AI capacities and digital entrepreneurship: The moderating role of Fintech entrepreneurial ecosystems and university infrastructure

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping digital entrepreneurship by supporting business decision making, digital planning, customer analysis, and process automation. However, the mechanisms through which students’ perceived AI capacities relate to digital entrepreneurial self-efficacy and digital entrepreneurial intention remain insufficiently theorized. Drawing on Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT), this study examines whether digital entrepreneurial self-efficacy mediates the association between AI capacities and digital entrepreneurial intention, and whether FinTech entrepreneurial ecosystems and university infrastructure condition these relationships. Based on cross-sectional survey data from 1061 higher education students in Vietnam, the results show that AI capacities are positively associated with digital entrepreneurial self-efficacy, which in turn is positively associated with digital entrepreneurial intention. Crowdfunding is associated with a stronger AI capacities–self-efficacy association, whereas mobile payment shows a negative moderating association and blockchain shows no significant moderation. University entrepreneurial environment and entrepreneurial program learning positively—though modestly—moderate the examined associations. Because the study applies an efficacy-centered, partial specification of SCCT to cross-sectional data, all findings are interpreted as associations rather than causal effects. These findings contribute to technology-enabled entrepreneurship research by linking user-centric AI capacities with financial and institutional boundary conditions in an emerging-market context. Practically, the findings suggest that universities, FinTech providers, and policymakers should not treat all digital-finance and institutional supports as uniformly beneficial. Instead, universities should embed applied AI tools within entrepreneurship education, FinTech providers should clarify the strategic business relevance of payment and blockchain tools beyond routine transactions, and policymakers could differentiate support across crowdfunding, mobile payment, and blockchain according to their function for early-stage student ventures.