Smes

... Sony Heru Priyanto* ... Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Priyanto, SH and Sandjojo, I. (2005) 'Relationship between entrepreneurial learning, entrepreneurial competencies and venture success: empirical study on SMEs', Int. ...

High penetration of renewable energy sources such as wind generation in microgrids (MGs) causes fluctuations of power flow and significantly affects the power system operation. This can lead to severe problems, such as system frequency oscillations, and/or violations of power lines capability. With the proper control, superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) is able to significantly enhance the dynamic security of the power system. In a SMES system, the power conditioning system (PCS) is the crucial component that directly influences the validity of the SMES in the dynamic control of the power system. This paper proposes the use of an improved SMES controller for the stabilization and control of the power flow of wind-hybrid MGs. In this sense, the design and implementation of a novel high performance PCS scheme of the SMES is described. Moreover, a detailed model of the SMES unit is derived and a novel three-level control scheme is designed, comprising a full decoupled current control strategy in the d-q reference frame and an enhanced power system frequency controller. The dynamic performance of the proposed systems is fully validated by computer simulation.

This research present an analysis of the importance of training in 115 mike and small enterprises and microenterprises (SMEs) in Tecomán a municipality of the state of Colima, in Mexico, and also shows its impact on the detection of training needs. It turned out that most of the enterprises don´t do or plan training activities. Only few cases presented courses for sellers, with the idea that this would increase their sales and the enterprise´s development. It was found as well that training is not set up because of a lack of knowledge about it by the small business men, who besides don´t have the specialty related to managerial administration. For the statistical analysis of the research, crossed tables and analysis of variance were carried out between the turn of the company and the perception of the importance of training.

76 Int. J. Value Chain Management, Vol. 2, No. 1, 2008 ... An investigation into the effects of computer-integrated manufacturing systems on the productivity of SMEs in Pakistan ... Ghulam Yasin Shaikh* and Hussain Bux Marri ... Department of Industrial Engineering and ...

This working paper highlights the comments and recommandations emerging from a broad survey conducted in Belgian SMEs in 2008 & 2009. It is a part of the final report of a study financed by the Belgian SPF Economy.. Centre d'Etudes de la Performance des ...

The ability of small and medium-sized enterprises, which account for 99 % of all economic entities in the Czech Republic, to involve in the internationalization process is an often discussed topic. Apart from finding the key motives for entering a foreign market, the aim of this paper is to determine whether there is some dependence between motives and characteristics of a company. The results show some differences among sectors. Nevertheless, the key motives for internationalization of Czech SMEs are the foreign demand for products, the lack of demand in the domestic market, the customer portfolio enlargement and the increase in sales.

The use of e-commerce in small medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has become an important topic in information systems research. At present, there is a large number of well-documented benefits derived from e-commerce for small-medium enterprises (SMEs) both in theoretical and practical literature. Despite the enormous attention given to encourage SMEs to adopt e-commerce both by academics as well as governments, little research has been carried out in identifying strategies of ecommerce adoption for SMEs in developing countries, especially Indonesia. It is, therefore, the aim of this paper to understand the factors and combinations of factors that SMEs need to be considered before embracing e-commerce into their business by providing a closer look at actual experience of Indonesian SMEs. Case study research was carried out to analyse and explain the underlying factors that are likely to determine the varying extent of e-commerce adoption in SMEs, especially the service sector. The findings of the case studies have further extended into the development of proposed practical framework to illustrate how e-commerce adoption should be carried out from a strategic perspective.

In the last few decades, SMEs have become increasingly active in international markets. SMEs do not necessarily follow a pattern of incremental internationalisation as they have a wide range of options and many are opportunistic. A large postal survey was conducted in five countries-the UK, France, Finland, Australia and Mexico. Many similarities in internationalisation strategy were found among these companies.

Despite the increasing recognition of the importance of word of mouth as an integral component of a firms' marketing efforts, there has been little emphasis on developing suitable guidelines for entrepreneurs who wish to leverage scarce resources by pursuing more innovative marketing techniques. In addition, although there has been a great deal of research into the nature of social networks and interpersonal communication via word of mouth, there have been few attempts to link this research with the firms marketing strategy. In this paper, we consider the diffusion of innovation literature and recent research into social network structure and propose a framework that may be useful for enhancing the marketing efforts of entrepreneurial firms.

