The main purpose of this study is to identify the major driving factors that determine the environmental commitments and certification ownership of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Turkey. Turkey has been undergoing major economic and environmental developments since 1990ies. SMEs play a significant role in the Turkish economy, constituting 99.8% of total enterprises in number. Even though most managers overlook their firms&rsquo / particular impacts, SMEs&rsquo / cumulative effect on natural environment is significant. According to previous research, regulations, community, competitors, suppliers, consumers and media have been found to be the main external determinants that affect a manager&rsquo / s attitudes about the environment and therefore his or her firm&rsquo / s environmental commitments / whereas managers&rsquo / beliefs about the environment, their confidence in their firm&rsquo / s abilities and resources and their environmental governance principles are the internal determinants. In line with previous research findings, this study tries to examine the effects of these factors along with the demographic characteristics of the manager&rsquo / s. As the results of the questionnaire distributed to 80 SME managers in Ankara suggest, institutional and social pressures and manager&rsquo / s confidence in him/herself and his/her firm&rsquo / s abilities showed to have significant influence on the firm&rsquo / s environmental commitments, along with the size of the company and the education level of the manager. In addition to that, external pressures and size are also major factors driving SMEs to obtain environmental certifications.

International programmes, namely Framework Programmes 6, 7, and European Research Cooperation Agency (EUREKA), aim supporting national Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs) to subcontract their research needs to Research and Technological Development (RTD) performers. Main objective of this thesis is to measure level of success of knowledge transfer from RTD performers towards Turkish SMEs within the FP6, FP7 and EUREKA. The thesis proposes a model for knowledge transfer consisting of four stages: initiation, implementation, elaboration, and internalization. Extensive data is collected from sixty projects involved in these programmes via structured survey. The data is analyzed within the context of the proposed model via using the variables selected from the literature. Main findings show that the initiation stage is at a satisfactory level. The national SMEs continue learning from the international partners while they practice the knowledge they acquire, therefore, necessary support should be given to national SMEs to communicate as much as possible in order to receive as much knowledge as possible from their international partners, during implementation process. Level of absorptive capacity is indispensable for elaboration. Therefore, much effort is required to strengthen absorptive capacity of national SMEs. Internalization is the weakest stage. If internalization is not successfully achieved, it is hardly possible to sustain and systematize the knowledge. All stages are mutually exclusive. If the initiation is not based on real needs and expertise of the SMEs, implementation will fail. It will be difficult to elaborate on the knowledge / therefore, improvement of the knowledge will not be at expected level. Since the improvement will not be sustained, internalization of the knowledge will be less, which will undermine successful transfer.

<p>Absorptive capacity is fundamental for small-middle enterprises to increase their innovativeness and competitiveness in the market place. Human resources, being the most important asset in SMEs, might help firms to obtain adequate levels of absorptive capacity through a planned set of human resource practices. The hu-man costs of implementing such practices, however, cannot be neglected, and this paper studies the relationship between these different variables.</p>

<p>Small and medium sized companies are important to the European economy and considered as the true backbone of the European economy, being primarily responsi-ble for wealth and economic growth. Further, the purchasing function of small and medium sized companies had become more and more important to firms within the creating of competitive advantages. Additional, former research emphasizes the need of companies to engage in closer relationships in order to survive in nowadays business environments.</p><p>These three issues, - SMEs, its purchasing performance and the relationships the small and medium sized firms are engaged with are interrelated and therefore the essences of the thesis. The thesis is limited to the manufacturing industry due to the potential wide area of small and medium sized companies.</p><p>The purpose of the thesis is to examine the purchasing practices of small and me-dium sized enterprises with a focus on strategic considerations and supplier relation-ships.</p><p>The research project is developed with four single case studies. Participating companies were two small sized manufacturing companies and two medium sized manufac-turing companies, defined according to the definition of the European Commission.</p><p>The study is built on a critical review of former literature and research findings within the purchasing area and the area of small and medium sized companies. The find-ings from literature review (frame of references) and the findings from the empirical study were connected in order to fulfill the purpose of the thesis as well as the developed research questions.</p><p>In the analysis, the characteristics of SMEs purchasing process were outlined. Evi-dence for strategic consideration were found and the characteristics of the companies relationships where established.</p><p>Small and medium sized enterprises have developed its purchasing performance po-sitively in the comparison to former research findings. By using business technology systems, strategic planning and deliberations and finally through building close and long-term relationships, manufacturing SMEs found a suitable ways to perform its purchasing activities successful and found its place in sophisticated supply chains.</p>

