Business is an entrepreneurial activity. It is conducted by subjects of a market economy, government agencies using borrowed funds at their own responsibility or their own funds. The main goal of the above activities is to make a profit on the further development of your enterprise.
Big business is today one of the foundations of the economy. Large firms at the expense of their resources are less dependent on market conditions. In other words, a large business has a reserve (stock) of resources that can be used in the event of adverse market conditions. In addition, many large firms, due to their high share, influence the market (for example, by price changes). This, in turn, leads to attempts at monopolization, as it weakens competition. In this regard, an antitrust policy is being pursued in relation to the largest companies.
Big business - the definition is quite voluminous. This concept characterizes the combination of several enterprises around a certain technological chain, product group or general group of top managers and owners. The main quantitative indicator of a large association is the volume of sales of services and goods (turnover), since the size of market capitalization and profit largely depends on the accepted behavior of players in the stock market or accounting system.
It should be noted that large firms make a significant contribution to the development of many industries, in particular, knowledge-intensive (complex) and capital-intensive (requiring large capital expenditures). Often, evaluating the production indicators of certain goods, it is clear that it was big business that was able to achieve the greatest progress. Large concerns are able to develop the development and mass production of ships, automobiles, power equipment, agricultural machinery, semi-finished products and materials (plastic, aluminum, steel). In addition, large enterprises can organize the mass production of ore, oil, gas and other raw materials. All this leads to a kind of ambivalent attitude of the state towards large enterprises. On the one hand, they are trying to limit them through antitrust policy. On the other hand, big business is supported as the basis of capital-intensive and knowledge-intensive spheres.
In many developed countries, large-scale enterprises occupy a leading place in the economy. Typically, large businesses account for between 50 and 60% of GDP (gross domestic product). Undoubtedly, large enterprises dominate in many engineering industries (instrumentation, electrical engineering, transport engineering), the chemical industry, the fuel and energy complex, non-ferrous and ferrous metallurgy, and the mining industry.
Big business contributes to increased concentration of production in a number of service industries. In particular, this applies to higher education, software production, finance, healthcare, trade and other areas. For example, in America large-scale enterprises account for about 47% of the workforce and 60% of GDP.
In Russia, large forms are considered more effective than the bulk of small and medium-sized companies, and in terms of growth, and productivity, and profitability. The special situation of Russian large business allowed to concentrate the main financial flows during the reform period. As a result, large firms were able to organize fairly strong teams of highly qualified and highly paid managers. At the same time, the size of large enterprises in Russia is noticeably smaller than in other developed countries.