Challenges and prospects of youth start-up movement research as a new trend of Russian entrepreneurship development

The number of startups and the amount of their fundings have been recently increasing in the face of the rise of inefficient and shortly operating enterprises. The trend is accompanied by general slowdown in the financial results of economic entities1 and the distrust preservation to the startup industry. The issue concerning the purpose of startups: whether they are simply trends or are purposefully created to achieve economic and social indicators in future is acute.

Young people are traditionally considered to be the most creative and active part of the society that is able to participate in economic activity of the country or a region more efficiently. It is the youth that easily adopts something new and is responsible for risks typical for any startup project. The provided statistics proves it. The international trend is that startups are mainly created by graduates of higher education institutions. And in this case Russia is not an exeption as according to the Academy of projects Farminers that accepted 926 aplication forms from IT-startups from different regions in 2011 to receive investments the agerage age of a staruper is 26–30 years old and only 8% of applicants are older than 35 years old2. The study of the Russian market of innovation entrepreneurship by Startup Barometer conducted in 2017 revealed the similar data: the funders of Russian startups are 30–32

years old3. In this regard we may speak about the “youth” character of the startup movement in Russia.

The importance to study startup movement in Russian is caused by many reasons.

So, today the scale of the startup movement of the Russian young people, who seek to create their own successful startup company, is increasing. The extension of this economic phenomenon is confirmed by several facts.

Firstly, despite the fact that the startup movement appeared in Russia with the usual delay, the ideas were enthusiastically accepted. So, more than 160 different incubators and accelerators have appeared in more than 80 cities of the country for the last 9 years. They were oriented not only on the Internet environment, but also on the production sector, which is the most important for Russia today4. They were created not only with the help of the government, but also by private organizations: almost every city has at least 2 incubators – one developed by a municipality or a corporation and the second one by a large university. When the Resolution of the Russian Federation government “On the state support for the development of innovative infrastructure in federal educational institutions of higher professional education” from 2010 was adopted, business incubators were established in several hundred Russian universities.

Secondly, state authorities strongly believe in startup industry. The term “startup” first appeared in the Russian legislation system in 2013. For example, in the Forecast for the long-term social and economic development of the Russian Federation by 2030 such measures as improving the legal framework, reducing the tax burden, as well as facilitating import and export procedures were recommended as the conditions for startup development in the field of information technologies1. The support of startups became the key target of the management system in a new government program “Digital economy” adopted in July 28, 2017. The document declares “One of the most important tasks of the management system is to support “startups” and small and medium-sized businesses in the development and implementation of digital technologies by means of their information and investment acceleration2.

The activity of the young participation in startups is influenced by the state youth policy implemented through the programtarget approach and the identified priorities, including those affecting the entrepreneurial, innovative and technical activity of young people. The state youth policy is currently implemented through a number of programs and documents including: “Fundamentals of the state youth policy of the Russian Federation for the period up to 2025”3. The document introduces the concept “youth entrepreneurship” and is aimed at the development of the systems that will inform the youth about programs that support the launch of private business; the state program called “Patriotic upbringing of the Russian Federation citizens for 2016–2020”4 determines the opportunities of business community to participate in financial support of the youth policy events, in their initialization, organisation, etc. Other federal programs and projects have less impact on the startup movement. There are also various regional and municipal programs and projects for the implementation of the state youth policy. Content analysis of these documents has led to the conclusion that, however, many programs reflect the objectives of promoting the development of innovative and entrepreneurial potential of young people, but there are no tools and mechanisms aimed at capacity development in general and youth startup projects in particular. The latter are considered to be the most important form of realization of the potential of young people.

Besides, the state directly and indirectly spends millions of budget money on the maintenance and strengthening of the infrastructure that forms and develops entrepreneurial intentions (support and regulation authorities, business development institutions: accelerators, incubators, etc.). This fact indicates the growing interest to the startup movement on the behalf of the government.