The business structure in Jalisco, Mexico is primarily composed of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Thus, it is fundamentally necessary to understand the dynamics, evolution and above all, the strategic challenges of this sector in order to understand the state’s economic performance and the possibilities for future development in Jalisco. As a result, this study analyzes the evolution of the SMEs (known as PyME, in Spanish) in Mexico and Jalisco by using data from the Economic Censuses of 1999, 2004 and 2009 as well as sources such as the Mexican System of Business Information (Sistema de Información Empresarial Mexicano, or SIEM, in Spanish). This analysis includes the distribution of companies by sectors and size. It also makes a comparison between the observed trends at both national and state levels, allowing the identification of significant differences in productivity and the challenges that these small and medium-sized companies face as they seek to moderniz...

Despite the claims on how stakeholders could benefit from electronic marketplaces (eMarketplaces), the actual user take-up of eMarketplaces have been modest and in many cases even failed to deliver their promises. We believe this is due to the lack of preparations in dealing with values of such ventures during the strategic planning of the organisations concerned. Given that values are

The primary objective of the study is to carry out an assessment of the current status of modern energy supply among the urban and peri-urban poor in Kenya and to identify viable policy options that can assist in providing cleaner and more sustainable energy services to the rapidly growing urban population in Kenya. The study also assesses prevailing energy policies that address the challenges associated with supply of modern energy services to the urban poor. The study focuses on the example of energy consumption patterns of urban poor households in Kibera-often said to be Africa's largest slum-and the trends in energy use among small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the area, providing an empirical basis for key findings of the study. The findings of the household survey clearly demonstrate the role that kerosene, electricity, biomass and LPG can play in cooking and lighting in low-income areas such as Kibera, Nairobi. According to the survey findings, kerosene is the most important modern energy option for the poor for both lighting and cooking. Electricity also appears to be a relatively important energy option. Biomass in the form of charcoal and LPG appear to be consumed by a relatively small segment of the urban poor in the selected sample area. The results of this survey largely reflect the situation at the national level. The study concludes by presenting central issues related to identified key energy options for the poor in Kibera (kerosene, electricity, biomass and LPG) and presents policy measures that could enhance modern energy services among the urban poor.

Abstract—Virtual teams give many advantages to organizations, including increased knowledge sharing and improve organizational performance. Virtual teams have altered the expectations and boundaries of knowledge worker’s interactions and make a new opportunity to develop the business. In this paper, we present summary results of an online survey. The online questionnaire was emailed by using a simple random sampling method to 356 Malaysian manufacturing small and medium –sized Enterprises (SMEs). The findings of this study show that SMEs in Malaysia are gaining to use virtual teams, and it can be concluded that virtual teams provide a new platform for developing the business in SMEs. Based on the study, we suggest avenues for future research that are important to advancing our understanding of virtual team effects on business growth. Keywords—Collaboration, virtual teams, SMEs, Entrepreneurship, Business development, Survey

La France, comme d’autres pays, cherche a valoriser son excellence scientifique et a augmenter la competitivite de ses petites et moyennes entreprises (PME) pour tirer plein profit de l’innovation et soutenir la croissance economique et l’emploi. Il n’y a pas, ni en France ni ailleurs, une politique specifique de soutien a l’innovation dans les PME mais des politiques scientifiques et de la recherche industrielle, en particulier en faveur des petites entreprises, et des politiques d’innovation, dans lesquelles peuvent etre identifiees des mesures specifiques visant a promouvoir le developpement technologique et l’innovation dans les PME. Cette etude s’interesse a la facon dont en France, a travers les differentes epoques, ces politiques publiques sont definies et organisees et s’interroge sur l’efficacite et l’impact des interventions publiques dans le developpement de capacite d’innovation des PME francaises. Elle se deroule en trois parties, en respectant une chronologie historiqu...

This book is written in the form of a dissertation. It explores strategic management theory and the use of management tools for decision making in service sector SMEs. It is thought that owner managers of SMEs do not use strategic planning and often find themselves managing crisis. After identifying the prevalence of management tools by SME owner/managers the author establishes whether or not there is a difference in the tools used depending on gender.

