The economic environment has changed drastically and the international marketing environment has also changed significantly. The factors of production have produced transnational flows, and a globalized economic system is progressively taking shape. The means of competition between enterprises are also changing. The global marketing strategy has generated new development trends from the original scale, price, quality, service, and trademark of strategic competition. Since its inception, the company has always been committed to innovation leadership, has continually increased its investment in R&D, and has built its core competitiveness. The high-quality development model of listed companies, such as new energy and high-technology manufacturing, has been gradually formed, and the ecology of the capital market has been further enhanced. How operators face the globalization of the market, regionalization of the economy, and internationalization of business and give agile and rapid response has become an imperative for modern companies...

Measuring and managing the performance of a business is one of the most genuine desires of management. Balanced scorecard, the performance prism and activity-based management are the most popular frameworks in this setting. Based on the findings of R.G. Eccles’ acclaimed "Performance Measurement Manifesto (1991)" this book introduces new contexts and themes of application and presents emerging research areas related to business performance measurement and management, e.g. SMEs and sustainability. As a result of the 1st International Summer School Piero Lunghi on "Perspectives of Business Performance Management" this book is written both for students and academics, as well as for practitioners looking for new, yet proven ways to measure and manage business performance.

The 2nd World Congress on Genetics, Geriatrics and Neurodegenerative Disease Research (GeNeDis 2016), will focus on recent advances in geriatrics and neurodegeneration, ranging from basic science to clinical and pharmaceutical developments and will provide an international focum for the latest scientific discoveries, medical practices, and care initiatives. Advances information technologies will be discussed along with their implications for various research, implementation, and policy concerns. In addition, the conference will address European and global issues in the funding of long-term care and medico-social policies regarding elderly people. GeNeDis 2016 takes place in Sparta, Greece, 20-23 October, 2016. This volume focuses on the sessions that address geriatrics.

This book examines the relationship between family influence and financial performance and non-economic goals in small and medium family-owned enterprises (SME) in Portugal. Research on the performance of family-owned firms is growing but results are mixed, especially for non-listed companies. This book examines smaller family-owned firms that operate in a small, open economy, characterised by a context of relatively weak capital markets and predominantly bank-based financing. Delving into the impact of key variables such as the power dimension, experience and culture on performance establishes, the book goes on to analyse the determinants of performance in such family-owned SMEs. Given the importance of family firms to open economies, this book would be a valuable read to scholars aiming to understand the reasons behind their success, managers seeking out strategic and operational guidance and to regulators and policymakers at the regional and national levels.

