Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) rarely grow into larger companies in France because they are bought out by existing companies, an INSEE official said on Wednesday.
“The SMEs that, due to their activity, see their size grow, either in number of employees or in billing, are quite a few. Generally, they are bought,” says Sylvain Moreau, director of statistical companies at the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies , during a presentation to the press of the 2022 edition of the “Companies in France” publication.
“As soon as they reach a certain size, they are absorbed by larger companies, and it is through this phenomenon that employment and the activity of ETIs (intermediate-sized companies) grow,” he pointed out.
“We do not have any recent example of an SME that has grown to become an ETI”
SMEs have up to 250 employees, mid-caps employ between 250 and 5,000.
A finding that raises questions as France has been trying for years to catch up with Germany and Italy, which have many more industrial TSIs.
“Very large French companies are old companies that are between 50 and 100 years old. There are no large companies that have appeared recently” unlike, in particular, the United States, Sylvain Moreau still points out.
The ETIs have a total of 4 million employees in France, or a quarter of the jobs in the market sector. Between 2009 and 2019, the French ETIs created 280,600 jobs, while the foreign ETIs present in France lost 57,300, most of the job cuts occurred between 2009 and 2013, following the financial crisis, points out the ‘Insee in a study.
ETI job losses affect industry above all, with 63,900 jobs lost in the same period.
Source: BFM TV