The paper is based on data from a questionnaire survey (interviews) conducted in the western part of Poland on 183 rural tourism and agri-tourism small and medium enterprises. The classification of enterprises was based on the methodology proposed by Wysocki (1996) and included the k-means clustering algorithm. As the result of the research three types of SMEs were separated, including the top resilient enterprises aimed mainly at tourism activity and usually connected with horse recreation, a cluster of mixed SMEs for which tourism activity was an additional and less important source of income, and a group of SMEs for which tourism activity was an additional but important source of income. The classification may be used as a hint for rural development policy makers for future support of rural tourism / agri-tourism development.

Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) can experience difficulties in adopting Information Systems (IS) and aligning them with their strategic development. Using the concept of bricolage, an improvisational approach that allows learning from concrete experience, we explore IS adoption and organisational change in two SME case studies. The case studies cover IS rationalisations and innovations and smalland large-scale change over a 4-year period, and highlight the roles of different actors, internal and external to the SMEs. We find that bricolage is a useful concept as it deals with the need for SMEs to learn about the possibilities of IS in situ, simultaneously exploiting the can-do approach that is usually found in SMEs. However, bricolage needs organisation space and the possibility for trust to grow between end users, developers and management as visions are explored and revised. The paper concludes with a set of guiding principles that can be adopted by SMEs to enable IS bricolage to contribute to an organisation's strategic direction. q Technovation 26 (2006) 232-241 www.elsevier.com/locate/technovation 0166-4972/$ -see front matter q

There’s a new wind of change in the IT industry today. It’s called virtualization. Virtualization is a software technology designed to let us run multiple virtual machines with different operating systems on a single physical machine.Virtualization is changing almost every aspect of how we manage systems, storage, networks, security, operating systems, and applications. Server consolidation reduces maintenance cost while high availability and live migration allow us to minimize the downtime. With virtual machines, recovering from failure and disaster recovery is easier and more affordable than ever.

Six Sigma (SS) methodology is nowadays one of the most used approaches in the Quality Management field since its benefits coming from the improvement of the process outputs quality by identifying and removing the causes of defects and variability in manufacturing and business ...

One of the most important parameters of the system where wind turbine generators (WTGs) are connected is voltage profile at the point of common coupling (PCC). In the earlier stage, WTGs were possible to be disconnected from the system to avoid the damage of WTGs. Following the rapid injection of WTGs to the existing network during last decades, the transmission line operators (TSOs) require WTGs to stay connected in certain level of fault to continue support the grid. This new requirements have been compiled in new international grid codes. In this paper, superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) is applied to improve the voltage profile of PCC bus where WTGs equipped with doubly fed induction generator (DFIG) is connected to meet the used gird codes of Spain and German during grid dip and swell. The voltage dip at the grid side is examined to comply with the low voltage ride through (LVRT) while the voltage swell at the grid side is examined to comply with the high voltage ride through (HVRT) of both Spain and German voltage ride through (VRT).

The aim of this paper is to determine whether Australian small and medium enterprises (SMEs) could be described as 'bleak houses' or whether they have developed over the last decade into 'bright prospects' typified by human resource innovations. This study builds on empirical work (n = 1425) from ten years ago (1998), and re-examines the prospects of SMEs through the lens of human resource management (HRM) practices. Uniquely, the 2008 cross-sectional data provides for the large-scale tracking of strategic HRM practices. Specifically, 110 HRM practices over five traditional areas across 1230 SMEs are analysed. The prevalence, change, and patterning of HRM practices used by Australian SMEs in 2008 are investigated. It was found that SMEs need less of a make-over in relation to the adoption of HR practices, compared to a decade ago. From a practitioner viewpoint, the study provides cross-sectional benchmarking against the previous time-point, 1998, as well as extending that work with an examination of a more extensive range of new and emerging HRM practices. This project was conducted with a USQ research grant. Given the nature of our two-point longitudinal panel data, this research question uniquely investigates the extent of change in HRM practices over the last decade. Question 3. To what extent do key firm characteristics differentiate the patterning and prevalence of HRM practices?

This article examines the opportunities for fostering sustainable development through public sector sourcing from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Buying from small businesses can make such contributions in a variety of forms, ranging from a contribution to local economic development through providing innovative green products and services, particularly in the food sector, to helping the public sector organisation to better align its operations with its community. Sourcing from small businesses does also have implications for the governance of sourcing processes and would benefit from a partnership approach. Barriers to public sector sourcing 2 from small businesses are discussed and suggestions made on how these can be overcome.

