Volume 61 (2015): Issue 2 (April 2015)

The aim of this article is to present research results on the influence of factors of sustainable water use training (management support of training, co-worker support of training, incentives for using skills acquired during training) and the influence of this training on technical efficiency and employee efficiency. The article is based on an empirical study of 328 medium and large companies in the Slovene processing industry. The findings show that the training factors have a statistically significant and positive effect on sustainable water use training and that training has a positive effect on technical efficiency. They also offer new theoretical knowledge as well as practical guidelines for anyone working in the sustainable development management of natural resources.

E-business is entering its mature stage. E-business in large companies has been researched in several surveys, whereas SMEs and micro companies have been researched less often. Micro companies are, together with SMEs, a critical part of national economies worldwide; both are central to the EU’s development strategies. It is well known that, in an information society, business models are driven by e-business concepts, and e-business models are emerging. An in-depth understanding of e-business use in micro companies is crucial for the success of such companies. The main purpose of this paper is to research the intensity of e-business use, advantages and disadvantages of e-business, the biggest problems of e-business implementation/maintenance, and attitude toward trends of e-business in micro companies. The paper presents findings from a survey carried out on a sample of micro companies. Data were collected via an e-questionnaire, and results were calculated using SPSS. The data confirmed that e-business in micro companies is most often used in connection with e-banking; e-business with the government also appears to be very important.

In February 2013, the European Union successfully completed more than 30 years of negotiations and formally signed an agreement establishing a single European patent. The agreement brought about a more competitive patent law compared with that in the United States and Japan. The agreement resulted in a number of advantages, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, such as the reduction of costs by as much as 80%, simplification of procedures, and the adoption of the Unified Patent Court. With the new unitary patent, intellectual property will grow in importance. Yet experts warn that the new patent results in new forms of unwanted behavior, such as forum shopping and the emergence of patent trolls. This study presents both sides-the pros and cons-to predict the effects on business and cover the widest possible range of experts, providing their views on the topic.

In this paper, that is a country study of Slovenia, we tried to determine why individuals in rural residential areas are less likely to recognize entrepreneurial opportunities. Our results show that the increase in resources in human capital, consisting of education, skills, knowledge, and experiences in entrepreneurship, has a significant and positive effect on opportunity identification. For policy creators, our results suggest that policies focused on entrepreneurial education- especially education that would enable the acquisition of real-life entrepreneurial experiences and skills-are useful, especially in rural areas.