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Title: Resources and Business Failure in SMEs: Does Size Matter?

Authors: Densil A. Williams

Addresses: Author address listing can be found in the "About the Authors" section at the end of the article.

Abstract: Almost all analyses that use small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) as their unit of analysis treat this group of firms as a homogenous group. However, the literature indicates that the small business sector is more heterogeneous than originally thought. To test this assumption, this study investigates business failure among SMEs controlling for size of the firm. Using data from over 60,000 SMEs in the UK, the study utilizes logistic regression to model business failure with a number of surrogate measures for resources. The analysis is compartmentalized into small and medium-sized firms. The results reveal that the resources that impact business failure do in fact vary based on firm size. The implications of the findings are addressed in the paper.

Keywords: Business failure; SMEs; firm size; resources; logistic regression.

DOI: 10.1504/JBM.2014.141226

Journal of Business and Management, 2014 Vol.20 No.2, pp.89 - 102

Published online: 05 Sep 2024 *