Thirdly, the number of young people who are involved in the startup movement is sharply increasing in Russia. Businessincubators and accelerators have been existing for several decades in the Western countries. The first accelerator was Y Combinator created by Paul Graham in 2005 and that is still popular. Since its inception 566 projects have benefited from its services. Indicators of one of the largest Russian accelerators – the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (IIDF), demonstrate that more than 8,500 projects participating in the Fund programs have been involved in the startup movement1. If we consider that each startup project on average consists of 3 people, only the IIDF attracted 25,500 people to the startup community. Given the existence of an online version of this accelerator, it can be concluded that it has a significant potential to increase entrepreneurial activity among young people.

Fourthly, the number of events organized for startups is increasing. Thus, according to Xpir – the information and analytical service for support of research and development, at least 362 events took place throughout the country for potential and existing startups in 2015, and 580 events have been organized for the first half of 2016².

Startup Village has been one of the most important and the largest specialized event in Russia and Eastern Europe held on the basis of Skolkovo Innovation Centre in 2018. It is both a competition and presentation of start-up projects to investors and visitors of the exhibition. This event was attended by approximately 500 companies, including more than 200 startups. Moreover, the exhibition was attended by approximately 10,000 guests (representatives of authorities, development institutions, science, education and active citizens, especially young people). Representatives of Chamber of Commerce and Industry from Germany, Italy, Switzerland, etc. have become the guests of the event. Keynote speeches concerning the peculiarities of transfer technology, activity of hubs and other platforms for innovation introduction and startup development organized on cluster, substructures and techno-parks basis have been made.

About 200 startups were presented at the open platform Skolkovo. They were presented by a founder or participant of a startup. In addition, “stress tests” were organized for startups and all interested parties could participate in there. One of the main events was a startup competition. Startups were divided into 2 categories: the first category included early stage projects with a business idea of a product but they did not have a ready-made financial model; the second one included projects of late stages that have a financial model and, as a rule, the first sales of an innovative product. The stage also included projects that have long-term statistics of the implementation of their product as an indicator of success rate. Startup representatives were given 5‒7 minutes for presentation. The projects were assessed by a group of experts from different fields: business, media, Skolkovo and the IIDF experts, etc.

During sessions one could get acquainted with the cases of various companies containing the strategy of entering the foreign markets, in particular the markets of China and the United States. If we divide the number of presented startups by the number of regions of the Russian Federation, it turns out that on average almost 6 startups were in each region. This fact indicates the lack of active participation of startups in the event.

The event was unique as it provided everyone an opportunity to ask business experts from different branches questions and to get contacts of accelerators, consulting companies from different countries that help to launch a startup. The speeches at the Startup Village were more motivational and informative as the meetings were aimed at telling where and with what tools the business community is supported in different countries.

At the same time nowadays despite the positive dynamics of youth involvement in startup projects, issues related to the analysis of motives for participation in the startup movement, the reasons for leaving the startup community and the consequences for an individual and the economy in general remain poorly investigated. In this regard the purpose of the article is to provide socio-economic analysis of the nature of the startup movement, to develop methodological and methodical tools to identify the causes, problems and consequences of the phenomenon development that will allow us develop more effective mechanisms for its promotion in Russia.

Theoretical approaches to the study of the startup concept as a new trend of entrepreneurship development

With reference to the research object the problem readiness can be analyzed with two approaches: the first approach includes the presence of studies devoted to startup and startup movement; the second one concerns the development of interest to the startup movement in practical-oriented and popular scientific literature.

With the regard to the first approach it should be noted that first of all foreign researchers have made a significant contribution to the study of startups. Analysis of the existing definitions of the term “startup” and the chronology of their appearance shows that the concept of “startup” is a relatively young scientific category (Tabl.).

The term “a startup” was introduced into business practice in 1939 in the USA but the interest to the concept emerged in 1970 in the UK, and the term was widely discussed in scientific literature only in the 1990s. In Russian practice the concept is mainly considered as manufacturability whereas in foreign literature innovativeness is not a key criterion of a startup. According to foreign scholars the crucial indicator of startup is its orientation towards a significant growth of business.

