Over the last few days we have seen some inspiring and innovative responses to the Corona Virus crisis by UK firms and universities. The JCB-Dyson collaboration to produce ventilators and the UCL-Mercedes AMG collaboration to develop other breathing aids are outstanding examples. Necessity is the mother of invention after all. But what of the wider… Read more
As in the UK, significant parts of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Germany are affected by the corona virus pandemic. In this difficult economic situation, the Federal Government in Germany has sent a very positive signal with its comprehensive support measures targeted not only at large corporations, but also at medium-sized, small and micro… Read more
Given last week’s government announcement of the stimulus bill meant to mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on the UK economy, it is important to recognise the implications for women broadly, and self-employed women more specifically. Such bills are notoriously gender blind, thus discounting the impact on the extent to which self-employed women are… Read more
After a wait that felt like an eternity, self-employed people finally got some clarity yesterday (March 26th) on how the Government intends to support them during the coronavirus pandemic. Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s Self Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) was more generous than many expected. The headline is that self-employed people will be able to claim… Read more
Education of consumers and minimising red tape is essential as the UK develops its own ‘geographical indication’ (GI) labelling system for traditional food products following Brexit, new research shows The introduction of a new system for protecting unique British food products such as Cornish pasties and Melton Mowbray pork pies will depend on better educating… Read more
Spatial Incidence of High Growth Firms High-Growth Firms (HGFs) are a very small proportion of the UK business population yet they have a disproportionate impact on job creation. We present data at local economic area level over time to show that there is a very distinct geography emerging for the incidence rate of HGFs since… Read more
Our blog provides a space for comment by the ERC Directors on current issues related to entrepreneurship, small business development and innovation. Blog posts are contributed by the ERC Directors Professor Stephen Roper (Stephen.roper@wbs.ac.uk) and Professor Mark Hart (Mark.Hart@aston.ac.uk). Please noted that the views expressed in this blog belong to the individual blogger and do not… Read more
The UK Innovation Survey provides information on product/service and process innovation as well as the barriers to innovation activity for a relatively large number of UK firms. In this paper we present the first local economic area analysis of this data derived from four surveys covering the 2002-04, 2004-06, 2006-08 and 2008-10 periods. The analysis… Read more