Running a business today is becoming more complex than two or three decades ago. The world is becoming increasingly open and globalized, and the production processes of goods and provision of services are inscribed in global supply and value-added chains. Large corporations are doing well in such a market, but small and medium-sized enterprises often find it increasingly difficult to function. In addition, apart from the processes exerting pressure on enterprises operating in the real economy, as a result of financial globalization, the scope of financial entities (banks, investment funds, stock exchanges) was also increasing (Knox-Hayes & Wójcik, 2020). However, this is a phase of the past. Currently, not only crossing borders but, above all, far-reaching digitalization and the development of modern technologies set the main direction for the development of enterprises (Florek-Paszkowska et al., 2021). In order to cope with these changes, both individual companies and entire sectors, public administration, and society, as well as national economies, have to make so-called digital transformation (Gajewski et al., 2016). More profound changes are triggered by sustainability, ecology, and human-oriented goals, leading towards industry 5.0. All these processes exert pressure both on big companies as well as on small- and medium-size enterprises. The ongoing changes related to the digitalization process mean not only incorporating modern technologies into existing entities and structures but are much more critical. They are spiritus movens, leading to the transformation of entire sectors of the real economy and the financial markets (Marszk & Lechman, 2021). We can observe the emergence of ecologies and ecosystems (Gancarczyk & Rodil-Marzábal, 2022; Piątkowski & Urbaniec, 2023), mechanisms leading to the development of sharing economies (Szpringer, 2020), as well as the increasing rooting and linking of traditional financial services with services leading to meeting the needs of society. Financial services are embedded in products and become inseparable from these products, and the traditional division into sectors is gradually disappearing. This is possible thanks to the creation of platforms which connect many market participants (Sironi, 2021). In the context of the abovementioned far-reaching processes, many business entities operate according to traditional principles. The key for them are sales, profit and liquidity, which define the crucial financial performance. Among important aspects are also such issues as maintaining the security of business operations and obtaining the desired market indicators in stock companies. For enterprises from developing countries, the basic problem is access to finance, the market, and advanced technologies (Jalil et al., 2022; Łasak, 2022). In developed countries, enterprises also encounter many challenges related to the traditional corporate finance dimension despite a better situation. The current Issue published in the Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management and Innovation (Volume 19, Issue 4, 2023) is aimed at considering the nexus of topics related to the various aspects of the functioning of financial and non-financial enterprises. The main purpose of the articles is to focus on selected problems related to the financial aspects of business activity. The considered problems were presented in the context of contemporary processes taking place in the environment of enterprises. These include, on the one hand, far-reaching digitalization and the use of advanced technologies and, on the other hand, processes belonging to the Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) area. A description of the situation faced by many enterprises, including financial institutions, undergoing digital transformation is presented in the article written by Łasak and Wyciślak (2023). Digitalization processes not only lead to far-reaching digitization of enterprises and related dilemmas regarding corporate governance but also the transformation of entire sectors of the industry. The banking sector is the best example of this. The question arises what is the pattern of behavior of digital platform partners in the situation of transformation of this sector and platformization of banking services? The paper aims to present the dynamic pattern of behavior among partners stemming from the tensions between governance costs and co-created value within platforms in banking services. The study provides a taxonomy of digital platforms in banking, highlights the values of the most typical platforms, namely blockchain-based and cloud-based platforms, and discusses the potential implications of the platformization of banking services. One of the key contemporary perspectives of business activity is looking through the prism of the need for a responsible and sustainable approach. This is the perspective embodied in the approach referred to by the term ESG. Sustainable business models, considering the ESG principles in the company’s operation, are based on financial and non-financial reasons. The paper written by Zioło, Szaruga, and Spoz (2023) aims to examine the relationship between financial and non-financial factors in enterprises and indicate for which groups of enterprises the relationship of ESG financial performance is most visible in the context of building sustainable business models and the ability to adapt to sustainability. It was found that large enterprises with a solid financial position simultaneously get better non-financial results. In each of the analyzed aspects, large enterprises with an excellent financial standing did better. The conclusion presented by Zioło, Szaruga, and Spoz (2023) does not change the fact that small and medium-sized enterprises play a key role in the economic growth of emerging economies. The paper by Amoa-Gyarteng and Dhliwayo (2023) examines the impact of capital structure and profitability on the short-term solvency of nascent SMSs in Ghana, building on the liability of the newness framework. The study demonstrates that financing decisions and financial performance are crucial mitigating factors for the potential risks of default and failure faced by nascent SMEs. Notably, the study finds that an appropriate balance between debt and equity financing raises the working capital ratio and thus reduces the liability of newness, which is a major challenge faced by nascent SMEs. The analysis also identifies that return on equity (ROE) is a crucial driver of short-term solvency for nascent SMEs. Declining profitability is manifested by a decrease in operating profits and cash flows. The resulting cash flow shortages can cause the company to fall behind on payments and obligations, leading to short-term insolvency, with all the adverse consequences. All these conclusions might be valuable for enterprises in other developing countries. Operational and financial market performance is a crucial determinant not only for SMEs but also for larger companies. Such type of businesses is presented in the paper by Yaşar and Gerede (2023). The article shows how complex are the processes accompanying the functioning of such enterprises as airlines. This paper refers to the competitiveness of such airline companies and the conditions determining their favorable market position and long-term competitive advantage. The market position of such companies is influenced by such factors like firm maturity, its size, financial resources and some technical dimensions (number of flights, fleet homogeneity). This means that despite the processes taking place today, the business performance of such entities as airlines still depends on the classic factors described in the literature of corporate finance. The contemporary opportunities resulting from the dynamic development of information technology contribute to the development of new forms of financing business activity. One such form is crowdfunding. The paper by Nose and Hosomi (2023) is dedicated to the equity crowdfunding (ECF) issue in the Japanese context. The research provides an answer to the question of what makes equity crowdfunding successful. The “Signaling Hypothesis” and “Lack of Financial Literacy Hypothesis” were tested. Despite the research is focusing more on investors’ side, it also sends an important signal to the business considering crowdfunding as a source of funding. The conclusions can be helpful for start-ups planning ECF campaigns in the future. The company’s position on the market may also depend on factors other than financial performance, and recently, it has depended to an increasing extent on environmental, social, and governance performance (defining corporate sustainability performance). In this context very important research thread is the relationship between corporate sustainability performance and stability of dividend payouts. This topic is presented in the paper by Matuszewska-Pierzynka, Mrzygłód, and Pieloch-Babiarz (2023). The research verifies many detailed interdependencies between the ESG performance of an enterprise and the propensity to pay stable dividends to the enterprise. The possibility of financing business activity is determined by the situation in the banking sector. The conditions of financing provided by banks are of particular importance in the case of developing countries, where other forms of raising capital by enterprises are often limited. Shaikh, Tunio, and Dagar (2023) paper discusses the relationship between banks funding liquidity, capital funds and bankers’ lending activity in emerging markets. This research firstly provides insight into the activity of financial companies in emerging markets, and secondly, informs the public, and especially the business, about the lending practices of the banking sector, and in consequence, on the financing opportunities in these economies. These unique studies presented in this Issue enrich our knowledge about contemporary business activity. The papers contribute to understanding the nature of business performance and link corporate finance issues with other, mainly technological and social aspects. Particular attention, however, is paid to the traditional conditions of operation and financing of enterprises. At the same time, however, efforts were made to combine new business conditions, including digitization. The issues raised also concern processes ensuring sustainable development. We want to express the hope that the papers presented here will be of interest to readers, scholars, and researchers worldwide. They provide theoretical concepts, and quantitative analyses, and indicate pathways for further research. Many of the presented areas require further, in-depth analysis.