Theoretical approaches to the definition of the startup concept

Startup definition	Author(s)	Main differences
Startup is temporary structure necessary for searching a reproducible and scalable business-model	Steve Blanck, 2011 [1]	Limited nature of startup companies’ activity in time, its focus on a business model as a conceptual description of entrepreneurial activity is highlighted
Startup is an organisation that develops a new product or service in terms of significant uncertainty	Eric Reis, 2014 [2]	Significant role of uncertainty factor in a startup company activity is stressed
Startup is a company that works at the problem with unobvious decision and the success is not guaranteed	Ganefi Robi Tanzil, 2016 [3]	Attention is focused on solution of nontrivial problems in the absence of a guaranteed commercial success

In our study the term “a startup” is comprehended as it is considered in foreign literature. It is an economic agent (both functioning and potential) characterised by or possessing a significant potential for high business growth rate for a short period of time by introducing qualitative novelty at the market and operating in terms of high risk and significant uncertainty.

To understand the main points of a startup we suggest to systematize the reasons of the startup rise using research results and considering conventional motives of an individual’s entrepreneur intentions to develop his/her own business. The reasons widely accepted in scientific literature are an entrepreneur’s self-efficiency [4‒6], an individual’s beliefs in entrepreneurship that form his/her business activity (the theory of planned behaviour) [7], the behaviour is affected by personal features and situation factors [8]. Besides, a research interest decrease to the study of the motives for independence, self-dependence or financial self-sufficiency of startups in favour of psychological factors associated with a change in the attitude to him/herself or to the world has been currently observed [9; 10]. The reasons for the startup development that have been highlighted by scholars seem to require empirical verification in terms of contemporary Russian conditions for the startup movement. The classification of these reasons among young people should also be done. Another research area that is also connected to the startup investigation concerns the assessment of values and cultural features of young people involved in entrepreneurship [11‒14]. The scientific interest to this particular age group is caused by the following reasons: young people have increased risk taking due to the lack of large financial commitments, high creative potential and a non-standard view on the systemic problems solution. In addition, young people when having more free time may access to the benefits of a university environment where special attention is paid to learning and research.

Besides, studies that assess the role of startup companies in the economic development of Russia should be mentioned [15‒16]. Unfortunately we should admit that currently there are not enough fundamental studies that systematically characterize the current or potential place of the startups both in the Russian business environment and in the structure of the national economy. The available studies mainly indicate the signs of the startup industry that is considered to be the emerging economic phenomenon and highlight the existing challenges. Thus, the most popular Russian studies currently refer to the issues of marketing tools for the startup development [17‒20] and different programs and training courses that teach students the startup development technologies [21‒23]. It is quite symbolic that the researchers’ interest to marketing aspects turned out to be higher than that paid to the main points and meaning of the startup companies. Though, without verified methodological basis the tools for startup promotion can not be quite efficient. In the view of the above mentioned facts we may conclude that the main research directions of a startup as an economic phenomenon, the importance of startups for the economy and their role in the formation of professional entrepreneurial qualities of initiative subjects of the economy in general are not considered deeply enough in the Russian scientific literature.

Despite this fact it should be noted that several major research centres have been recently developed in the Russian economic science. Entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial intentions, the problems concerning the potential of young people in terms of readiness for innovation, entrepreneurship, technical activities and the interests of young people to sa tartup are investigated there.

Let us study the achievements of these scientific schools in details.

The Entrepreneur Centre of St. Petersburg State University1 is represented by G.V. Shirokova, T.V. Tsukanova, etc. the scholars who investigated the youth entrepreneurship. The studies of these scientists are devoted to the analysis of a family role for the formation of entrepreneurial intentions to organize a startup, the factors of formation of entrepreneurial activity and entrepreneurial spirit of students have been investigated in the studies. The role of social networks at various stages of development of startup companies has been also considered there [24]. Despite the fact that the methodological foundations of the startup research have not been directly considered in the works of the representatives of the centres, these studies are quite interesting as they concern fundamental basis for the development of entrepreneurial activity of an individual.

The scientific and training laboratory of entrepreneurship study of Higher School of Economics is presented by the works by A.Yu. Chepurenko, A.B. Dukhon [25] and other scientists. The studies are devoted to interdisciplinary study of the entrepreneurial potential of the Russian society, diagnosis and analysis of entrepreneurial activity of the population2 [26]. The studies conducted by the laboratory forms an important component of studying the nature of startups using an interdisciplinary approach. However, they

Сhallenges and prospects of youth start-up … mostly focus on the use of sociology methods, therefore, only some particular aspects of the development of startup companies are studied, e.g. the importance of network interactions that are formed in business incubators for startups.