This paper provides new empirical evidence about the impact of technological policies upon firms' innovative behavior. We take into consideration the role of R&D subsidies and innovative public procurement. While the former policy tool has been both extensively discussed in the literature and empirically investigated, the latter is a growing trend, which still lacks robust empirical evidence. In this paper, we replicate existing results on R&D subsidies, we surmise fresh empirical evidence on the outcome of innovative public procurement, and we address the issue of a possible interaction among the two tools. When controlling for this interaction of public procurement, R&D subsidies cease to be as effective as reported in previous studies. Innovative public procurement seems to be more effective than R&D subsidies. Evidence suggests that the two policies provide the highest impact when they interact and that they have to be simultaneously considered. Failure in doing so might lead to biased results.

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have an important role in the economy of each country. However, most of the SMEs are facing difficulties in accessing finance. Understanding the importance
of SMEs in the economy, the governments established credit guarantee system to support SMEs through the provision of credit guarantee services for SMEs. Credit guarantee system for SMEs are widely used in the world, but also there exist many problems in the management and operations in some countries. This paper analyzes the actual operation of credit guarantee for SMEs in Vietnam. Also, giving the successful experiences were applied in Japan and from the propose measures to improve the performance of the credit guarantee system in Vietnam

Access to credit has been considered as one of the main problems that SMEs have to deal with in order to survive and keep growing. This document describes a system dynamics model based on the case of a mediumsized manufacturing firm located in Colombia. The model integrates operational and financial aspects of the firm, including variables associated with trade credit and bank's credit. A sensitivity analysis is made in order to find high leverage variables. The results obtained indicate that operational and financial policies, when applied alone, are not sufficient to solve the firm's stagnation problem. An appropriate combination of access to credit, credit conditions, and adequate operational and financial policies, might be the best way to deal with the complex problem of SMEs survival and growing. KEYWORDS System dynamics, Access to credit, SMEs. RESUMEN El acceso al crédito se considera como uno de los mayores problemas que deben afrontar las Pymes para su supervivencia y crecimiento. Este documento describe un modelo de dinámica de sistemas basado en el Acceso al crédito y límites del crecimiento en Pymes: una mirada a través de la dinámica de sistemas SISTEMAS & TELEMÁTICA

Building on institutional theory and on existing literature regarding barriers to private businesses in transition countries, this paper examines the inter-related effect of nineteen factors grouped into four types of barriers (formal, informal, environmental and skills) on existing small- and medium-sized enterprise operations in Lithuania. Regression analyses on a sample of 332 business owners indicate that perceived formal barriers are associated with perceived informal barriers such as corruption and perceived environmental barriers are associated with perceived skill barriers such as management problems. The transition effect based on business start-up date was not found to play a significant role.

To meet changing needs of customers and to survive in the increasingly globalised and competitive environment, it is necessary for companies to equip themselves with intelligent tools, thereby enabling managerial levels to use the tactical decision in a better way. However, the implementation of an intelligent system is always a challenge in Small-and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). Therefore, a new and simple approach with 'process rethinking' ability is proposed to generate ongoing process improvements over time. In this paper, a roadmap of the development of an agent-based information system is described. A case example has also been provided to show how the system can assist non-specialists, for example, managers and engineers to make right decisions for a continual process improvement. , W. (2006) 'Design and development of an agent-based information system for process improvement', Int.

We investigate the capital structure determinants of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) using a sample of Greek and French firms. We address the following questions: Are the capital structure determinants of SMEs in the two countries driven by similar factors? Are potential differences driven by country-specific or firm-specific factors? Are the size and structure of their financial markets important factors to explain any cross-country differences on SME capital structure? To answer these questions we apply panel data methods to the sample of firms for the period 1998 to 2002. We assess the extent to which the debt to assets ratio of firms depends upon their asset structure, size, profitability and growth rate. The results show that the SMEs in both countries exhibit similarities in their capital structure choices. Asset structure and profitability have a negative relationship with leverage, whereas firm size is positively related to their debt to assets ratio. Growth is statistically significant only for France and is positively related to debt. We attribute these similarities to their institutional characteristics and in particular the commonality of their civil law systems. We find differences in the intensity of the capital structure relationship between the two countries. We provide evidence that these differences are due to firm-specific rather than country factors.

