Small Business Economics最新文献

Trade credit is a relevant channel through which institutional development affects the real economy. When contract enforcement is weak and trust is low, firms engage in opportunistic behavior that is likely to disproportionally penalize small firms, characterized by weak bargaining power with respect to their larger customers or suppliers. This mechanism is particularly relevant during periods of sharp tightening of credit conditions from banks. Exploiting regional variation in Italy, the paper finds that institutional development mitigated the impact of the financial crisis, particularly for smaller firms, by limiting the adverse effects of the trade credit channel on their liquidity conditions.

Eco-innovations integrate complex and diverse knowledge sources. For this reason, firms engage in worldwide collaborations that promote learning from different partners that, in turn, promote environmental innovations. This study analyzes how the learning experience of previous collaborations at the national and international levels impacts the likelihood of eco-innovation development by small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This work also examines whether such linkages between prior collaboration experience and eco-innovation are influenced by alliance portfolio diversity (APD), which can broaden the number of knowledge sources but also increase coordination costs. The results of longitudinal analysis, based on a dataset of Spanish SMEs, suggest that the learning acquired from prior domestic openness is more useful for enhancing eco-innovation activities. Moreover, the results confirm the negative moderating role of APD, as SMEs with greater prior experience in national and international openness are more likely to eco-innovate than those with less prior experience, but these relationships weaken with increased diversity in collaboration portfolios.

This paper analyzes bank financing for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in an unprecedented context marked by the convergence of the unique challenges posed by the COVID-19 crisis and unconventional monetary policy (UMP). It takes a comprehensive approach by conducting both cross-country and single-country analyses to provide a nuanced understanding and broad insights into SME finance in times of crisis. The main findings of the two-dimensional analyses are as follows. First, COVID-19 has a significant negative impact on SMEs’ access to bank finance, exceeding the magnitude of the 2008–2009 global financial crisis (GFC). Second, central bank asset purchases implemented during COVID-19 mitigate this negative effect, surpassing their impact during the GFC. Moreover, the combination of central bank asset purchases with government interventions further improved SMEs’ access to bank finance. In addition, the effect of negative interest rate policy (NIRP) in increasing bank financing for SMEs is likely to be relatively limited. Furthermore, the negative impact of COVID-19 and the positive impact of central bank asset purchases are more pronounced in the manufacturing sector than in the non-manufacturing sector, suggesting sectoral heterogeneity in SME finance and the transmission of UMP. This paper has important implications for strengthening the financial resilience and sustainability of SMEs in future crises.

This paper investigates the role of business group affiliation for small businesses before and during the COVID-19 crisis. Business group affiliation provides access to key strategic resources, which are arguably useful during external shocks, especially for small businesses. However, which resources matter in a crisis depends on public policy responses. Moreover, having access to resources is not sufficient to recover from a crisis, because autonomy in the decision-making processes is also important and depends on the organizational distance between an affiliated firm and the headquarters. We use the Amadeus database to collect financial information on a vast sample of group-affiliated and standalone firms in Europe. Our results confirm previous findings indicating that business group affiliation is particularly beneficial for affiliated firms during periods of crisis. We also show that the benefits of group affiliation in the post-COVID-19 recovery period relate to the capabilities offered by business groups’ internal labor markets, not increased investment capacity through access to internal capital markets. Firms at the periphery of business groups benefit the most from group affiliation.

This study explores the effect of bailout capital and digital diversification by small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) on their propensity to survive during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Using a random sampling of 5469 SMEs from 16 European countries, collected by the World Bank Enterprise Survey in May 2020, January 2021, and May 2021, we conduct a two-stage estimation to examine factors that first affected the propensity of SMEs to access bailout capital, and second, factors that increased the propensity of SMEs to survive longer during and after crises. Two key findings emerge. Diversification of government financial aid and the adoption of various digital tools to leverage the effect of shock by SMEs increase their propensity to survive by sized firms. Moreover, government financial aid does not moderate the effect of digital tool adoption on the propensity to survive. Policy insights and implications are also discussed.

