The success of a city’s entrepreneurial ecosystem (EE) depends on a combination of interconnected factors that foster innovation, collaboration and growth. Urban planning, infrastructure management and an entrepreneurial culture are essential factors for the success of cities’ Entrepreneurial Ecosystems (EEs). Land use and infrastructure management create opportunities for growth and industry expansion. EEs are local, social, business, institutional and cultural stakeholders that encourage and enhance the formation and growth of new businesses, which are supported by enabling infrastructure. The objective of this study was to investigate how urban planning affects EEs in the metropolitan region, Nelson Mandela Bay (NMB), South Africa. NMB is known for poor land use management, which hinders the management of diverse spatial needs, as well as bureaucratic processes for land rezoning for commercial activity. In order to better understand the fundamental issues, a qualitative case study was conducted. The data were collected from fifteen economic development role players from NMB using semi-structured interviews combined with secondary data from the NMB Integrated Development Plan (IDP). The data analysis included thematic analysis using Atlas.ti and Claude 2.0. In order to validate the findings, qualitative data were cross-referenced with secondary sources from the NMB IDP. The key themes that emerged effect the NMB metropole’s management of infrastructure to support the EE. These include, Land use issues, Poor oversight by metropolitan leadership, Lack of infrastructure maintenance and pushing out potential investment and economic growth. The results highlight that the NMB metropole fails to prioritise land use and infrastructure challenges, impacting the NMB metropolitan area’s economic development and worsening inequality among different groups. The findings from this study add to the current research on cities’ EEs and The Right to the City Theory, which supports the UN Sustainable Development Goals 8, 9 and 11.

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