The European e-Business Report The European e ... - empirica

The European E-Business Report 2005
3.5 e-Business in Spain
by Jesús Galván, Prof. Schiller Int. University, Madrid Campus
Introduction
The chapter provides an overview of the main policies that are being deployed in Spain in an effort to
promote e-business amongst companies. A brief analysis is presented of the relative situation of e-
business as compared with EU-15 countries and its time projection. Finally some general conclusions
attempt to show what could be the future of e-business in the country.
3.5.1 E-business policy initiatives in Spain
The policy framework
Spain is one of the most decentralised European countries. For policy-making, this means that both
the regional governments and the national government have designed and implemented their own
innovation promotion campaigns. This is the case with the promotion of e-business between companies.
However, European Regional and Development Fund (ERDF) contribution to the development
of innovation and information society has so far been extremely positive in the following aspects:
• It has contributed with financial resources to the development of information society and e-
business.
• It has contributed to the development of a certain discipline, by which the involved public administrations
must agree, during the design and implementation phases of the Operational
Programmes, about objectives and policies, stating them clearly on a five year basis.
The main actions undertaken in order to promote e-business by public administrations during the
period 2001-2006 fall within the following categories:
• The promotion of sector-level e-business collective solutions for SMEs
• Training in ICT for workers and managers
• Diffusion of the possibilities provided by e-business to companies
• Direct loans for companies wanting to invest in ICT
• Tax deductions in the corporate income tax for companies investing in ICT
The main players of these initiatives are the national and regional governments, the individual
companies (wherever it applies) and the industry associations. In most cases the eligible recipients for
funding must be non-profit organisations representing groups of companies.
Artepyme II, a comprehensive national initiative for the promotion of e-business
ARTEPYME II is a programme launched in 2001, co-financed by the EFRD, which promotes the
implementation of e-business solutions in Objective 1 regions, even though companies from other
regions can be included within the projects. The main policy objectives are to generate collective
e-business solutions for SMEs that may solve the lack of technical and financial resources of small
companies for the adoption of ICT and e-business. The programme partially funds investment projects
of four different types: diffusion of the possibilities of e-business for SMEs; feasibility projects; pilot
experiences in e-business; and Implementation projects of e-business solutions. The projects must be
presented by non-profit institutions representing the interests of SMEs, favouring a sectoral approach.
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