More than one in two European SMEs consider the use of new digital technologies necessary to secure their competitiveness. Many small and medium-sized enterprises have not yet made much progress here due to a number of digitalisation hurdles, including insufficient digital infrastructures and a lack of digital competency, both in the business itself and on the external labour market. This is shown in a joint study from KfW Research and the European promotional institutions Bpifrance, BGK, ICO and the British Business Bank, in which more than 2,500 small and medium-sized enterprises in Germany, France, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom were surveyed. Although some SMEs anticipate that some tasks in their company may become obsolete as a result of digitalisation, most of them believe that the number of employees in their company will remain stable – or even grow.

European SME Survey 2019(PDF, 7 MB, non-accessible)