The Scottish Government

A National Statistics Publication for Scotland

SCOTTISH CORPORATE SECTOR STATISTICS 2008

This publication provides information on Scotland's business stock in 2008. The tables include information on businesses' employment and turnover and are broken down into various groupings including industry, company size, local authority area, and country of ownership.

The main points are as follows:

• The total number of private sector enterprises in Scotland was 282,125 as at March 2008. A 0.9% increase since March 2007.
• The associated employment was 2 million (2.3% increase).
• Small enterprises (0-49 employees) accounted for almost all of the rise in the total number of businesses, although the number of unregistered firms (i.e. those not registered for VAT or PAYE) decreased by 1%.
• Large enterprises (250+ employees) accounted for nearly 60% of the total increase in employment, with the total employment among small and medium firms also increasing over the period (1.1% and 3.9% respectively).
• Over the medium term (between 1999 and 2008), the total number of enterprises has increased by 22% (over 50,000 enterprises).
• The number of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Scotland was 279,840 as at March 2008. A 0.9% increase since March 2007.
• SMEs accounted for 99% of enterprises and 53% of employment.
• Registered enterprises with ultimate ownership outside Scotland accounted for 3% of businesses and 35% of employment. Within large firms (250+ employees) they accounted for 81% of businesses and 63% of employment.

Table 1: Number of Enterprises in Scotland

All the above figures exclude central and local government.

More information and a full set of tables can be found on the publication website at the following link:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Business/Corporate

Background Notes

1. The estimates have been constructed using data from the Inter Departmental Business Register (IDBR) operated by the Office for National Statistics, the Labour Force Survey (LFS), the Family Resources Survey (FRS) and the Survey of Personal Incomes (SPI). The IDBR extract provides an estimate of the number of enterprises registered for VAT and/or PAYE. A procedure that combines data from the IDBR with estimates derived from the LFS, FRS and SPI is used to estimate the number of unregistered enterprises (see Methodology section of the publication website for further details).

2. The estimates include enterprises that operate in Scotland irrespective of whether their head office is located in Scotland or elsewhere. Each enterprise is however only counted once in Scotland irrespective of the number of local business sites.

3. Enterprises are classified by employee size bands on the basis of the number of their total UK employees.

4. The number of enterprises with no employees (where the enterprise is owned and managed by the same individual(s)) which are not registered on the IDBR is estimated from a combination of surveys which are all subject to sampling error. For example a yearly estimate of 6,000 taken from the Labour Force Survey has a 95% confidence interval of +/- 2,640. It is the nature of sampling variability that the smaller the group whose size is being estimated, the proportionately less precise that estimate is. Very small estimates are subject to larger standard errors, which can result in fluctuation between years. For this reason year on year comparisons containing the smallest size band (enterprises with no employees) should be regarded with caution.

5. National Statistics are produced to high professional standards set out in the National Statistics Code of Practice. They undergo regular quality assurance reviews to ensure that they meet customer needs. They are produced free from any political interference.

Issued by:

Office of the Chief Economic Adviser
Meridian Court
5 Cadogan Street
Glasgow
G2 6AT

Telephone
Communications Office: Stewart Cooper 0131-244-2175
Statistician: Lynn Graham 0141-242-5605