Greeks more eager to start a new business

The easing of uncertainty and the economy’s improving growth prospects strengthened the number of new businesses in 2018, a trend that the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research (IOBE) believes has continued this year too, and with greater momentum.

The annual IOBE report on entrepreneurship showed on Wednesday that 6.4 percent of the population aged between 18 and 64 years (some 418,000 people) were in the initial stages of starting an enterprise, including self-employment, up from 4.8 percent in 2017. For this year, more than 8 percent of the population is estimated to have started a business activity. Opportunity entrepreneurship has also grown – i.e. starting a business out of choice – at the expense of necessity entrepreneurship, the IOBE survey found.

At the same time, there was a reduction from 4.8 percent in 2017 to 2.8 percent last year in the rate of people who stopped their business activity, mainly because of the lack of profits.

However, the new entrepreneurship retains its consolidated features, which are low innovation, entry into markets with strong competition, and the use of established technologies for the majority of ventures.