Entrepreneurs in business enterprise sector

Enterprise
In the Standard for Industrial Classification (SN) an enterprise is defined as an organisational unit comprising all economic activities engaged in by the same owner. Hence, an enterprise is a legal entity covering one or more productive units. An establishment is defined as a local kind of activity unit, which mainly conducts activities within a special industry group.

Establishment
In SN an establishment is defined as a local kind of activity unit, which mainly is conducting activities within a special industry group.

New enterprise
A new enterprise in a given period is an enterprise registered with dates that indicate start-up in this period. The registration of a legal unit in the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities counts as a new registration if the registered information assumes that the unit is to be operated as an industrial activity. See 3.1.

Newly established enterprise
The number of newly established enterprises is the number of new enterprises corrected for the change of ownership. This means that new enterprises that take over existing activity are not counted as newly established enterprises, but as new enterprises.

Survival
A new established enterprise in year t is considered to have survived in t+n (n>=1) if it is active in terms of turnover and/or employment in any part of t+n. This means the enterprise will be found in the annual population (of active enterprises) in t+n.

Two kinds of survival can be distinguished:

1. Direct survival. A new established enterprise in year t has survived directly in t+n (n>=1) if the enterprise is active in terms of turnover or employment in t+n.

2. Survival by take-over. A new established enterprise is also considered survived if it has ceased to be active, but its activity has been taken over by another new enterprise set up specifically to take over the factors of production of the first enterprise.

New established enterprises which are merged or taken over by an existing enterprise (not a new one) are not considered to have survived.

The new established enterprise will keep its economic activity code, size class and legal form of the year of registration of the enterprise.

Growth
Growth in survived enterprises is measured in the number of persons employed. Some of the new established enterprises may not have any registered activity in the year of registration. As a result the number of employees in year t will be low and the growth in t+1 large.

Organization form
Structure registered in BR. A distinction is made between sole proprietorships, public limited companies, general partnerships etc.

Personally owned enterprises
Personally owned enterprises refer to the organisational structures sole proprietorships, general partnerships and general partnerships with shared liability.

General partnership and general partnership with shared liability
Must have at least two partners, and these partners are known as partners with joint liability and partners with unlimited liability respectively. The partners are personally and economically responsible. In a general partnership, all partners can be claimed for the total debt of the company, but in a general partnership with shared liability every partner is personally liable for a certain part of the company's debt. In total, the partners are liable for the whole debt. Both physical persons and body cooperates can be partners. Having a board and/or manager is optional. In the tables, only the enterprises with physical persons as partners are included, and only the active roles are included.

Sole proprietorship
A sole proprietorship must have one, and only one, owner. The owner is fully and personally responsible for the whole establishment, and needs to be a physical person. It is possible to employ a manager who is someone other than the owner.

Public limited company and private limited company
These are organisational structures in which none of the owners have personal responsibility for the company's liability. The owners' responsibility for the company's debt is restricted to the share capital. A private limited company cannot, unlike a public limited company, receive share capital from the public.

All public limited companies and private limited companies must have a board of directors. This board must as a main rule consist of at least three members. In limited companies that have less than NOK 3 million in share capital, the board can consist of two members in addition to a deputy. All public limited companies and private limited companies with share capital of more than NOK 3 million must in addition have a manager.

Entrepreneur
An entrepreneur is defined as a person, an enterprise or a combination of different types of shareholders.

An enterprise can have one or more entrepreneurs. A limited company can have one or several shareholders. The entrepreneur may be the person who had the business idea, a shareholder, or the person who runs the enterprise.

The method aims to identify the shareholders in an enterprise who have a considerable share of the capital stock, or who have the role as either general manager or member of the board. If a new enterprise is owned by other enterprises and the other enterprises are owned solely by private individuals, the entrepreneur is identified among these individuals. If the other enterprises do not only have private individuals as shareholders, the entrepreneur will be among the enterprises that are shareholders in the new enterprise.

The entrepreneur in personally-owned companies: sole proprietorship, general partnership and general partnership with shared liability, is defined as the owner(s) of the enterprise at the time of set up.

Age
Refers to age at the end of the year.

Immigrants includes persons who have two foreign-born parents and are born outside Norway themselves. In addition persons born in Norway with parents born outside Norway are also included in these statistics.

National background is the person's own, their mother's or possibly their father's country of birth. Persons without an immigrant background only have Norway (000) as their national background. When both parents are born abroad they are in most cases born in the same country. In cases where the parents have different countries of birth the mother's country of birth is chosen

Employees
The number of employees comprises all persons that work for an employer more than 4 hours a week. Persons with more than one job may be counted as employed in several industries. The population shows the number of employees at the time of counting.