Growth over a period of time can be used for performance measurements of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) since this, rather than short term performance, will reflect the long-term strategy of the firm. Subcontracting relationship with large enterprises, especially Transnational Corporations (TNCs), can be an important source for technological innovations of SMEs leading to their better performance. An attempt is made in this paper to probe into how far Indian SMEs carry out technological innovations as a result of technology and other related inputs acquired through subcontracting relationships and achieve growth using the case study approach covering two SMEs in Bangalore. Customer requirements were the major causal factors while internal factors such as self-efforts and in-house technical capability along with external factors in the form of technical inputs, suggestions and initiative from Large Enterprises (LE) customers were the sources of innovations for these SMEs. Because of these innovations, SMEs achieved growth in terms of investment in plant and machinery, output and customer base, which are ideal indicators of SME performance.

In Taiwan's national innovation system, the Government-Sponsored Research Institutes (GSRIs) facilitate technology assimilation and/or transfer and cooperative R&D promotion in support of firms, and also act as a policy assistant. Drawing on the dataset of the "Local Industry Innovation Engine Program", the study quantitatively compares various types of the R&D alliances initiated by GSRIs and the types of R&D grants they received. Based on the empirical evidence, the study argues that there are significantly matching effect between types of GSRIs and the size of firms in organising R&D alliances. Some of GSRIs have their advantage in relieving the distribution inequality problem of innovation resources across sectors and regions.

Prompted by findings from the 2012 Kingston Smith funded national survey, Success in challenging times: Key lessons for UK SMEs, this new study focuses on the ways in which SMEs use and benefit from social capital is created through both offline activities such as networking events, and online activities including social media use. Offline and online networking activities are not mutually exclusive alternatives for SMEs. Successful SMEs network with a number of different communities, integrating a combination of both offline and online methods. SMEs’ websites are crucial and need to be optimised to improve search engine positioning. Social media sites, such as Facebook and LinkedIn are used widely to both showcase the business and build relationships with customers, but are not considered a substitute for face-to-face networking. The most popular reason for SMEs using social media is to develop their business image or to market products. The fast, easy and low cost access to people ...

Researchers have found that the determinants of entrepreneurial intention (or action) include general, specific, and social aspects of human capital as well as the possession of entrepreneurial attitudes toward income, independence, perquisites, risk and hard work. Recently the cognitive bias of overconfidence has been associated with entrepreneurship, with research showing that entrepreneurs exhibit greater overconfidence than do other managers. Accordingly it is useful to investigate the role of overconfidence in the decision to form an intention to become self-employed. This paper finds that overconfidence significantly drives the intention to behave entrepreneurially, and moreover has significant interaction effects with ownership motivation of nascent entrepreneurs. Interestingly, self-efficacy, and attitudes towards income, autonomy and risk were not significant determinant of intentions in this study, contrary to earlier studies.

The modern world is stepping towards a globalised economy, and not even a single company can shut its eyes to globalisation and escape the challenges caused by globalisation. This paper critically examines the challenges faced by the local companies due to the introduction of Globalisation. It also analyses the impact of global challenges on the local companies. The persistent outstanding barrier for the small and local companies is market competition. Globalisation stimulates competition from large ventures and international companies. MNCs have the capability to eliminate global challenges than small companies. In the matter of reduced barriers and receptiveness of the world, the inexorable procedure of globalisation portrays the projects which are touching the success potentials and risk potentials. Innumerable challenges have been created by the economic globalisation for small and local companies owing to expeditious climb in the competition. Hence, the collapse rate of small companies is climbing the ladder. Correspondingly, small and local companies need to ensue the survival strategies mentioned in the review in order to succeed in challenging the global challenges. Arising out of the industrial revolution until today, irrevocable economic integration persists. The rationale is straightforward, business and profits do not acknowledge the boundaries. Wherever nearly a give and take relationship is created, a business connection is promptly established.

Nowadays, almost all the enterprises in the world fall in Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) category even though SMEs has different definitions in different countries. At the same time, there is no exemplar standard and /or framework for information technology (IT) governance for SMEs. This paper presents the main issues in implementing IT governance in SMEs. Firstly, it explains the definition of SMEs and their characteristics, secondly it discusses IT governance definition and its framework. Finally, some issues and approaches for ITG implementation in SMEs are described, and end with conclusion and future work.

