Job creation by startups - - new firms up to one year old- - and young firms, defined as up to 5 years old, is crucial for the American economy. These firms are responsible for all the net annual job creation in the United States each year - - but in March 2011, companies less than a year old employed 2.5m people according to the Department of Labor. The full article also looks at the falling cost of innovation and we provide here a link to a presentation on innovation in China.

That was up fractionally from a year earlier, but still well below the 3.5m people such startups employed in March 2007. Funding remains difficult for many new companies and traditional sources such as credit cards, home equity release and family, have dried up.  Meanwhile, research shows that less than 20% of the high-tech startups that were founded in 2000 survived by 2009.

Separately, Prof Seamus Grimes of NUI Galway who has done research with Prof Debin Du of the East China Normal University in Shanghai, which is focused on investments in R&D in multinational companies in China, made a presentation last week at the 4th International Congress on Innovation, in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

This is a copy of the presentation [pdf]

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