This project first studies the costs and benefits of holding liquid assets for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). Second, the project examines the impact of corporate liquidity on investment in SMEs before, during and after the 2007-2009 financial crisis. For this purpose, a multi-country, longitudinal database of SMEs will be used.
Micro-small-medium-sized enterprises (MSME) constitute 99% of formally established enterprises in Latin-American countries such as Ecuador. However, MSMEs’ levels of productivity are often exceedingly low due to inefficient management of activities, times, and resources. These MSMEs are also confronted with the global trend to become more sustainable. Although theoretical models on sustainability have been developed, we identify the need to ...
Topic 1: Search behaviour, is defined as to find solutions for problems, to acquire heterogeneous knowledge, to seize innovative opportunities, and to keep up with environment changes. Existing literature based on the behavioral theory of the firm (BTOF) has suggested that problems and resources, as two critical factors, can trigger a firm’s search behaviours. In our study, we add the time effects and discuss how underperformance duration and ...
This PhD research focuses on the social, economic and environmental impact assessment of innovative types of small-scale processing systems that yield high-quality products with high nutritional value in response to consumer needs. The processing systems are mobile or flexible units that are used by vegetable producers and/or small and medium-sized enterprises of the first processing stage. The processing systems, that focus on mild and ...