Entrepreneurial opportunities emerge and dissipate over time, yet little is known about how and why they vary in their ephemerality and what the implications of temporal variance are for the optimal timing of entrepreneurial action. Building on the actualization theory of opportunity and signal processing theory, we propose that profit possibilities exist in the convolution of consumer desire, technical feasibility, and economic viability of an innovation. Conceiving consumer desire – a necessary ingredient of any profit opportunity – as consisting of fleeting or enduring consumer preferences and fixed or variable consumer expectations, we identify four possible distributions of consumer desire over time. We then show how the interaction of these distributions with technical feasibility functions produces a temporal typology of entrepreneurial opportunities. Our analysis suggests that, despite sharing conceptual similarities in structure, each type of opportunity emphasizes a different form of asymmetry across opportunity categories, which is likely to differentially affect the optimal timing of entrepreneurial action. We conclude by pointing out how considerations of time facilitate the move away from fruitless philosophical debates and toward a more theoretically nuanced and empirically informative view of the concept.

创业机会随着时间的推移而出现和消失，但人们对它们短暂性如何以及为何变化以及时间变化对创业行动最佳时机的影响知之甚少。基于机会实现理论和信号处理理论，我们提出利润可能性存在于消费者愿望、技术可行性和创新的经济可行性的卷积中。将消费者欲望（任何利润机会的必要组成部分）视为由短暂或持久的消费者偏好以及固定或可变的消费者期望组成，我们确定了消费者欲望随时间的四种可能分布。然后，我们展示这些分布与技术可行性函数的相互作用如何产生创业机会的时间类型。我们的分析表明，尽管在结构上具有概念上的相似性，但每种类型的机会都强调机会类别之间不同形式的不对称性，这可能会对创业行动的最佳时机产生不同的影响。最后，我们指出对时间的考虑如何促进人们摆脱徒劳的哲学辩论，转向对概念进行更细致入微、经验丰富的观点。这可能会对创业行动的最佳时机产生不同的影响。最后，我们指出对时间的考虑如何促进人们摆脱徒劳的哲学辩论，转向对概念进行更细致入微、经验丰富的观点。这可能会对创业行动的最佳时机产生不同的影响。最后，我们指出对时间的考虑如何促进人们摆脱徒劳的哲学辩论，转向对概念进行更细致入微、经验丰富的观点。