MittelstandsWiki

Contrary to the message put forward by the Wirtschaftsjunioren Deutschland association (WJD), a current survey by the Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW) reveals less optimism on the German economy. In August the ZEW´ s economic indicator for Germany clearly fell by 20.7 points to -5.6 points, whereas in July it stood at 15.1 points. Thus the indicator is currently well below its historical average of 35.0 points. +++

German people are optimistic again about the future of the German economy. This was shown by a recent public opinion poll carried out by the Wirtschaftsjunioren Deutschland (WJD). Almost fifty percent of the more than 8.500 people questioned during the survey expect an economic upswing. People have not been that optimistic since the year 2000 which was a real boom year. +++

“Small and medium-sized entities and new markets – start into new spheres of growth” – this is the title of the seventh yearbook on research and practice in small and medium-sized entities (SMEs). The new almanac raises quite a lot of questions with regard to research and daily business of SMEs: Where and what are their new markets and where should these markets be? The new book combines all the relevant new knowledge not only from German speaking countries. +++

On Friday August 18th a new law on the introduction of a European cooperative legal form and on the modification of the existing cooperative legislation was put into effect. “There will be quite a lot of changes to existing cooperatives as well as for those to be set up in future, and the cooperative legal form will become more attractive”, said Mrs. Brigitte Zypries, Federal minister of justice. +++

After having reached a 15-year-high last month the opinion of SMEs on the economic outlook has – as expected – been less optimistic in July. This is confirmed by the current findings of the KfW-ifo-barometer survey carried out each month by the KfW banking group in co-operation with the Munich based ifo Institute. +++

There is an ever increasing need on the part of small and medium-sized entities (SMEs) to know all relevant management ratios and to include them into their financial communication. Therefore the German Federal Association of Information Management, Telecommunication and New Media e.V. (BITKOM) in co-operation with the Ernst & Young AG accounting agency has developed a benchmark system called BWLK which is subject to a charge and which takes into consideration 22 management ratios. +++

One reason, among others, for which open source software is an interesting thing is its reduced cost. Many open source programmes are even available for free. If such programmes are meant for commercial use, it is advisable to rely on high quality products which are mostly not free of charge. Otherwise downtimes may quickly turn out to be quite expensive in the case of software flaws. But which open source software should be used? Which one is suitable for application in a small and medium-sized entity? To answer these questions OpenSource4Ebusiness.com provide a 140-pages guide on open source for free-of-charge-download. +++

Sometimes it is the inconspicuous news which is of special interest – in particular if provided by insiders. Mr. Henning Wüst, lawyer and specialist in labour law, on his “Arbeitsrechtblog” website has published a guide on how to use in-house instructions published on internal webpages of the German Federal Labour Office. Given that this advice is given by an experienced lawyer we assume that it is legally correct.

The personnel departments of German companies and administrative bodies are still not well prepared for the entry into force of the general equal treatment law (AGG), the former anti-discrimination law, which took effect on August 18th. This is the finding of a joint survey by LexisNexis Germany and the “World Of Staff” personnel consulting agency which was carried out among 100 companies. In particular small and medium-sized entities expect to be faced with serious consequences. +++

The general equal treatment law (AGG) was put into force on Friday. “By introducing this law Germany meets its obligation of translating four EU directives on the protection from discrimination into national policy”, says Dr. Gerhard Sabathil, the EU Commission’s chief representative in Germany, who welcomes the entry into force of the new law… +++