A.L. Zhuravleva [27], V.P. Poznyakova [28], E.D. Dorofeeva, etc, ‒ the scientists working at the Laboratory of Social and Economic Psychology of the Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences study motives that affect the choice of business activity. They investigate psychological relationships and business activity of its entities and social and psychological features of economic consciousness of Russian entrepreneurs, etc. [30]. However it should be emphasized that interdisciplinary psychological researches are not totally focused on the study of the phenomenon of the startup movement: startups are not an object, but rather an illustration of a social group in the existing works. The phenomenon is considered to be an example of a variety of entrepreneurial activities with a more pronounced willingness to change.

The Ural Social and Economic School of Small Business Problem Research at the Institute of Economics of the Ural branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences is an example of a regional scientific school. It is presented by the following scholars: academician A.S. Frants, E.L. Andreeva, A.I. Tatarkin, O.A. Romanova, A.V. Ivanova, A.G. Shelomentsev, V.N. Arkhangel'skii E.M. Kozakov,, E.S. Mezentseva,. The works that are devoted to the management of value-oriented factors of business culture development attract a particular interest there [31]; the studies concerning social and economic opportunities for the development of small business, especially in single-industry territorial entities of the industrial type [32] and the problems of development and evaluation of the entrepreneurial infrastructure of the region and the metropolis [33]. In addition, the main areas of the studies by the Ural Social and Economic School of Small Business Problem Research include the assessment of social and economic efficiency of small business, taking into account both quantitative and qualitative parameters; determining the actual and expected performance, identifying problems of small business on the basis of diagnosis of the current state and assessment of prospects for its development [34, p. 49‒97]. Despite the systematic study of the peculiarities of economic activity of innovation-oriented economic agents, the study of startups was not an independent direction of scientific investigations conducted by scholars from the Ural Social and Economic School of Small Business Problem Research at the Institute of Economics of the Ural branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences until the present study that was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research.

There are also scientific communities that have been investigating themes adjoining to startup for a long time, in particular the origin of youth movements. For example a number of publications by I.M. Il'inskii [35] and V.I. Lukov [36] (Moscow University for the Humanities) is devoted to the role and potential of the youth involvement in organized youth movements, including innovative and entrepreneurial activities of the society. It is considered to be one of the key tasks of the state youth policy. The involvement is organized by the creation of conditions and incentives for the youth to solve their own problems, the development of their innovative potential for socio-economic and political progress of Russian society. The works by V.T. Lisovskii concern the same theme. He analyzed the dynamics of social changes in the youth environment considering the experience of comparative sociological studies devoted to the Russian young people [37, p. 52]. A.A. Afonenko and N.D. Il'enkova studied the startup peculiarities, K.G. Zainudinov investigated the types and main features of startup companies [38; 39]. D.O. Cherkasov, N.Yu. Saibel' studied the concept characteristics and stages of startup development comparing Russian and foreign scientific experience in the field [40]. At the same time the specific nature of the youth startup movement has not been analysed in the above mentioned works. However general theoretical basis for the comprehension of the youth movement nature has been developed. The study of causes and features of the development of youth startup communities in Russia can be based on this scientific basis.

Finally we may conclude that the results we have obtained while studying the degree of the phenomenon investigating allow us to assert that the studies of some groups of Russian scientists have appeared as a transmission of foreign approaches, while others are the result of the generalization of the Russian experience of the startups origin in Russia, and the domestic scientific concept of startups is still being formed.

