The Development of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises - Some Empirical Findings (Sweden)
基于瑞典两项实证研究，分析了中小企业随时间在财务结构、管理行为和员工数量上的变化，以及企业面临的关键事件和问题，对政策制定者和中小企业管理者有参考价值。
THE DEVELOPMENT OF SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED ENTERPRISES - SOME EMPIRICAL FINDINGS [SWEDEN] During the past ten years different agencies have become more interested in finding out to stimulate the development of small and medium-sized enterprises. The Board of Technical Development, The National Swedish Industrial Board (SIND), and the Regional Development Funds are examples. While the main type of action taken by the government has been to provide various kinds of financial support, resources have also been made available for education and service activities. However, in spite of this increased attention, we really do not know very much about how and why such firms develop over time. SIND has investigated different types of problems in small and medium-sized enterprises. This note describes some results from two projects which were completed last year. The questions raised by the two studies can be summarized as follows: * How do small firms develop over time in terms of financial structure, managerial behavior, and number of employees? * Which have been the most important events and problems for such firms during recent years? * What do leaders of the firms think of their environment and, above all, of the actions taken by the authorities? Both studies take similar methodological approaches. The difference is that in the first study we followed up on the development of 28 small and medium-sized firms in the Swedish towns of Eskilstuna. We had done the same type of research in these companies five years earlier. In the second study we expanded our findings from the first study to five other regions in Sweden with different industrial structures. In this subsequent study 80 firms were investigated. Developments Over Time 1. In Sweden during the past ten years there has been a tendency for small and medium-sized firms to slowly increase their percentage of risk-bearing capital. One explanation for this trend is that the return on total capital has increased very quickly, i.e., firms generate more money and therefore can use some of this capital to increase the equity portion of their total capitalization. Another explanation is that only small net investments are required, i.e., the need for external capital has decreased. Thirdly, firms with a low share of own risk-bearing capital have been forced to improve their financial strength. In one region almost every firm which had 10 percent or less of its assets financed with its own risk-bearing capital has had at least one financial crisis or gone bankrupt during the next five years. 2. Over time, variability in net investments in inventories and machines has been low, even though the variations among the median measures are very high. On the other hand, investments in physical plants have rapidly decreased during the last five years. Therefore, total net investments have decreased. One explanation of this change is that new, more effective machines demand relatively less capacity. Another explanation is the fact that many firms will only grow to a certain size. Finally, in Sweden, if desired, small firms can rent instead of own their plants. 3. Tax payments in percent of income before allocations are relatively small because many forms of allocations, e.g., various investment funds, exist. 4. We have also tried to see how firms develop with regard to the number of employees during the first ten years. The development can be illustrated by the curve shown in exhibit 1. The resultant curve is similar to that from other studies. Generally, the number of employees increases rather rapidly during the first few years, leveling off to about ten as the firm matures. Some explanations from the interviews for this pattern are the following: * The plant and production capacity is designed from the start for a certain size. If a firm wants to grow beyond this point it has to invest in new facilities, which will involved higher risk. …