilience of Hungarian startups, mainly to explore the most typical parameters and characteristics of Hungarian startups and their surrounding ecosystem. The paper aims to investigate the critical events faced by startups founders in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequently, the Russian-Ukrainian war, and how they reacted to protect their startups. Based on this, the following research questions were formulated:

RQ1: What are the characteristics of Hungarian startups after the crisis?

RQ2: How has the coronavirus crisis affected Hungarian startups?

The research aims to prove the following hypothesis:

H: Resilience to crisis and shocks varies in Hungary and the V4 countries”

Point 4: [Chapter 2.1] How is resilience about? It should be explicitly defined.

Response 4/2.  

We extanded this literature review part, please check it out as we put down some words about the psychological roots and a systemized table about the startup and business relevance of resilience. Thanks for your criticism we also agree that this development of the literature review helps to understand the role of resilience:

“Literature review

This section presents the main theoretical components regarding the impact of business resilience with a focus on startup enterprises, then the startups surrounding the startup ecosystem (the Hungarian ecosystem) and last but not least, business protection measures in the V4 countries.

2.1 Resilience with a focus on startup companies

In the 21^st century the biggest challenge of the information age is how we are able to domesticate the ‘unstable chaos’ to ‘fertile anarchy’; the ability that makes this possible is called ‘resilience’ [29]. The concept of resilience was spread in psychology in the 1950s, and the past decades it has taken many different forms. Resilience means the ability to be resilient, the ability to cope with challenges [29]. Resilience in general is demonstrated after an event or crisis occurs [30], while business resilience enables organizations to quickly adapt to disruptions while maintaining sustainable business operations and protecting people, assets, and overall brand equity [31]. It also means the capacity for companies to survive, adapt and grow in the face of turbulent change [32]. A variety of research studies use and define the concept of resilience; however, the definition used varies depending on the focus of each article [17,33]. Several articles examine business resilience, but just a few papers focus on startup resilience.

We conducted systematic literature review based on the following key words: startup, resilience, crisis, COVID and pandemic in the database Web of Science and Google Scholar. Table 1 summarizes the major challenges, the examined sectors/industries, the measures and the examined geographical areas of the recent topic.

Table 1 The implications of the crisis for startups

Major challenges of startups	Examined sector/industry	Measures to encourage recovery	Examined geographical area	Literature
Digitalization	Tourism	Economic stimulus packages	113 countries	Okafor et al. [34]
Finance	Software industry	Strategy (metrics)	Literature review	Kemmel et al. [35]
	Several industries	New business model	USA	Kenney et al. [36]
		Policies facilitating access to credit	Italy	Castado [37]
		Policy recommendations for recovery	Canada	Croteau et al [38]
	(Renewable) Energy sector	Assisting policies & respond to financial needs	Israel	Pilloni et al. [39]
Management	Tourism	Financial measures	Poland	Olsewszki [40]
	Several industries		Indonesia	Aldianto et al. [4]
		Strategy	Poland	Sady [7]
			India	Davis & Thilagaraj [11]
			Germany	Haase & Eberl [33]
		Counseling as personal development attempt	Iran	Yousefian Arani et al. [26]
		Sustainable business reconstruction	Romania	Foris et al [14]
Networking	Techindustry	Enterprise framework	Global	Budden et al. [41]
Resilience factors	Agriculture	Policy recommendations for recovery	Italy	Paoloni et al. [42]
	Transportation	Networking (collaboration)	Poland	Skala [43]
	Several industries	Lack of research	Literature review	Saad et al. [17]
		Management	Brasil	Mota et al. [44]
		Strategy	Indonesia	Ridho et al. [9]
		New opportunities & directions	Germany	Kuckertz et al. [12,45]
		Policy recommendations for recovery	Hungary	Kézai & Konczosné Szombathelyi [46]
			Hungary	Csákné et al. [27]
Supplier management; Finance	Logistics	Factors affecting supplier selection	India	Sreenivasan et al. [47]
Sustainability factors	Several industries	Strategic management	Czechia	Naděžda et al. [48]
Uncertainty (risk)		Communication	Global	Sharma et al. [13]

Source: Own compilation.