Speaking about practically oriented and popular scientific literature that form the interest to startup movement in the society first of all we should mention the following trends and directions popularizing the youth participation in startups: 1) Lean Canvas – tools for strategic management; it allows entrepreneurs briefly describe the new business idea, the project in the form of a system diagram – a business model; the tools were developed by A. Maurya1 The following advantages of the approach as an opportunity to decrease the period of startup uncertainty due to comprehensive analysis of key areas of future business in the business model make the method popular in startup environment; 2) Customer Development toolkit developed by S. Blank suggests a particular approach to the creation and development of new business and it is based on the obligation to check any ideas by clarification of a real demand of a client [1]. The main restriction for practical application of Customer Development toolkit is the complexity to comply with the proposed sequence of its implementation and the complexity of the development of the approach; 3) the tools suggested by E. Ries Lean Startup involves the use of flexible product development, its testing, iterative release to reduce the development cycle, the tracking the result of the market entry and feedback from customers. The flexibility is also achieved due to the development of a minimum viable product. The disadvantage of the latter and two previously mentioned approaches is the fact that all three tools have a common conceptual approach, which is not quite familiar and somewhat contrary to the existing business practice. It means that at the stage of product creation the main goal of the startup is not to create a product and enter the market, but to study a buyer and how he/she interacts with the developed product. In fact this is the basis for the formation of a previously non-existing customer segment.

Thus, taking into account the abovepresented critical analysis of the study of the youth startup movement in foreign and Russian publications, we may conclude that the presence of both research and practice-oriented and popular scientific works does not allow us talking about the presence of scientifically based concept of startups in economic science. Therefore, we have conducted a preliminary sample study and field study of startup companies to form initial ideas about the motives of activities and difficulties that young entrepreneurs – the founders of startups face with in Russia.

Challenges and prospects of youth startup movement development in Russia

T he preliminary results of empirical assessment of the level of the development of

Russian startups are presented in this section. The challenges and restrictions of the startup movement of young people in Russia have been revealed.

Desk surveys and field methods and procedures of data acquisition are more reasonable based on reconnaissance nature of investigation program. Russian startup companies participating in Startup Village – the largest specialized exhibition in Russia and Eastern Europe (Skolkovo Innovation Centre, May 31 – June 1, 2018) have been used as information basis for the research.

The desk stage of the study involved the exploration of startup companies by analyzing their websites. The choice of this object for the analysis allows us to provide a

Сhallenges and prospects of youth start-up … representative coverage for the preliminary study of Russian youth startup companies for their compliance with the main criteria of the “startup” category, formulated by the authors before. In case of compliance these startups may be considered as an object of the research at the field stage as respondents.

Information about 150 youth startup companies participating in the Startup Village Exhibition was selected by means of systematization. It should be noted that the vast majority of the startup founders were young people. The assessment of the websites of the startup companies was carried out according to 3 criteria:

• -    the website represents an innovative product, company, technology, etc.;

• -    the website does not contain information about innovative products and technologies;

• -    the website contains information for potential investors.

Then all investigated companies were divided into 5 groups accoding to the applied technology: the first group included startup companies operating in IT sector (IT cluster), the second one included startup companies operating in biomedicine cluster, the third one included startup companies belonging to the Centre of Collective Use by Skolkovo, the fourth one included startup companies operating in energy efficient technologies, the fifth one included startup companies operating in leading industrial technologies cluster.

While studying the websites of IT-startups we revealed that 3 out of 34 investigated websites had information for an investor (presentation for an investor, which described in detail the problems of not using the product, the results of solving these problems, the market assessment, presented a sales plan, analysis of competitors, the current status of the project, roadmap, the forecast of financial indicators, the term of the investment proposal, the payback period, etc.). 23 websites out of 34 mentioned their innovative technologies and products, 11 websites simply contained information about the provided services or products they sold.

The cluster of biomedicine technologies included 22 startup companies. Only 18 of them were presented in the Internet, the websites of 4 startup companies were developed. Only 3 out of 18 websites did not contain information about innovative developments. And only 2 out of 18 websites had information for investments.

While studying the cluster of companies belonging to the Centre of Collective Use by Skolkovo that united 9 companies at the event we obtained information only for 9 websites and only 2 of them had information about new technologies and products. But unfortunately none of the investigated websites contained information for an investor.

30 companies and 29 websites were investigated in the cluster of energy efficient technologies. 18 websites of the startup companies had the section for innovative products or new developments were mentioned at the web-pages. But we failed to find data, links or sections that contained the information for investors at all 29 websites.

While studying the cluster of leading industrial technologies we revealed that 11 out of 19 websites of the investigated startup companies presented innovative products or technologies, 8 websites introduced the companies, the field of their operation but did not attract the attention to any particular innovations. Only 1 website of the startup company contained information for an investor.

