SMEs in the EU

News and information about the European Union's policies for small and medium-sized businesses.

VAT — 28 June 2021, 22:09 CET

The application of VAT is decided by national tax authorities but there are some standard EU rules, which are explained on this European Commission website. Check basic VAT rules in each EU country, and consult a Tax information Communication database.

Tripartite Social Summit: Put competitiveness first, including in Climate Policy — 23 October 2014, 15:30 CET

On the eve of the European Council, at the Tripartite Summit, European Social Partners met with the Heads of State, the European Union President Van Rompuy and the EU Commission President Barroso on the topic “how to stimulate investments to create more jobs”. UEAPME – the European Craft and SME association – insists on the need to make best use of the growth momentum by putting SMEs’ competitiveness at the forefront.

Smart Regulation — 14 October 2014, 18:18 CET

To ensure that EU action is effective, the European Commission assesses the impact of policies, legislation, trade agreements and other measures at every stage - from planning to implementation and review. Before the EU takes action: The Commission publishes roadmaps describing planned initiatives; and Commission impact assessments examine potential economic, social and environmental consequences. After EU action: following implementation, initiatives are evaluated to check their performance; and REFIT (Regulatory Fitness and Performance Programme) identifies opportunities to reduce regulatory burdens and simplify existing laws.

High Level Group on Administrative Burdens — 14 October 2014, 18:09 CET

The high-level group advises the European Commission on how to reduce administrative burdens linked to its legislation. Examples include recommendations concerning the facilitation of electronic invoicing and the exemption of micro enterprises from EU accounting rules.

Smart Regulation in the EU - making EU law lighter — 14 October 2014, 18:24 CET

The European Commission is taking stock of its efforts to make EU law lighter, simpler and less costly. Under the title "Smart Regulation in the EU – Building on a Strong Foundation" politicians, stakeholders and experts have been examining the achievements and persisting challenges in the field of smart regulation, administrative burden reduction and better implementation of EU legislation. On this occasion, Dr Edmund Stoiber, the Chairman of the independent High Level Group on Administrative Burdens advising the Commission since 2007, will hand over the group's final report to EC President José Manuel Barroso.

SMEs Performance Review — 06 October 2014, 14:51 CET

In 2013, economic conditions remained challenging for SMEs in most Member States. Economic results suggest there is a recovery, but it is uneven and not yet following a robust trajectory. These are the conclusions of the annual SMEs Performance Review and country-specific SBA factsheets published on 3 October by the European Commission.

Directive on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information — 30 September 2014, 22:19 CET

The EU Council adopted on 29 September the Directive on disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by large companies and groups.

EU funds Open and Disruptive Innovation — 18 September 2014, 22:05 CET

The European Commission is committing EUR 90 million to Open and Disruptive Innovation over the next 12 months.

FIWARE makes EUR 80m available for Europe's SMEs — 17 September 2014, 18:25 CET

The European Commission has launched the FIWARE Accelerator Programme, enabling EUR 80 million to be awarded to SMEs, Startups and web-entrepreneurs using FIWARE Technologies. The FIWARE Accelerator is a network of European organisations which has already launched first calls for proposals earlier this month. The remaining calls were presented in Munich on 17th & 18th September on the occasion of the European Conference on Future Internet.

Member States' Competitiveness Report 2014: Reindustrialising Europe — 11 September 2014, 23:04 CET

Progress has been made by Member States to improve the competitiveness of their economies, but many challenges still remain. An updated Industrial performance scoreboard assesses Member States' industrial performance in five key areas, namely innovation and sustainability; business environment, services and infrastructure; public administration; finance and investment; and skills.

Industrial competitiveness - Commission reports — 11 September 2014, 23:10 CET

EU manufacturing possesses a number of competitive strengths that should be leveraged to promote economic growth, despite the current difficult economic environment. This is the conclusion of the two reports on industrial competitiveness released by the Commission today. However to ensure that growth does not stall, the EU and Member States urgently need to address a number of areas of concern: investment, access to finance, public administration, access to foreign markets, innovation and energy prices.

Unfair trading practices in the food supply chain — 15 July 2014, 22:30 CET

The European Commission adopted on 15 July a Communication encouraging EU Member States to look for ways to improve protection of small food producers and retailers against the unfair practices of their sometimes much stronger trading partners. Before a food product reaches the consumer, many different market players (producers, processors, retailers, etc.) in the supply chain add to its quality and value. Due to developments such as increased market concentration, there are very different levels of bargaining power in the relations between the players in the supply chain. Whilst differences in bargaining powers are common and legitimate in commercial relationships, these imbalances can in some cases lead to unfair trading practices (UTPs).

Green Action Plan for SMEs — 02 July 2014, 13:33 CET

A new Green Action Plan (GAP) for SMEs: Enabling SMEs to turn environmental challenges into business opportunities emphasises the role of green growth in ensuring a lasting economic recovery within the longer term vision of a resource-efficient and low-carbon European economy.

Interoperability as a means for modernising the public sector — 26 June 2014, 22:52 CET

The European Commission has adopted a proposal for a new programme that will help EU Member States to modernise their administrations and provide interoperable digital services at national and European level.

