Many other Western entertainment producers have also found their new homes in Chinese industrial enterprises. The movie studio which produced the Dark Knight trilogy was bought by a real estate magnate from Beijing for $3.5 billion. Since 2015, up to 70% of acquisitions of gaming companies reportedly have a Chinese buyer.
In 2016, the costs attributed to operating a business in Ukraine have been lower than in a respective index in 2015. In particular, during the past year, Ukrainians spent on average UAH 27,412 for the purposes of compliance with the effective regulatory requirements.
Equally promising is that many politicians have clearly understood what clever solutions are: connecting the already existing services, using of the current state of knowledge, putting pressure on solutions implemented through open online platforms, encouraging interactions with citizens, among others.
The cost of payment backlogs is not limited to the cost of maintaining the liquidity of the company. In addition to the interest on bank loans, one should also take into account all the additional costs associated with the monitoring of payments from contractors, chasing late payments, and growing risks caused by the delays.
In a way, digitization is old hat. E-mails turned 45 on September 30, 2016. In 1997, 4.1m Germans were online; today the figure is 58m. Growing up in today’s world, it is impossible to imagine being without a smartphone. But not having a landline phone or not owning a car? No problem.
49% of Ukrainian SMEs said they were inspected by a government body in 2015. These inspections took up to 14 days per year for a business on average, which means that businesses spent around 2 weeks of their operation time on dealing with the officials.
Bulgaria’s population is aging and shrinking. Labor Market demands are shifting quickly from low skill to high skill. Twenty percent of Bulgaria’s youth are NEEDS (not in employment or education). Almost 50% of Roma in the country have primary or lower education.
In 2015, the USAID Leadership in Economic Governance (LEV) Program conducted a large-scale survey of small and medium enterprises (Annual Business Climate Assessment in Ukraine). One of the features of this survey is that entrepreneurs themselves identify obstacles to doing business and reforms they expect from the state.
We believe that if the state ceases to intervene in the pricing mechanisms, the profitability of enterprises will improve, investments will increase and administrative burden on business will be reduced. On the other hand, there are certain risks that were the reason why the government abolished this regulation in the form of experiment.
Ranked 20th in the 2016 World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business Index, Lithuania has outstripped its closest neighbours Latvia and Poland. Yet, possibilities of forging ahead as one of the most business-friendly economies are not fully exhausted.