The main conclusions made on the analysis of 109 websites of Russian youth startup companies are presented in Fig. 1.

□ Present «Absent

Fig. 1. Distribution of startup according to the presence of key information on a project website, %

Thus, 69 cases presented information about innovations was, i.e. approximately 63% of companies’ websites mentioned the information about innovations, the product novelty, about new techniques and methods of investigation. Speaking about the information presented for investors we should confirm that only 6 internet resources out of 109 researched websites presented these data, i.e. 5.5% of the total number of the investigated objects.

Considering the above mentioned information we have come to the conclusion that Russian companies are not interested to attract investors online using the websites. Moreover, it is not quite clear whether the startup companies need the investments to increase their market share, to hire new qualified personnel, to refine and promote their product. We can only assume that startup accelerators primarily solve the problem of motivating managers and participants of the startup community, teach how to assess the demand and promote the product.

The field stage of the study involved a preliminary sample expert survey of startup companies previously analyzed during the desk stage of the research. About 200 startup companies were represented at the open platform of Skolkovo. Each project had its own information stand. The participants communicated verbally, they were asked questions about any aspect of the project. The form of the startup-companies selection involved the choice of youth projects (the head or an active member of the startup team should be at the age, as a rule, up to 40 years old). The sample size for the preliminary study is sufficient enough. It included 20 startup companies that were interviewed. As a result, the average age of the main participants-managers of startup projects who took part in the expert survey was 34 years old. Respondents were asked questions to reveal the importance of creating startups for young people and for the government (authorities), as well as to reveal the challenges that startup face with.

The importance of startup companies for the government and how they and their founders are considered by the government is presented in Fig. 2.

Fig. 2. Distribution of respondents’ opinion on the issue: “Is a startup a trend or necessity for the government?”, % of the total number of respondents

According to Fig. 2 most startups (36.8%) believe that they are system necessity for the country development. This may indicate that the vast majority of startup companies rely on the state support, feel that it is necessary and important for them. They are also confident in the need to implement innovative solutions developed in various sectors of the economy. However, the high rate (31.6%) of the second response – “Correspondence to the global trend (trend for the government)” that is opposed to the first one is alarming. The prevalence of this opinion may be dictated by some difficulties in the implementation of the state programs for the development of advanced markets and technologies, which are met by startups. The next response partially concretized the most popular opinion: the respondents answered that a startup was an economic necessity in general, an opportunity to search for strategic solutions in various industries; it was a school of talented personnel, it was a reality to which the government should adapt, it was a driver for small and medium-sized businesses; the possibility of using technologies and products developed by startups (including IT cluster) to improve and solve problems of public administration; it was an opportunity to solve major social problems that were difficult for the government to cope with; it was a global trend that the authorities were trying to correspond to. The significant variation of respondents' answers is explained by the differences in regional innovation policies, in conditions when the stimulation and support of startups is not implemented evenly, and, as a rule, depends on specific persons who are responsible for political decision-making.

The comparable results of the similar question about the meaning of a startup for young people according to the founders or participants of the startup are presented in Fig. 3.

Fig. 3. Distribution of respondents’ opinion on the issue: “Is a startup a trend or necessity for the youth?”, % of the total number of respondents

According to the data presented in Fig. 3 about the importance of startups for young people, whether it is a trend or necessity, a significant part of respondents (26.3%) insisted that a “startip” is a trendy word and the innovation activity existed even before. Besides, the concept was compared with “a new world”, “young people’s vision”,

“the system spread in cities”, i.e. according to the respondents a startup is an exciting area for young people that helps to achieve professional success rapidly.

The responses to the next question allow us to identify the key challenges that prevent the development of startups in Russia (Fig. 4).