The literature review highlighted the major challenges of the startups in sectors and industries, as well as the suggested measures to encourage recovery. The issues faced by startups are digitalization, finance, management, networking, risk, sustainability factors and diverse resilience factors. At the same time, the measures to increase the recovery are suggestions and recommendations for financial support, management, strategy, new business models, networking, communication and counselling, which could lead to strengthening the resilience of startups to achieve recovery in the post-crisis-period.”

Additionaly we changed the conclusion and the discussioin according to the new literature review.

Point 5: [v.112-117] of this part I needed help understanding for what purpose the authors write about it and what this paragraph is about.

Response 5/2:

We extended the literature review part to clarify the role of this part. As we have much more background info and data sometimes it is hard to write the right sentence which makes our message understandable. So as you point out the weakness of this part we reworked it like this:

„It is irrefutable that new companies using digital technologies, i.e., competitors from outside the industry, are emerging in traditional industries, and these startups are creating serious competition, and sometimes even displacing the former leaders of traditional industries by upturning the parameters and characteristics of competition [49]. To sum up, startups can be described as a subgroup of SMEs — young, innovative companies addressing global markets based on technological, process or business mod-el innovation [43.48,50,51]. They differ from large companies in terms of their organi-zational structure, leadership style, reactions to the environment, available resources and the internal context in which they operate [52,53] especially due to the fact that startup companies lack expertise, resources, funding, and technology [54].

In today's knowledge-based economy, innovation is seen as the driving force of the economy. The high risk inherent in innovation means that inventions are brought to market by formalized organizations, mainly startups [55]. In the post-crisis period, the re-launch of the economy should take into account that the development of startups and innovation ecosystems is not just one of many opportunities for society, but rather an obligation [56]. As the presence of a dominant startup ecosystem can enhance economic diversification [41], it can facilitate the emergence of a more sus-tainable stock of foreign capital (foreign direct investment) even if startup investment cannot be a serious competitor to a manufacturing project in any category. The im-portance of startups lies in knowledge sharing and talent attraction. Startups create new opportunities that traditional industries which have collapsed in the crisis are currently unable to provide. Startups can also ensure the presence of the large compa-nies of the future [57] As the FDI-Center aptly put it: "if you can't convince Google to locate in your country convince the Google of the future to open its first international office in your country.” [58] “If these companies expand, the investment location will benefit more and more from their presence." [58:9]. In order to achieve these ambitions i.e., catalyzing knowledge-based economic development and innovation ecosystems, building higher education institutions as knowledge hubs will take on a new, promi-nent role in the coming years [59]. To sum up the scientific literature the issue of "startup resilience" is a timely and topical one.”

Thank you very much in advance!

Best regards,

the authors

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 3

Reviewer 1 Report

The work is fit for publication in its current form, but I think the nature of the work surveys paper more than research.

Author Response

Reviewer 1_3^nd round review

Dear Reviewer 1!

We would like to say thank you very much for your entire support during the reviewing procedure. You give us a great guideline, on how to adjust and expand our paper, to succeed to present the results of our research on this topic starting resilience in Hungary. We all know, that in the scientific era, the research topic startup is still a divisive and new topic.

Research on this topic is essential in a post-socialistic Central and Eastern European country like Hungary, characterized by a young startup ecosystem, where, unlike in the Western European and Anglo-Saxon ecosystems, long-term time series are not available for studying startup businesses. In times of crisis, it is especially important for companies to adjust themself to the sudden changes in the external environment to be able to survive.  Startups are among the most vulnerable among economic actors and are currently still facing a number of unexpected challenges they were not prepared because they are too new, and they do not have the relevant organizational culture and experience. Therefore, conducting research on their resilience’s highly desirable.

Thank you very much for your time and effort, to support us, to correct our paper. We accepted all your comments and suggestions and kept developing our paper according to them. We added an additional literature review on the topic ‘startup resilience’, added a few more recent pieces of literature, clarified the aim of the research and corrected all mentioned suggestions.

Thank you very much for your kind support!

Best regards,

the authors