<p><strong>Introduction:</strong> Open Source ERP is considered as a viable alternative of proprietary ERP paradigm. Open Source ERP is getting more and more acceptance among Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) recently. Majority of Proprietary ERP vendors are changing their strategy nowadays and extend their focus on SMEs, even though SMEs are not that interested in Proprietary ERP systems. The factors that may motivate SMEs to select an Open Source ERP over proprietary ERP are not identified empirically in previous researches. Few researches raised the issue of cost and thus proposed that Open Source ERP is appropriate for SMEs. The other factors than cost involved in the selection process are yet to investigate empirically.</p><p><strong>Purpose:</strong> The overall purpose of this thesis work is to contribute in knowledge domain of Open Source ERP. Open Source ERP is an emergent area but it has the potential to attract many organizations to implement this kind of ERP Systems. The issue under investigation throughout this research will be the selection process of Open Source ERP in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs). The focus will be to identify mutually most important factors, from the perspective of SMEs and Suppliers that may motivate the Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) to select OS ERP.</p><p><strong>Method:</strong> Data obtained from the respondents is quantified in the research. Information gathered from the SMEs who have implemented Open Source ERP and from the Suppliers through web based survey. Two separate questionnaires comprised of various questions related to different factors in selecting of Open Source ERP solutions were made and sent to both SMEs and Suppliers of Open Source ERP. Opinion from an Open Source ERP expert is obtained regarding different factors motivate SMEs to select Open Source ERP. The results obtained from respondents through empirical findings were analyzed thereafter.</p><p><strong>Conclusions:</strong> SMEs were investigated regarding the importance of various rationales when they were selecting Open Source ERP solutions. The degree of importance of various factors in selection process might be diverse from organization to organization. It might be dependent on the size, geographical location of the organization or many other issues. Despite all this, there might be some common factors that may be always considered as foremost factors which influence SMEs to select an Open Source ERP over proprietary ERP.</p>

<p>In business today efforts are being taken in order to grow, while some firms slowly grow organically others decide to perform a merger or an acquisition (M&A). Firms performing M&As have a high failure rate and many times this is caused by a poorly handled post-acquisition process. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have, according to researchers, not the same ambition to grow compared to large firms, and the research area concerning the post-acquisition process is often from a large firm perspective. However, SMEs do perform M&As as well and therefore it is in our interest to investigate the post-acquisition process in SMEs and see how the post-acquisition process is performed in these firms.</p><p>The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the post-acquisition process in SMEs, this to highlight the SME characteristics in a post-acquisition process.</p><p>Our methodological approach in this study is hermeneutic. To collect empirical information we performed an interview study, where semi-structured interviews with the managing director or a member of the management team in four SMEs have been conducted. A model for analyzing has been constructed, which helped us to process the empirical information from a hermeneutic perspective.</p><p>The reason why the studied firms performed a M&A was to get access to a new customer base and to strengthen their market positions. The focus in the post-acquisition process has been on external value creation since the customers are highly valuated, and this can be related to the uncertain financial and environmental situation that SMEs experience. All firms in the study have chosen a high level of integration, though the planning in the firms has not been that extensive as the post-acquisition literature suggests. Further, several elements within the human resource area have been neglected in their planning, despite this three of the firms experienced a limited amount of resistance to change and this ought to be related to their SME characteristics. The employees are willing to follow the direction stated by the managing director, who has a high influence on the organization’s culture. In the firms we studied the centralization of power is one important element and the acquiring firms have preferred a unicultural organization, and in most cases a congruence con-cerning culture have occurred.</p>