This study examines the effect of characteristics of entrepreneur and characteristics of the firm on the business success of Small and Medium Enterprises in Bangladesh. The study is based on survey methodology through a questionnaire administered on the owners and employees of small firms. Data are analyzed using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS). Two hypotheses are proposed and tested. The characteristic of entrepreneur is found to be a significant factor for business success of SMEs in Bangladesh. However the firm characteristics are found not to be significant factor on the business success of SMEs in Bangladesh. The results of the analysis show that only one of the demographic factors which is duration of organization operated has significant effect toward business success of SMEs. SMEs that are operated longer period have been more successful in comparison to those who have been in operation for a shorter period. In addition to this, independent sample t-test shows...

Small-to medium-sized businesses (SMEs) are emerging as significant Internet users and like their larger counterparts increasingly adopting e-commerce. This research suggests that SMEs in different industry sectors may adopt different strategies for e-commerce and have different needs for training and support. It also explores the possibility that the Internet may not be an unmitigated blessing. It can pose both a threat and an opportunity for SME business strategies. Survey results in the eastern England region of the UK show that despite recent setbacks to the dot-com sector, SMEs are placing ecommerce at the centre of their technology and corporate strategies and plan to use the Internet as a means for achieving transformational change.

The purposes of this paper are to contribute to the understanding of small medium enterprises (SMEs) and firm performances within the craft industry by drawing attention to the critical factors influencing its performance and to further provide an integrated framework to examine SMEs performances. Craft industry considered as one of the major contributors to the development of SMEs in most countries; however, its potential to be always overlooked. Relevant literature is reviewed and assessed critically. In this paper, an integrative framework of firm performance and factors influencing it is proposed that relies on resource-based view theory as well as combining insights from Porter's theory. Different theoretical perspectives are used to explore various factors that influence SMEs performances. An integrated framework is developed to provide the premise for the research. Based on the suggested framework, entrepreneurship, organization best practices, competitive advantage is identified as factors influencing firm performance while the firm performance considered both financial and non-financial perspective. The proposed framework allows the identification of the factors to be driving SMEs performances and the capture of holistic firm performance within the craft industry.

Oman, administered by the Middle Eastern standards, is a middle income economy, where oil makes a larger
contribution to the GDP of the country. Like every other nation in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), the Sultanate
of Oman too has been adversely affected by the decline in oil prices over the past year. The country saw its revenues
go down by more than 50% in recent years. Thereby Oman started to rethink its strategies. Presently Oman is into
its vision Oman 2020, commenced in 1995 as a five year plan comprising series of goals for economic and social
development. It comprises economic and financial stability, redesigning government’s role in the economy with
the cooperation of the private sector, building a diversified economy based on national resources, globalization
of the Omani economy, upgrading the Omani workforce and developing human resources. There is an upcoming
concentration of entrepreneurship being injected into SMEs as a catalyst to achieve economic and social development
objectives, including growth, innovation, employment, and equity. SMEs can manifest within an economy in a number
of ways, and it includes both formal and informal economic activities for the purposes of creating wealth. Having
understood the significance of SMEs and its role in economic development of Oman the present study is undertaken
to explore the best orientation model that will enable entrepreneurs to rethink and implement the best entrepreneurial
marketing strategies via SMEs at Oman. A sampling frame of eighteen units comprising SMEs, public sector, private
sector and educational institutions was selected and an in-depth face to face semi-structured interview was carried
out. Case study approach with an investigation of contemporary phenomenon from selected units was undertaken.
Through this method various evidences were gathered from several sources like documentation, records, interviews,
direct observation, participant observation and physical artifacts. Thereby the present paper explores and describes
the phenomenon by qualitative content analysis through text interpretation method.

Pricing is a classical marketing instrument. While it affects companies of all sizes and categories, scientific research often sees pricing as focused on large enterprises, particularly the consumer products industry. In the limited amount of articles on SMEs and/or start-ups, new developments in pricing and/or marketing often receive no attention. The following paper aims to address this: using the most current findings from marketing research, its goal is to show which characteristics result for pricing in SMEs and start-ups, and which implications for management can be derived from them.

The impact of innovative and appropriate technologies on the livelihoods of the poor and the disadvantaged in developing countries has been the concern of DFID for some time.  Modern Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have the potential to play a substantial role in poverty reduction, but further knowledge and work on realising benefits and understanding the impact  of ICTs is needed.

This paper looks at examples of both types of intervention and their potential impact on poverty. It presents several methodologies for impact assessment and assesses their relevance and usefulness to ICT based projects, particularly in the field of enterprise development.