France has become the “start-up nation”, dear to Emmanuel Macron. Is it so sure? To speak only of young technological shoots and business creations, we forget the thousands of SMEs and very small companies that irrigate the territories but sometimes die in the greatest indifference, for lack of a buyer. Between the two rounds of the presidential election, the association Cédants et repreneurs d’affaires (CRA) alerts political leaders by publishing a white paper which puts the subject back in the public square.
Created thirty-five years ago, this network of 240 volunteer delegates with the profile of former bosses and senior executives makes a series of regulatory, tax, administrative and social proposals to facilitate the transfer of companies often located in peripheral France. . “The legislator has a vision of big business, but the transfer of SMEs remains a political blind spot”, regrets Bernard Fraioli, president of the CRA, which trains executives interested in business takeovers, gives them access to databases, accompanies them in a process that lasts at least a year, sometimes two.
Aging bosses
The sketch of the “target”? An SME in industry, services or crafts which achieves 2 to 3 million in turnover and employs around thirty employees in a medium-sized town. That’s about a million jobs at stake. If the taxation of transmissions has evolved favorably, it must be improved, claims the CRA association, which is worried about a questioning always possible of the “Dutreil pact”, an arsenal of measures voted in 2003 to facilitate the creation or transfer of SMEs.
It does not hide, however, the procrastination of some aging bosses, who are struggling to part with the work of a lifetime. Too many family business owners don’t say they’re selling, creating a “hidden market” that must be brought to light, according to the association. Result, “there are more buyers than sellers”, notes Alain Tourdjman, Director of Economic Studies at Banque BPCE.
The association wants to make “recovery”, as there is entrepreneurship, a “national issue” in the name of employment, regional development and support for entrepreneurship. And proposes, among other things, the creation of a “advisory check” to help those over 60, i.e. more than 20% of small business owners, to finance an independent assessment of their company. Already down between 2016 and 2019, the number of handovers fell further with the pandemic: owners were waiting for better days to sell at the best price. The way out of the crisis is likely to be difficult.