<p>Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) prevail in their business communities and constitute the base of many nations’ economies. As a reason it is vital that SMEs show their active engagement and relatedness of their CSR activities making them at the core of their business strategies, as well as maintain their role as responsible citizens in their communities.CSR activities and practices being mainly developed by large corporations impede the way they can be applied on their smaller counterparts; ultimately leading to different results. SMEs require different solutions and run in different settings, which afford them unique opportunities to become sustainable enterprises. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the level of CSR engagement in Småland, Sweden. The study was divided into two parts, social (community wise) and environmental. We aimed to understand the reasons behind engagement and non-engagement in this matter. Also, it was important to find a pattern for future development of CSR among SMEs. We relied on previous research conducted for SMEs around Europe, and compared mainly the results from Sweden to our research findings.</p><p>This study was largely done by using the quantitative survey method, where a questionnaire was designed to collect the results. Descriptive and exploratory statistics is at the core of interpreting the results. Some of the findings were confirmed by previous research while the rest were either unprecendeted or surprising, both in a positive and negative way. The CSR involvement was highly related to the size of the companies, in total more than half of the companies were involved to some extent. The main reasons for involvement in local communities were ethical as well as to satisfy own employees. The reasons for non-engagement were due to lack of resources, time and money, but also the fact that many companies simply never thought about engagement. When it comes to the environmental part, the results showed that companies act very responsibly. They are also aware and compliant to legislations and have environmental policies. Again, ethical reasons were the main driving force behind environmental concerns for the companies, but also the enhancement of the image was a chief reason. In general, companies do not seem to find economical benefits behind the engagement in CSR and less than half of the companies that engage in social responsibilities today are planning on continuing in the near future. Social involvement is voluntary and companies choose to do it mainly because of ethical reasons. On an overall basis, the engagement of SMEs in social activities is quite weak to moderate, while in environmental engagement the results are to some extent more optimistic. However, we cannot allege that a handful of Smålands SMEs see the full business benefits of engagement and as a result they cannot be said to be working towards ‘doing well by doing good’. Policy makers, municipalities and larger firms need to support the SMEs in their further engagement.</p>

The Adoption of E-commerce in SMEs: An Empirical Investigation in Egypt It is recognised widely that e-commerce can offer substantial opportunities for Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs) to compete in the global market. In developing countries, e-commerce opportunities can be a meaningful approach for SMEs to be able to compete with large businesses and to access, with lowest possible costs, international markets. However, the current situation shows that SMEs continue to lag behind in maximising their capabilities in taking these chances. Universally, they are reported to be slow adopters of new technologies as a result of limited financial resources and lack of expertise. The importance, of SMEs, emerged from their positions since they contributed more than 90% to many developed or developing countries’ economies and they were considered to be the backbone of any economy. Hence, the main purpose, of conducting this research, was to increase the body of knowledge about the process of the adoption of e-commerce. This was done by a primary empirical focus on small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Egypt. SMEs represented about 90% of all Egyptian businesses (ITP, 2012). This study aimed to investigate the factors which could influence the SMEs’ adoption of e-commerce. In order to accomplish this objective, the researcher investigated the previous studies, on the same approach, in order to identify the gap, within the literature, regarding the adoption of e-commerce amongst SMEs. Additionally, the researcher integrated existing theories on the adoption of innovation in order to develop a conceptual framework for the determinants of the adoption of e-commerce in the SMEs sector. The researcher reviewed the Diffusion of Innovation (DOI); Resource Based View of the Firm (RBV); Technology–Organization–Environment (TOE) Model; and Technology Acceptance Models (TAM) to give constructive information about the firm and decision makers, within the firm, who were believed to have an impact on the adoption of innovation. 3 The proposed model was tested using quantitative research data. The data was collected by means of an online questionnaire survey and, subsequently, due to the high rate of non-respondents, changed to a face-to-face survey. A total of 130 usable responses were generated for purpose of analysis. The study contributed to the existing research by providing valuable information about the factors which influenced the SMEs’ adoption of e-commerce. As the results showed, there were 6 groups of factors which impacted mainly on the adoption processes. Namely, these were: Decision maker characteristics (education level, position within the firm, management support, management attitude); organisational characteristics (firm activity, firm size, firm’s assets/capital, firm age, employee’s IT knowledge, firm marketing capability); innovation characteristics (Perceived Relative Advantage); e-readiness (Individual and organisation e-readiness); government support; and barriers to e-commerce. This study’s findings offered important information for Egyptian government, policy makers and managerial participants; those were the people who encouraged the Egyptian SMEs to adopt e-commerce. These findings could be generalised to be applied to other countries with similar conditions to Egypt, as well as being applicable to Egyptian SMEs in other sectors.

