G. Pitsilis: Very soon the process of starting or stopping a business will be done digitally

Small and medium-sized enterprises, despite the structural problems, can become a key player in economic growth and innovation in Greece. This is the conclusion of the hybrid event of CompeteGR, the Council of Competitiveness of Greece, which took place yesterday afternoon with the theme: “The power of small: unleashing the potential of small and medium enterprises”.

According to today’s announcement, the Deputy Minister of Finance, Theodoros Skylakakis, in his statement, stated that the size of a company should not affect its treatment by the state and the banking system, but on the other hand the so-called economies of scale should encourages business partnerships and mergers as it is an important element of competitiveness. He also spoke about a characteristic of Greek small, medium and large enterprises: It is smaller than the corresponding foreign countries, while at the same time, as he said, there is a relatively large undeclared business activity, which completely excludes them from bank financing, but also makes it difficult for them to access other productive resources. All the above deduct points of competitiveness from Greek small businesses while on the other hand the banking system does not focus on small and medium enterprises.

The governor of AADE, George Pitsilis, taking stock of the actions of the Independent Public Revenue Authority, particularly focused on the goal of AADE to reduce the time that a small and medium enterprise devotes to fulfilling its tax obligations. This has been done and is being done through the digitization, simplification and standardization of dozens of processes and services, and of course by the fight against bureaucracy. George Pitsilis also stood at the new digital service myAADE, where the citizen can communicate digitally with over 90 tax authorities.

He also referred to the digital invoicing platform, which has issued more than 2 million invoices to date, while very soon the entire process of starting a business will be done digitally, as well as the cessation of operations.

The other speakers focused on the fact that small and medium-sized enterprises in our country, despite the basic structural problems and major challenges, such as sole proprietorships, their small footprint in the market, problematic access to finance and small-scale economies, can have faster growth and more opportunities through easier access to new technologies and digital services from around the world, but also through networking and collaboration with other companies in Greece and abroad. At the same time, they can more easily manage new regulations, such as the ESG, and thus gain a competitive advantage.

Finally, they can more easily gain access to a single supplier, for example through wider alliances, as long as they have the necessary tools for support, training, networking and funding from the government, but also from the entire business ecosystem.

More specifically, the president of the Central Union of Chambers and the Athens Chamber of Commerce, Giannis Chatzitheodosiou, stated that the vast majority of companies in Greece are very small (1-9 people) while 5% are small (10-49 employees) with the most small businesses lag behind in many areas of competitiveness and the integration of new technologies that prevent them from growing, especially in the manufacturing sector.

“Despite the fact that there are many actions of empowerment, collaborations – synergies, digital transformation and financing, as long as the financing goes through the banking system, it does not reach small businesses,” said Mr. Hatzitheodosiou.

The president of the National Chamber Network of Women Entrepreneurs and First Vice President of EVEA, Sofia Kounenaki Efraimoglou, said that small and medium enterprises want the support of all of us to strengthen their competitiveness. Two factors are important for their future:

The first is innovation and technology, which dramatically change the data in the business environment and can give them a global impetus. The second factor concerns the emergence of women entrepreneurship which can give another perspective and new dimensions to the issue since it is a lever of economic growth. This is confirmed by a recent report by the Boston Consulting Group which states that if women participated equally in entrepreneurship, world GDP would be higher by 3 to 6%.

The President of CompeteGR, Simos Anastasopoulos, stated: “Countries are recovering from the crisis as quickly as their competitiveness allows, while a critical size in any case is the ability to produce innovation at all levels and especially for the production of new products and services. “. This finding was made through the change of the productive model of our country from introversion to extroversion and the presentation of products and services that can compete globally “.

“Innovation is the driving force for development and prosperity,” he added.

The consolidation of a stable economic and investment environment by the government, the integrated plan by the European recovery fund, but also the effort to integrate innovation in entrepreneurship has attracted foreign investment in our country and has given Greece the characterization of a best practice worldwide . At the same time, the transition to a digital, green and sustainable economy will further improve our competitiveness, said Mr. Anastasopoulos.

For her part, Dr. Venice Kousia, General Manager of CompeteGR, focused on the low performance of Greece in terms of competitiveness of small and medium enterprises, since our country, as she said, is characterized by “nano-atomic” enterprises, while adding that , many of their founders, started the business for the wrong reasons, without having the ability to lead a team but also with a lack of vision. He was particularly supportive of government-sponsored entrepreneurship, especially in the last two years, which is moving in the right direction, which he said will motivate young people interested in doing business.

Finally, as it became known, CompeteGR in collaboration with the Delphi Economic Forum will organize the Global Innovation Summit for 2022 in Athens.