IfM Bonn News

How can innovation in small and medium-sized enterprises be effectively supported? How can the digital transformation be brought to the attention of particularly small businesses?

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How should university spin-offs interact with key players in their region in order to gain access to important resources and knowledge? How can they generate business growth at the same time? Dr Julia Mokhtar and Assoc. Prof. Dr Mirjam Knockaert examined these questions during a workshop held by the …

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There is broad consensus among family businesses in Germany that an ecological transition is necessary. But from the perspective of the Mittelstand, the key question at present is how companies can achieve a climate-friendly transformation while at the same time remaining competitive.

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Innovations play a key role for companies. In his policy brief "Vocational Qualifications in the Context of Innovation: Does Firm Size Matter?", Dr Jörg Thomä (ifh Göttingen) explains why vocational training not only helps to secure skilled workers, but also strengthens the innovative power of …

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Which role do family members play in supporting female entrepreneurs? How do cultural factors affect their businesses?

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Germany has around 3.6 million self-employed people. A third of them are women, and a quarter of all self-employed people have a migrant background.

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If entrepreneurs can draw on individual social capital and functioning networks and if they are also mentally and emotionally stabile, it is generally easier for them to survive sudden disruptions and crises.

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Research by Dr Nadine Schlömer-Laufen, Olga Suprinovič and Dr Markus Rieger-Fels shows that demographic change is leading to an increase in the number of family businesses looking for a successor.

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As in the past four years, the issue of "skilled workers/demographic development“was the biggest challenge for entrepreneurs in 2025: According to the survey, four in ten companies find it difficult to recruit qualified staff despite the current economic slowdown.

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Entrepreneurship research has traditionally focused primarily on companies with exceptional developments.

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Although 63% of exporting companies report feeling the direct im-pact of US tariffs through higher costs, and 60% are experiencing indirect effects such as declining demand, German companies are responding in a largerly pragmatic manner.

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Does public childcare provision help reduce the gender differences in the propensity of starting a business?

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Federal Minister of Economics Katherina Reiche has appointed Professor Friederike Welter as a member of the SME Advisory Board at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy.

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According to estimates by the IfM Bonn, a succession will be due in around 186,000 companies over the next five years, as their owners are expected to step down from management because of age, illness or death.

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Representatives of the Organisation for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises and Regional Innovation and the Japan External Trade Organisation met with Dr Christian Schröder, Dr Jonas Löher und Dr Sebastian Schneider at the end of November to discuss the progress of digital transformation in Germany.

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