Bakgrund: Småföretag i Sverige har fått en ökad betydelse i näringslivet. Bland annat kommer idag 60 procent av näringslivets bidrag till landet från småföretagare. För att underbygga framtida tillväxt och utveckling är det viktigt att företagen kan etablera sig även på internationella marknader. Detta är ett stort steg för kapitalbegränsade småföretag som därmed behöver vägledning både gällande internationalisering och val av etableringsform. I dagsläget är forskningen inom området begränsad gällande små teknikintensiva tjänsteföretag, vilket är den mest växande sektorn i det svenska näringslivet. Syfte: Studiens syfte är att analysera internationaliseringsprocessen och valet av etableringsform i utlandet för teknikintensiva småföretag som är verksamma inom den svenska tjänstesektorn. Metod: Studien har en kvalitativ forskningsstrategi samt en deduktiv forskningsansats. Den bygger på semistrukturerade intervjuer med tre tekniska småföretag inom tjänstesektorn och kan klassas som en komparativ flerfallstudie. Slutsats: Slutsatsen i studien är att det viktigaste verktyget för en lyckad utlandsetablering, är ett utpräglat kontaktnät. Studien visar också att den tekniska aspekten hos dessa företag, där tjänsten kan förmedlas via internet, medför att samarbete med en utländsk aktör är den minst risk- och kostnadsintensiva etableringsformen vid inledningen av en utlandsetablering, vilket motsäger och ifrågasätter den nuvarande forskningen inom ämnet. / Background: Small enterprises have become increasingly important in the Swedish business world. Among other things, 60 percent of the contribution to the country’s economy comes from small businesses. To support future growth and development it is important for companies to venture onto the international markets. This is a big step for small enterprises with constrained capital and guidance on the internationalization process and choice of entry mode is needed. Research on these two factors are limited in relation to small technology-focused enterprises in the service sector, which is the most rapidly growing sector in the Swedish economy. Aim: The aim of the study is to analyze the internationalization process and the choice of entry mode for small and technology-focused enterprises in the Swedish service sector. Methodology: The study has a qualitative research strategy and a deductive research approach. It is based on semi-structured interviews with three small technology-focused enterprises in the Swedish service sector and can be classified as a comparative case study. Conclusion: The conclusion of this study is that the most essential tool, for small technology-focused enterprises in the Swedish service sector when going abroad, is a distinct network of contacts. The study also reveals that the technical aspect of these types of companies implies that collaboration is the least risk and capital-intensive choice of entry mode at the beginning of a foreign establishment, which challenges the current research on the topic.

This thesis focuses on the internationalization process of SMEs, the strategies and methods they use. The major aim of this research was to gain a better understanding of the process by comparing and analyzing three main internationalization process theories: the Uppsala model, network theory and international entrepreneurship theory. An essential part of this study consisted of gathering empirical data from SMEs that has already been internationalized as well as from some of those who intend to internationalize in the near future. Our findings show the application and usefulness of the three theories to these SMEs, especially their heavy reliance on network relationships. The findings also indicate that firms use a combination of variables from all three theories and some aspects of the much criticized Uppsala model are still significant in describing the internationalization process behavior of SMEs.