{"title":"Is green public procurement a deterrent for SMEs? Empirical evidence from France","authors":"Adrien Deschamps","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01034-1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01034-1","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Public procurement can be defined as the process by which public contracting authorities purchase goods, services, and works from private suppliers, including small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The access of SMEs to public contracts is one of the objectives of public procurement policies, as they suffer from complex procedures and high transaction costs. At the same time, public procurement is increasingly being used as an instrument for environmental policies, through green clauses (i.e., mandatory specifications in the contract performance) and award criteria (i.e., the dimensions of the offers the contracting authority assesses). The objective of this empirical work is to determine whether environmental clauses and criteria have an impact on SME participation in award procedures. This paper assesses for the first time the compatibility between SME accessibility and environmental issues in public procurement with a dataset encompassing approximately 10,000 award procedures in France between 2022 and 2023. The findings indicate that green public procurement stimulates SME participation. The intensity of this effect may vary between environmental clauses and criteria across sectors, but there is no evidence of a deterrent effect of green public procurement on SMEs.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143661251","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Immigrant self-employment in turbulent times","authors":"Mats Hammarstedt, Per Skedinger","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01032-3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01032-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p>We examine immigrant self-employment in Sweden during the turbulent decade 2011–2021. This is done for different cohorts of immigrants from Africa and Asia and for unincorporated and incorporated firms. Immigrants have lower business earnings and higher exit rates from self-employment than natives, which is in line with previous research. The period in which the immigrants arrived in Sweden and the type of business they are engaged in have important implications for outcomes. In most cases, outcomes are more favorable for those who came to Sweden up to the turn of the millennium, and less so for the latest arrivals. Even so, a closer look at outcomes by organizational form reveals that immigrants who arrived during 2011–2021 suffered less in terms of lower business earnings compared to earlier cohorts if they were in incorporated instead of unincorporated self-employment. Switching organizational form is not associated with catching up on business earnings for immigrant self-employed vis-à-vis Swedish-born.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"18 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143640744","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"We are in this together: leading resource exchange between entrepreneurial ecosystems to strategically steer their development","authors":"Matthias Fink, Daniela Maresch, Ludovit Garzik, Rainer Harms","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01027-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01027-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Entrepreneurial Ecosystems (EEs) are embedded in a global network of resource exchange relationships. To explain how EEs develop, one must consider the dynamics of resource exchanges. To do this, we combine a social capital perspective with the concept of strategic action fields in an abductive study of six cases of EEs. We find three dynamics of resource exchange, each drawing on a specific type of social capital and fostering either optimization or innovation of EEs’ offer to entrepreneurs. These findings contribute to the EE field by highlighting the relevance of inter-EE resource exchanges for developing competitive EEs. EE practitioners find that strategically managing the exchange of resources across the boundaries of their ecosystem is vital to balancing optimization of the established offer and innovating for enriched offers to entrepreneurs in their location.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"12 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143640743","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"International linkages between entrepreneurial ecosystems: understanding the role of corporate accelerators","authors":"Moyra Marval","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01025-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01025-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Entrepreneurial ecosystems (EEs) literature has typically focused on the internal dynamics between actors and factors within specific territories, ignoring potential exogenous linkages. This paper examines the potential interconnections between EEs using corporate accelerators (CAs) as focus. CAs are prominent actors connecting startups to large firms, investors, universities, and governments in regional EEs. Although CAs are often set up in multiple locations, their potential role in creating linkages between distant EEs has yet to be investigated. This study adopts an exploratory qualitative approach based on 43 semi-structured interviews and abundant archival data from three prominent CAs headquartered in Europe, with locations in various EEs around the world. This study uncovers three main drivers (internationalization of startups, expansion of the sourcing space, and exchange of best practices), together with five key mechanisms CAs use for fostering global linkages between EEs. In addition, adopting a theory-building perspective, this research offers several propositions to advance scholars’ understanding of EEs’ exogenous linkages formation and the relationship between motives, mechanisms, and spatial distribution. The findings highlight the role of multinational enterprises, through their CAs, in supporting EE development.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"14 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143640742","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Qiantao Zhang, Chiara Marzocchi, Shiri M. Breznitz
{"title":"Educational diversity and work experience paths towards entrepreneurship","authors":"Qiantao Zhang, Chiara Marzocchi, Shiri M. Breznitz","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01033-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01033-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p>While there is ample evidence on the role of education and employment in entrepreneurship more generally, we know less about how the accumulation of specific educational paths and work experience before or during university education contributes to entrepreneurship. Using unique data from two combined surveys linking information on the population of University of Toronto graduates, we provide an analysis on how the sequence of educational paths (STEM and non-STEM; non-STEM and STEM) and work experience before and during university studies influence entrepreneurial activities. The results suggest that diverse educational backgrounds are positively correlated with both entrepreneurial propensity and number of firms established. Full-time employment experience before the completion of the final degree, while not significant for entrepreneurship, is found to play an indirect role. Our findings have implications for understanding the importance of distinctive combinations of education paths and employment in shaping university students’ entrepreneurial activity after their graduation.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143618359","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Bruno Fischer, Maribel Guerrero, Heike Mayer, Dirk Meissner, Susann Schäfer, Christina Theodoraki
