Professor George Saridakis, Head of Marketing, Entrepreneurship & International Business at Kent Business School has completed a project with GoDaddy.com, the world’s largest web hosting service and a domain registrar, to examine the impact of microbusinesses on the economy.
The Great Britain Microbusiness White Paper by Prof. George Saridakis, Dr. Nicholas Litsardopoulos and Prof. Chris Hand studied more than two million UK businesses to investigate altering demographics of British microbusinesses capturing the effects of the pandemic. Microbusinesses are defined as those made up of 10 or less people.
Key findings of the report included:
- Deprived neighbourhoods benefit from proximity to entrepreneurship hubs (e.g., East London Tech City)
- Online businesses can act as a source of alternative income in periods of economic volatility.
- Online microbusiness venturing seems to have beneficial impact on the prosperity of locations with a higher proportion of women, or with a gender-balanced population (e.g., Stockport).
- Self-employment is positively associated with microbusiness venture density, whereas wage-employment negatively associated with it.
- The highest densities of online microbusiness are located in areas of London, the South-East, and the South-West.
- Start-up owners aged under 35 have more than doubled since March 2020, rising from 16.4% to 34%. Among this group, the proportion aged 18-24 has soared from just 1.7% pre-pandemic, to 8.6% in the two years after the Covid-19 outbreak.
- Unemployment increases microbusiness venture density, while the increase in microbusiness venture density leads to lower unemployment in the short run.
- Individuals in areas with high frequency of internet use are more likely to start their own online microbusiness and are less likely to report being unemployed.
- Individuals living in regions with lower microbusiness venture density are less likely to intend to start their own business.
Prof. Saridakis said: “The job creation findings are particularly salient in more disadvantaged locations, suggesting that online microbusiness venturing plays an important role in developing and strengthening business activity of these locations.
“The data provide concrete evidence of the benefits of increases in online microbusiness density on employment and business turnover. The data also provide strong evidence that online microbusiness density increase benefits the prosperity of disadvantaged neighbourhoods in several indicators, such as jobs, income, and living environment.”
Professor George Saridakis is interested in the area of small firms and entrepreneurship, with a further interest in the social media, illicit behaviour and supply chain linked to business performance and economic growth. His research typically uses cross-sectional, time-series and panel data approaches.