Employment (Persons employed)
All employees and owners make up the employment. The figures show an average number of employees at the end of 5 selected months in the year, and may deviate from what is published in the Labour Force Survey (AKU) and the National Accounts (NR) because sources and average calculations differ. In industries where employment cannot be collected through the data collection for the SBS, the number of employees is calculated based on number of employees in the CRE. Persons with more than one type of employment may be counted as employed in several industries.

Turnover
Turnover is defined as the sum of remuneration of sale to customers, sale of commercial goods and gross income from other industry activities. The turnover includes rental income and commissions receivable, but not public assistance or gain by sale of fixed assets. VAT is not included in the figures. In certain industries the turnover concept is not clearly defined, and for these industries the turnover is not published. For units in industries that are included in the SBS the turnover is collected from these. In other industries the turnover is collected from administrative sources (VAT or annual accounts).

The current Standard for Industrial Classification (SN2007) in Statistics Norway is based on EC's standards NACE Rev.1.

Norwegian Standard Classification of Education (NUS2000)
The Norwegian Standard Classification of Education, which was created by Statistics Norway in 1970.

Statistics Norway's use of terms in immigrant-related statistics are from the Immigrant Classification Standard (Statistics Norway 1994).

Name: Entrepreneurs in business enterprise sector
Topic: Establishments, enterprises and accounts

Division for Business Dynamics Statistics

National level, county and municipality.

Frequency: Annually

Timeliness: Statistics on entrepreneurs in newly established personally owned enterprises 2003 was published for the first time in 2004. Statistics on entrepreneurs in limited companies are published from the reference year 2004. The statistical population of limited companies is temporary the first year of publishing and final numbers are published the following year.

Statistics on survival and growth in newly established personally owned enterprises were published for the first time in 2006 for the statistical year 2002. Entrepreneurs in limited companies were published for the statistical year 2004 in 2007.

The focus is the entrepreneurs characteristics like gender, age, education and national background.

Not relevant.

Micro data, information about sampled units and population are temporarily stored in the program language SAS and long term as text files.

The units and structures in the Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises (CRE) are entered into most large nationwide administrative data systems, such as the Register for Employers/Employees. The information about roles in the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities in Brønnøysund (BR) and shareholders in Directorate of Taxes' Register of Shareholders provides the corresponding connection to the enterprises through organisation number and to the population through national identity number. This makes it possible to make statistics on entrepreneurs.

The first part of the statisics focus on the entrepreneurs gender, age, education and national backgroud. The other part focus on the entrepreneur by looking at the enterprises survival and growth measured in employees and turnover.

The users of these statistics are public authorities, ministries, research institutions, industry and the media.

Not relevant.

The figures that are presented will deviate from the number of legal units in the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities, and may on an industrial level deviate from what is presented in the structure statistics. The deviation in relation to the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities is mainly caused by the fact that it comprises all legal units, including those that are not conducting industrial activities, and that CRE controls to find out whether an enterprise has activity or not.

The statistics on entrepreneurs in business enterprise sector may also deviate from Statistics Norway's other statistics on enterprises. The reason for this is that these statistics only include enterprises where the entrepreneurs are identified.

Not relevant.

Not relevant.

Enterprise statistics based on annual populations comprise all industries according to NACE standards (see 4.2) except public administration and defence (industry 84). The primary industries (industry 01, 02 and 03) are also excluded.

The statistics is demarcated in relation to public and social security administration, counties and municipalities. Enterprises within this section of public administration (administration and services) are not included in the statistics even if they formally are supposed to conduct activities sorted under industries included in the statistics. For industries that are characterised by a mixture of public and private services, the population may seem insufficient since public services are excluded from the statistics. This is especially the case for electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply,
water supply; sewerage, waste management and remediation activities, education and human health and social work activities

The Central Bank of Norway, public lending institutions, enterprises within public business operations, publicly-owned enterprises, municipal business operations and independent municipal enterprises are included in the statistics if they conduct activities within the industries that are covered by the statistics. In theory, this is also the case for enterprises within all other institutional sectors.

The population comprises all limited companies, sole proprietorships, general partnerships and general partnerships with shared liabilities. General parnerships and genereal partnerships with shared liabilities with only body cooperates are excluded.

information about shareholders in public and private limited companies are found in the stock statistics, which are based on Directorate of Taxes' Register of Shareholders. The statistics are limited to shareholders identified by personal identification number (personal shareholders) who owned shares on 31 December.

