In the past few weeks I’ve worked with a number of small business clients looking to go international.
In what I perceive as a definite sign of a strengthening economy, the increase in small businesses looking to capitalize on international business opportunities has skyrocketed in the past six months.
Increasingly, these international business enterprises are getting government support.
But not enough.
In the United States, the Small Business Administration and the U.S. Trade Representative are the primary government agencies working on the issues of the international competitiveness of American SMEs in the global marketplace.
However, these agencies tend to focus on the fact that while U.S. SMEs account for 97% of the total number of exporting firms they produce less than 30% of the total value of U.S. exports.
As a consequence, American small businesses are frequently overlooked in favor of much larger multinational companies that produce 70% of U.S. exports.
It’s time the U.S. provide more resources for globalizing domestic small business.
Doing so would spur unprecedented growth in this under-served sector.
What do you think?