Fig. 4. Distribution of respondents’ opinion on the issue: “What are the challenges that lead to startup failures?”, % of the total number of respondents

Considering the responses to the issue about the restrictions of the startup development in Russia we have come to the conclusion that the majority of startups are convinced that Russian entrepreneurs do not have a “faith” in innovations (23.5%). On the one hand, it indicates a low motivation of top management to support innovations, on the other hand, it shows the lack of elaboration of business projects on behalf of startups. The latter is expressed in their doubt to convince the consumer about the benefits of a new product. According to the developers and participants of startups another restrictions that also lead to the startup failure are the development of a product that is not demanded at the market (17.6%); the lack of funding and government support at the early

Fig. 5. Distribution of respondents’ opinion on the issue: “Is the participation of the youth in startups movement widespread?”, % of the total number of respondents

The startups currently assess their movement as not very massive (52.9%). Taking into account this assessment, the prospects of the youth startup movement in Russia while maintaining the current conditions, seem to be restricted in quantitative growth, since the trend for startups among young people is slowly declining. The startup movement is also restrained qualitatively because of the low efficiency and effectiveness stages of projects (17.6%); a wrong business strategy (11.8%); lack of motivation of the team (11.8%); low quality of managerial decisions (11.8%). The respondents have also mentioned the absence of required knowledge among the participants of the startup; they met significant difficulties because of lack of particular skills while applying for the government’s grants, they had to complete a huge amount of documents. They also paid attention to the lack of coordination among all ministries and departments when working in high-tech areas, the low response of the government to the initiatives of startups.

The opinion of startups about the mass character of the startup movement is demonstrated in Fig. 5.

of the startups and the government investment into them.

We strongly believe that in order to extend the current perspectives the key restriction should be overcome. This restriction concerns the separate character of the youth startup movement in Russia, which is spread only within certain communities of young people. For this purpose two problems should be solved: first, to overcome some kind of “closure” of particular startup communities, when participants of local (university, urban movements) do not have an idea about the real number of employees in the startup movement; secondly, to overcome the widespread practice, when the startup movement is concentrated and has a more mass character mainly in the megacities of the Central regions of Russia, and entrepreneurs from peripheral regions do not have an opportunity to participate in the startup community. really

Thus, the conducted study allowed to confirm the importance of the startup movement for its participants and to identify the challenges of development of startup companies in Russia, which involve young people. The prospects of the startup movement of Russian youth have been assessed and the need to develop methodological and methodological tools for a comprehensive socio-economic assessment of the phenomenon has been confirmed.

Conclusion

Young people are becoming the most crucial source of economic and social transformation of the society as it is characterized by a strong desire to search for new opportunities to apply their forces and knowledge. Young people are ready for risk, creativity, innovation, impulsive actions and without these features no startup project can do.

The review of the existing studies to assess the knowledge of the startup movement has revealed that some aspects were studied by foreign and Russian scientists and practitioners. For example, the value and cultural aspects of young people who are focused on entrepreneurship, the factors for formation of entrepreneurial activity and entrepreneurial spirit of students, value-oriented factors of development of entrepreneurial culture of the youth, the role of startup companies in the development of the country's economy have been considered but separately from each other. However, the comprehensive socio-economic assessment of the essence of the youth startup movement has not been done, the factors influencing its qualitative and quantitative characteristics have not been revealed, as well as the causes and consequences of this fairly new phenomenon in entrepreneurship.

From our point of view the main reasons for the absence of studies devoted to social and economic assessment of the startup movement are the lack of adequate empirical data on the results of economic activity of youth startups, the lack of contribution to the economy, the parameters of the effectiveness of public and private investment in the development of youth startups and the lack of methodological apparatus for assessing the activities of startup companies.

While conducting the desk and field studies of the Russian youth startup companies we have come to the conclusion that youth startups in Russia demand for information, consulting and financial support from the government and the society. but the support could be properly provided after a comprehensive social and economic assessment of this phenomenon, which is impossible without the development of methodological and methodological tools for the study of the startup movement phenomenon. For example, one of the possible mechanisms for the development and support of youth startups may be the development of programs and activities of the state youth policy as the basis for the development of technologies for involving young people in the startup movement considering their aptitudes and readiness for entrepreneurship.

The interconnection of economic, social, psychological, cultural and historical aspects of the study of startups, consideration of the most important motives of participation in the startup movement of young people, the study of the social and economic structure of the startup movement, the mechanisms of its stirring up, the reasons for leaving the startup community and the consequences of this phenomenon for an individual and the economy in general seem to be a promising and popular direction for further research.

Acknowledgements

The study was financially supported by Russian Foundation for Basic Research according to the research project No. 18-310-00130.