Whether slack resources inhibit or facilitate SMEs to introduce strategic changes is an unresolved question. We investigate how different bundles of financial and human resource (HR) slack relate to strategic changes, and how this relation is influenced by the presence of family majority ownership. We survey 654 private Belgian SMEs and find, in line with the slack-as-resources for change perspective, that non-family-owned SMEs introduce the fewest strategic changes when they bundle low levels of financial slack with low levels of HR slack, while they undertake the most strategic changes when they bundle high levels of financial slack with low levels of HR slack. Family ownership moderates this relationship, as strategic decision-making in family-owned SMEs follows the behavioral agency model. As such, the effect of slack resources in family-owned firms is best described by the slack-as-a-buffer perspective, and the bundle of high levels of financial slack with low levels of HR slack results in fewer strategic changes rather than more.

This study examines how venture capital (VC) firms have modified their short-term investment practices in response to the COVID-19 crisis. We categorise VCs’ investment practices according to their level of visibility to external parties and hypothesise that unobservable investment practices are more likely modified than observable ones, since VC firms must comply with the objectives stated in their contracts with limited partners (LPs), and deviations may be viewed negatively by investors. Changing investment practices may have a negative impact on a VC firm’s reputation, but this potential reputational damage could vary along with the reputational capital already possessed by the VC firm and its degree of exposure in a VCs’ network. An empirical analysis based on a global survey of VC firms confirms these theoretical presumptions, shedding light on how the industry operates and responds to unique crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, younger and smaller VC firms are found to be more reluctant than larger and older ones to modify observable investment practices. Similarly, VC firms that are more central in a network of investors are also found to be more hesitant to modify observable investment practices.

Most entrepreneurial ecosystem research has focused on the actors and interactions within a focal (often regional) entrepreneurial ecosystem. This entails the often-implicit assumption that entrepreneurs mainly interact with actors within their own entrepreneurial ecosystem. We argue that this assumption limits entrepreneurial ecosystem research and address this limitation by exploring the research question: What influences interactions across the boundaries of entrepreneurial ecosystems? We study how both individual motivations and institutional logics influence interactions across the boundaries of a focal entrepreneurial ecosystem. We find that entrepreneurs interact across entrepreneurial ecosystem boundaries to gain access to resources, particularly finance, knowledge, and customers. Furthermore, we find that the ability of actors to engage in cross-entrepreneurial ecosystem interactions is influenced by two logics. Start-up development logics enable interactions beyond entrepreneurial ecosystem boundaries, as they prompt actors to prioritize the development and growth of start-ups. In contrast, regional development logics often hinder interactions by transforming administrative boundaries into entrepreneurial ecosystem boundaries. Identifying and describing these logics is the primary contribution of this paper.

This study investigates the resilience of 13,786 UK entrepreneurial firms that received equity financing before COVID-19, with 653 becoming insolvent and 6254 securing guaranteed loans during the pandemic. Utilising the resource-based view (RBV) and signalling theories, we hypothesise that equity-backed firms have sufficient resources to withstand crises, varying by investor type and involvement. We compare the bankruptcy risk of these firms during COVID-19 to the pre-COVID period, considering investor type, deal history and financial and non-financial factors. Results show similar insolvency rates during COVID-19 compared to pre-COVID, but firms backed by active investors are less likely to become insolvent during crises. We examine the characteristics of loan recipients, financing combinations and insolvency risk, finding that companies using COVID loans were generally more prone to insolvency, except those backed by active investor types. Our findings offer insights into the role of equity financing across various investor types in venture survival during crises, with policy implications.

Recent global crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, severe supply chain disruptions, and ongoing geopolitical tensions, have profoundly reshaped the entrepreneurial and financial landscapes. This Special Issue of the Small Business Economics Journal explores these transformations. Key insights include the impact of unconventional monetary policy on SME financing, the success factors of bailout programs, the critical role of active investors in fostering firm resilience, the implementation of digitizing technologies, and the adoption of survival strategies on a microeconomic level. Together, these findings underscore the flexibility and resilience of entrepreneurs and offer actionable lessons for policy and practice.