The numbers are based on the Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises (CRE), information on roles from the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities and population register data. The Division for Labour Market Statistics provides the number of employees. We also use stock statistics, which are based on Directorate of Taxes' Register of Shareholders

Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises (CRE). The Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises (CRE) is Statistics Norway's register of all enterprises (juridical units) and establishments in the private and public sector in Norway. The CRE is to be a complete and correct register, which forms the basis for a common population for economical and industrial statistics as well as statistics on persons.

Data are collected from structure business statistics (SBS) and from other administrative registers, i.e. VAT, accounting data and income tax returns from independent businesses in order to limit the population in relation to enterprises that in reality have ceased to exist.

Information about roles from Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities provides a survey of all physical persons and body cooperates that have roles in the Norwegian business enterprise sector. The physical persons are registered by national identity number or with a D-number, while the body cooperates are enterprises that are registered by organisation number. No one can register an enterprise in BR without also registering roles. The different types of organisational structures have different requirements concerning the roles. See 4.1.

Information about the physical person is updated continuously, and information is compared against the Central Population Register every 24 hours.

BeReg
The statistics is based on population register data. Since 1946, each municipality has had a local population registry that registers all residents in the municipality pursuant to the Population Registration Act and its regulations. The population registries receive reports of births, deaths, marriages, divorces, migration etc. from various sources.

Populations highest level of education and NUDB
The Register of the Population's Highest Level of Education (BHU) is now drawn directly from the Norwegian National Education Database (NUDB). NUDB collects all statistics on ongoing and completed education from 1974/75 and BHU since 1970 in a common database. The basis of the BHU is people 16 years and above registered as resident in Norway as of 1 October in the corresponding year. The educational activity with the highest level in the Norwegian Standard Classification of Education (NUS2000), which is registered in NUDB, gives the status for the highest level of attained education. In cases with more than one educational activity, the programme is selected with the highest level in the Norwegian Standard Classification of Education (NUS2000).

Directorate of Taxes' Register of Shareholders. Starting in 2004 the statistics are based on data from the Directorate of Taxes' Register of Shareholders.The registers consist of all Norwegian limited companies, specifying the number of shares issued, the share capital, the share premium, and proposed and paid dividend. In addition the register gives information about the shareholders and received dividends.

The statistics uses only administrative data and already existing statistical registers.

The Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises (CRE) is a comprehensive register and its quality is ensured in relation to population and basic characteristics like addresses, legal form and industry codes.

The quality of the population of active enterprises is taken care of among other things by directly contacting units in connection with the data capture for the SBS and through links toward administrative registers in the monitoring system for establishments in the CRE. See also 3.2.

The quality regarding the industry code for establishments and enterprises is continuously taken care of. This takes place by contacting the enterprises in SN's SBS-surveys, through administrative sources such as the National Insurance administration's annual check, and in other ways through direct contact with the enterprises. Furthermore with the help of statements of purposes with the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities.

Not relevant.

Not relevant.

The statistics is published every year so that the results are comparable.

Enterprise statistics
The statistics is based on statistical and administrative sources. Several administrative sources are instrumental in the work of updating the CRE, and are used both to define the population and to collect characteristics and information: the Central Coordination Register for Legal Entities, the VAT Register and the Register for Employers/Employees are used to collect information about the units. This may cause register errors that can affect the uncertainty of the statistics.

A possible source for errors is out-of-date information caused by lags in the registration. Such lags are caused by the fact that changes are often registered some time after they have occurred. The consequence is that the registers are not always up-to-date, which can lead to outdated information being used as a basis for the statistics.

Discontinuances of activities are normally registered after they have taken place, based on information in connection with the collection of data for structure statistics or by links to administrative registers. As a consequence, the population may be too high.

In connection with new registrations the respondent is to state whether this is a new activity or a change in ownership. In cases where such information is lacking a duplicate check against existing enterprises is carried out &– in order to identify possible ownership changes. All changes are not intercepted in these routines, and the number of new establishment is assumed to be somewhat high seen in relation to the number of new registrations.

Population statistics
The quality of the data from the Central Population Register is generally very good for statistical purposes, however one relevant complaint is delayed reporting. Delayed reporting can lead to some events being registered and counted in the wrong year.

The Central Population Register consists of persons with a Norwegian national identity number or a D-number. Some of the persons with a D-number are persons living abroad, while working in Norway. These persons will not be issued with a national identity number, but persons immigrating to Norway will get a national identity number after a period of time. It can therefore be difficult to distinguish between immigrants who have moved to Norway and persons living abroad. Another problem could be persons who change their national identity number as a consequence of new information about their date of birth.

Education statistics
Education statistics consists only of persons living in Norway who have taken their education in Norway.

Not relevant.