Entrepreneurs are increasingly integrating artificial intelligence (AI) with their business operations. The rapid obsolescence and development of AI tools implies that AI is not adopted as a one-time event. Rather, AI is pursued continuously by accumulating experience with usage of AI along with assessing potential beneficial versus detrimental impact, and with forecasting the role of AI in business operations in the future. Moreover, the pursuit may be enabled in a systemic context. This study aims at accounting for entrepreneurs’ pursuit of AI as usage, assessment and forecast coupled in the context of ecosystems. A measure of the digital entrepreneurship ecosystem in 35 countries is here combined with a survey of 20,178 randomly sampled entrepreneurs, reporting on engagement with AI. Hierarchical linear modeling reveals that extensive usage leads to favorable assessment, that usage and favorable assessment both lead to optimistic forecasting, and that these effects are enhanced by the development of digital entrepreneurship ecosystems. The findings contribute to an account of entrepreneurs’ pursuit of AI in digital entrepreneurship ecosystems around the world. These insights can guide policymakers in building ecosystems that promote AI-driven entrepreneurship.
