German economic performance has astonished the world. At the turn of the century, Germany had been written off as the sick man of Europe. No more. Even as most of its European neighbors and OECD trading partners have struggled in the face of a turbulent global economy, the German economy has thrived. How does Germany do it? What is the secret? In The Seven Secrets of Germany, authors David Audretsch and Erik Lehmann answer these very questions. This book reveals, explains, and analyzes seven key aspects of Germany, its economy, and its society that have provided the nation with considerable buoyance in an era of global turbulence. These seven features range from the key and strategic role played by small firms to world leadership in its skilled and trained labor force, an ability to harness global opportunities through leveraging local resources, public infrastructure, the capacity to deal with change and confront challenges in a flexible manner, and the emergence of a remarkably positive identity and image. The Seven Secrets of Germany have insulated the country from long-term economic deterioration and enabled it to take advantage of the opportunities afforded from globalization rather than succumbing as a victim to globalization. This insights can be instructive to other countries and refute the defeatist view that globalization leads to an inevitable deterioration of the standard of living, quality of life, and degree of economic prosperity.

The Seven Secrets of Germany: Economic Resilience in an Era of Global Turbulence

Business & Money

Audretsch, David B.

Lehmann, Erik E.

Economics

Oxford University Press

By serving as a conduit for knowledge spillovers, entrepreneurship is the missing link between investments in new knowledge and economic growth. The knowledge spillover theory of entrepreneurship provides not just an explanation of why entrepreneurship has become more prevalent as the factor of knowledge has emerged as a crucial source for comparative advantage, but also why entrepreneurship plays a vital role in generating economic growth. Entrepreneurship is an important mechanism permeating the knowledge filter to facilitate the spill over of knowledge and ultimately generate economic growth.

Entrepreneurship and Economic Growth

Keilbach, Max C.

A stream of research has begun to examine other forms of entrepreneurship, one of them being niche entrepreneurship with hidden champions being a prime example of these. Many economies are powered by rather small and medium sizes companies and some of these companies have become world-market leaders in highly specific niche markets and had been termed "hidden champions". Hidden champions are small to midsized companies that are often technology leaders within their niche market yet they are not commonly known to the public given their specialized markets. They are often located in rural areas and serve B2B markets so that they are only known by customers and the local community. The Evolution of Hidden Champions as Niche Entrepreneurs portrays hidden champions as an important vehicle in shaping a country's technological and economic competitiveness, revealing their key business strategies and investigating their evolution over space (geographical distribution) and time (technological change). Finally, the authors illustrate the subsequent growth in academic research which show that economies differ in providing hidden champions with an institutional environment that complementarily fits their individual strategic choices. The second part of this work analyses the evolution of hidden champions over time.The monograph starts by introducing a fundamental concept of hidden champions. Section 2 defines the concept and distinguishes it from similar concepts. Section 3 presents the key characteristics of hidden champions and provides empirical evidence from research on hidden champions. Section 4 presents the evolution of hidden champions, both geographically and historically. Section 5 outlines the development of the hidden champions' research field and its main milestones. Section 6 then presents the key contemporary discussions around hidden champions. Section 7 concludes and provides an outlook into future research.

The Evolution of Hidden Champions as Niche Entrepreneurs (Foundations and Trends(r) in Entrepreneurship)

Schenkenhofer, Julian

Business Development & Entrepreneurship

Now Publishers

Corporate Governance in IPO Firms encompasses theories and concepts analyzing, judging and describing financial decisions in entrepreneurial firms and draws on positive and normative aspects of entrepreneurship. In a positive way, this monograph describes these phenomena in aspects of governance issues in IPO firms, and why and how governance structures shape the behavior, the boundaries and the performance of these firms. In a normative way, this monograph offers concepts on how institutions and mechanisms should be designed and work to optimize a respective goal or performance associated with the IPO of an entrepreneurial firm. Corporate governance mechanisms in IPO firms differ from the traditional corporate governance issues in several ways. First, an IPO confronts the founder-manager of the firm with the trade-off between obtaining additional resources to sustain future growth and profits and maintaining total control of the company. Secondly, this constitutes a trade-off for investors between the expected returns of a risky investment and the agency costs associated with moral hazard and adverse selection effects caused by imperfect and asymmetric information. Thirdly, analyzing IPOs offers insights into how these agency costs are priced by investors at the point in time that these costs occur. Fourthly, of difference is which governance mechanisms are at work at this initial stage of a company's lifecycle. Finally, analyzing corporate governance issues in IPO's offers additional insights on the macro level and reveals country-specific differences.

Corporate Governance in IPO Firms (Annals of Corporate Governance)

Vismara, Silvio

Management & Leadership

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Books by Lehmann, Erik E.