EY study: mood of crisis in companies

A shortage of skilled workers, high or volatile raw material and energy prices as well as recession and inflation: these are the challenges facing the local economy. This is also shown by the SME barometer from the consulting firm EY, which conducts surveys twice a year. 600 medium-sized companies (without capital market orientation) with 30 to 2,000 employees from all over Austria were surveyed about their current business situation and their future prospects.

Most people are still satisfied with their current business: 82 percent of companies rate their current business situation as fairly good or good. Their own situation is assessed better than the general economic situation in Austria. The highest proportion of satisfied companies can be found in Salzburg and Vienna.

According to Erich Lehner, responsible for medium-sized companies at EY Austria, this is due to the good business in the previous year and also in the first half of 2023. “In the fall, however, the situation deteriorated,” says Lehner.

Bad prospects

This is particularly evident in assessments of the future: for the second time in a row, more companies expect their own business situation to worsen (21 percent) than to improve (17 percent). This means that around one in five companies expect their own situation to worsen.

Upper Austrian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are particularly pessimistic; 65 took part in the survey. Here, 27 percent expect their business situation to deteriorate, and a fifth want to invest less than before. A quarter (in the previous year it was 12 percent) are preparing to cut jobs, which puts Upper Austria in first place when it comes to planned job cuts compared to federal states.

In a sector comparison, tourism stands out in particular: three quarters of the tourism companies surveyed are currently completely satisfied with their own business situation, followed by the financial and other service providers and social, science, education and economic sectors, where the share is 65 percent each. Industrial companies are currently the least satisfied: only around two out of five companies (41 percent) rate their business situation as good.