1 compare and contrast characteristics of LESs v SMEsSolutio

1. compare and contrast characteristics of LESs v. SMEs?

Solution

Characteristics of Large Enterprise and that of Small and Medium Enterprises may be compared in terms of their set ups, vision and missions, products and services, control over raw materials, production processes, human resource managements, their roles in the development of local and global economies.

Comparision and contrasts starts with the very classification of enterprises into categories of Small, Medium and Large Enterprises. One definition highlights the size of Capital assets whereas another one focuses on the size of turnovers may be in terms of volume of quantities produced and sold and or in financial terms the money value of sales/turnover. As the words suggest Small, Medium and Large are relative terms, in country like US a SME may be bigger than the Largest Enterprise in small country like Nepal.

Never the less both LES and SME plays crucial roles in their field of operations and I am of the view that both must co-exist but not at the cost of each other rather for the survival of each other. Large enterprises should focus on the products and services where economies of large scales pays large dividends and provide good quality standardise products/services and may outsource from SMEs. On the other hand SMEs may take advantages of changing environmental factors and concentrate on specialised products/services having lower demands or emerging new demands but at a lower level of scales and or with high risk involved.

LESs may be more automated and SMEs may be more manual skill oriented. LESs operating at the national and international levels wheras operations of SMEs restricted locally at city and or state level. With the emergence of information technology and e-commerce the demarcation of markets of LES and SME is diminishing over the time.