{"title":"Entrepreneurial ecosystem as a spatially fluid concept: new territorial perspectives on entrepreneurship","authors":"Bruno Fischer, Maribel Guerrero, Heike Mayer, Dirk Meissner, Susann Schäfer, Christina Theodoraki","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01020-7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01020-7","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Although the concept of entrepreneurial ecosystems (EE) is inherently spatial, the actual spatiality of these productive structures has been largely assumed rather than defined based on its formative processes. The oversimplification of the spatiality of EE seems to be a function of empirical reliance on available data, a situation that has generated broadly accepted definitions that delineate EE as fixed territories (be they cities, regions or even countries). Although important insights have been derived from such approaches, this has also hampered a fine-grained scrutiny on the fluidity of EE spatiality—especially along the course of EE evolutionary trajectories. Although most of its components are tied to regional territories, EE are not isolated spatial systems with no outside connections. Accordingly, addressing entrepreneurial ecosystems as such can cause an inadequate comprehension of how entrepreneurship-oriented relationships are organized between EE or between EE and the “hinterland.” These are the motivations that led us to come up with the Special Issue “Exogenous linkages of and between entrepreneurial ecosystems: Perspectives from Interregional and Global connectedness.” In this editorial, we present the articles included in this Special Issue and propose the idea of EE as “spatially-fluid” structures which affect the dynamics of EE configurations and, ultimately, their respective evolutionary trajectories.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"206 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143599954","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Time after time: exploring the role of CSR on employees’ long-lasting working relationships in Italy","authors":"Ulpiana Kocollari, Fabio Demaria, Maddalena Cavicchioli","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01019-0","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01019-0","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Recent research has focused on the employee’s perspective in experiencing Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategies. The purpose of this work is to empirically investigate the drivers of employees’ long-lasting working relationships when CSR strategies are in place. A sample of 441 employees across 21 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) spanning various industries in Italy is surveyed to collect data on CSR-related experiences. Then, dimensionality reduction techniques and nonlinear models are applied to self-reported data. The empirical analysis reveals the following: (i) at the individual level, intrinsic CSR initiatives are of major importance; (ii) at the organizational level, sudden changes in perceived leadership hit negatively, especially during crises; and (iii) at the intermediate level, promoting happiness at work (HAW) enhances CSR strategies, creating favorable conditions even for dissatisfied workers. Therefore, the investigation enriches the CSR micro-foundation literature by examining the role of multifaceted layers in implementing CSR strategies in SMEs. In turn, this brings important implications for managers dealing with the phenomenon of the “great resignation.”</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"37 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-03-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143570391","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"AI, robots and innovation in European SMEs","authors":"Agustí Segarra-Blasco, Josep Tomàs-Porres, Mercedes Teruel","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01017-2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01017-2","url":null,"abstract":"<p>There is increasing interest in the impact of advanced digital technologies on SMEs, but the determinants of their adoption and their association with multiple innovation outcomes remain unexplored. Based on the Flash Eurobarometer 486, this paper analyses how the adoption of artificial intelligence and robots is related to European SMEs carrying out product, process, organizational and marketing innovations. Our results establish scale-ups and start-ups as the most likely adopters of these technologies and the most innovative firms. Furthermore, internal characteristics, such as internationalization and firm size, and external factors, such as the availability of digital skills and infrastructure, are significant drivers of digitalization at the firm level. In a two-stage approach, we find that the adoption of artificial intelligence and robots is associated with all innovation types, although these technologies serve more specialised objectives in manufacturing rather than in service sectors. Our results confirm a significant variability in the adoption of artificial intelligence and robots, as well as heterogeneous associations with innovation outcomes.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"31 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-02-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143485769","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Fabrizio Coricelli, Marco Frigerio, Pietro Vozzella
{"title":"The role of institutions in supporting SME financing through the trade credit channel: an empirical analysis of Italian provinces","authors":"Fabrizio Coricelli, Marco Frigerio, Pietro Vozzella","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01013-6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01013-6","url":null,"abstract":"<p>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.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"8 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-02-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143485768","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
María Teresa Bolívar-Ramos, Dante I. Leyva-de la Hiz
{"title":"Learning from prior national and international collaborations and eco-innovation: the moderating role of alliance portfolio diversity","authors":"María Teresa Bolívar-Ramos, Dante I. Leyva-de la Hiz","doi":"10.1007/s11187-025-01016-3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-025-01016-3","url":null,"abstract":"<p>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.</p>","PeriodicalId":21803,"journal":{"name":"Small Business Economics","volume":"19 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.4,"publicationDate":"2025-02-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143477497","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}