Thesis supervisor: László Szerb
Location of studies (in Hungarian): Pécs, Rákóczi u. 80 Abbreviation of location of studies: KTK
Description of the research topic:
While the economic importance of the small businesses is well-known the micro- small- and medium size (SME) business sector is very heterogeneous including part time sole proprietorship as well as high growth potential medium sized ventures. Small business research is also heterogeneous focusing on one or a few functional areas like finance, strategy, or digitalization. Competitiveness researches typically aim to investigate larger sized firms and there is a lack to adopt it o the small business context. At the Faculty of business and Economics, University of Pécs, we have been dealing with small business competitiveness research and data collection for over ten years. We have collected data for about 1000 Hungarian SMEs covering all functional areas of the firm operation. Most recently we have started data collection in other countries like Spain, Costa Rica and Columbia. Within the framework of the Small Business Competitiveness Index (SCI) we identified the ten most important functional areas of competitiveness. The database provides a unique opportunity to examine all functional areas of SME competitiveness including human capital, internationalization, digitalization or strategy.
Required language skills: English Number of students who can be accepted: 2