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This paper introduces the JEMS special issue on immigrant entrepreneurship and mixed embeddedness. The special issue has grown out of an EC-funded programme of networking research entitled 'Working on the Fringes: Immigrant Businesses, Economic Integration and Informal Practices'. Our opening paper provides a contextual overview for the case-study papers which follow. We pay particular attention to the mixed-embeddedness thesis and especially focus on the demand side of the opportunity structures framework which confronts potential immigrant entrepreneurs. We propose a three-level strategy for analysing the opportunity structure and its underlying dynamics, based on national, urban/regional and neighbourhood levels of comparison. In the nal part of the paper, we identify several possible future lines of research.