4 Oct 2013 11:00 PM
It is widely known that small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) play an important role in the vitality of local economies around the globe. I was recently reminded just how important SMEs are as growth engines of our economies.
Microsoft commissioned The Boston Consulting Group to conduct an independent study, which surveyed more than 4,000 SMEs in five of the world's largest and most diverse economies: the United States, Germany, China, India and Brazil. The objectivewas to look at the economic impact of IT on small businesses today.
The study found that tech-savvy SMEs outperformed SMEs using little technology in innovation, job growth and increased revenues over the last three years. SME leaders using technology have grown their businesses and reduced costs, and one important factor seems to be increased worker productivity. According to BCG, if 15 percent of those SMEs that use little technology and 30 percent of SMEs who use moderate amounts of technology adopted the latest IT tools, they could boost their combined revenues by $770 billion and create more than 6 million new jobs in just those five markets combined. Who can afford to leave $770 billion on the table?
What I found particularly interesting is that leaders in emerging markets are even quicker than developed market counterparts to embrace new tools. More than 80 percent of tech leaders in emerging markets use cloud services, communication tools and enterprise resource planning software, compared to only 60 percent of tech leaders in developed markets. And technology leader firms with female founders have achieved average revenues that in most cases match or surpass those of male-founded companies.
Continue Reading this article here: http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2013/10/04/technology-means-growth-lessons-from-smes.aspx
Continue Reading this article here: http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2013/10/04/technology-means-growth-lessons-from-smes.aspx
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