Guidelines to help EU businesses use the Cloud — 26 June 2014, 22:07 CET

Guidelines to help business users save money and get the most out of cloud computing services were presented to the European Commission on 26 June. Cloud computing allows individuals, businesses and the public sector to store their data and carry out data processing in remote data centres, saving on average 10-20 per cent.

EU Platform on undeclared work — 10 April 2014, 16:37 CET

The European Commission is proposing a new EU Platform to bring together all the various national enforcement bodies involved in the fight against undeclared work.

Single-Member Companies Directive — 10 April 2014, 16:20 CET

Today, SMEs face too many obstacles that hamper their economic activities within the Single Market. From the perspective of company law, they often find it costly and difficult to do business across borders. Only a small number of SMEs (2%) invest and establish subsidiaries abroad. The proposal for a Directive on single-member private limited liability companies tackles these obstacles as it would standardise requirements for the creation of companies with a single shareholder. It would remove the burdensome process of registering subsidiaries and make it easier for SMEs to operate across the EU.

Corporate governance package — 10 April 2014, 16:03 CET

The European Commission has today adopted measures to improve the corporate governance of around 10 000 companies listed on Europe’s stock exchanges. This would contribute to the competitiveness and long-term sustainability of these companies. Other proposals would also provide cost-efficient company law solutions for SMEs which operate across borders. The package of measures implements key actions identified in the Communication on the long-term financing of the European economy of 27 March.

Long-term finance: positive on regulation but not enough for SMEs — 27 March 2014, 17:00 CET

UEAPME welcomes progress on regulatory aspects, but criticises poor proposals for SME finance

Final Simplification Scoreboard - simpler EU funding rules — 04 March 2014, 17:52 CET

The Commission has adopted its Final Simplification Scoreboard: over 120 measures to simplify the EU funding rules for Europe's businesses, towns, regions, scientists and NGOs.

Innovation Union Scoreboard 2014 — 04 March 2014, 17:41 CET

Europe is closing its innovation gap with the United States and Japan but differences in performance between EU Member States are still high and diminishing only slowly. At a regional level, the innovation gap is widening, with the innovation performance having worsened in almost one fifth of EU regions. These are the main results of the European Commission's Innovation Union Scoreboard 2014 and the Regional Innovation Scoreboard 2014. The overall ranking within the EU remains relatively stable, with Sweden at the top, followed by Denmark, Germany and Finland – the four countries that invest most in research and innovation. The countries whose position has improved the most are Portugal, Estonia and Latvia. Overall progress has been driven by the openness and attractiveness of the EU research system as well as business innovation collaboration and the commercialisation of knowledge as measured by licence and patent revenues from abroad. However, growth in public R&D expenditure was offset by a decline in venture capital investment and non-R&D innovation investment in companies.

Company Law and Corporate Governance — 10 June 2019, 18:01 CET

The purpose of EU rules in this area is to: enable businesses to be set up and to carry out operations anywhere in the EU; provide protection for shareholders and other parties with a particular interest in companies, such as employees and creditors; make business more efficient, competitive and sustainable in the long term; encourage businesses based in different EU countries to cooperate with each other. EU company reporting, auditing and transparency rules complement this legal framework.

New tourism quality principles — 20 February 2014, 13:37 CET

The European Commission proposed on 20 February a set of voluntary European Tourism Quality Principles to ensure that tourists travelling to other EU Member States or visiting our continent from third countries will get value for their money. These principles cover four main areas: staff training under the supervision of a quality coordinator, consumer satisfaction to ensure that tourist can rely on handling of their complaints, cleanliness and maintenance, and correctness and reliability of information in at least the most relevant foreign language. Such access to reliable and up-to-date information on the quality of tourism services enables tourists to differentiate among competing products, to make an informed choice and to overcome linguistic difficulties. Small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) will find it easier to emphasize that they are providing a high quality service by sticking to the principles. The proposal will therefore help SMEs which make up over 90% of the EU tourism sector.

Challenges and opportunities of EU re-industrialisation: 2013 EU industrial structure report — 17 February 2014, 22:09 CET

According to a European Commission report published today on the current status of EU industry, most sectors have still not regained their pre-crisis level of output and significant differences exist between sectors and Member States. The "EU industrial structure report 2013: Competing in Global Value Chains" sheds more light on the downward trend in manufacturing. Also highlighted are the mutually beneficial links between manufacturing and services as well as the importance of global value chains. The report ultimately underlines the growing need to mainstream industrial competitiveness into other policy fields. These issues, recently highlighted by the Commission's Communication on a European Industrial Renaissance, will be directly addressed at the forthcoming Competitiveness Council meeting on 20-21 February.

Startup Europe — 13 February 2014, 17:43 CET

ICT and web entrepreneurs create new jobs for young people. Their businesses help transform the economy and the society. Startup Europe is a Digital Agenda initiative supported by Vice President Neelie Kroes promoting ICT and web entrepreneurs to start their business in Europe and to let them flourish in Europe. Therefore, she invites promising entrepreneurs to join The Startup Europe Tour: to be connected, to network and to be inspired for the leading tech conferences.