Entrepreneurship indicators of Canadian enterprises, 2018
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Released: 2020-11-10
The entrepreneurship indicators for the reference year 2018 are now available upon request.
The Canadian enterprise entrepreneurship indicator program was created to meet the economic challenges associated with policies on entrepreneurship in Canada, the provinces and territories.
The entrepreneurship indicator program provides data describing the dynamics of a subset of Canadian enterprises, such as the number of active enterprises with one or more employees; the number of births and deaths of active enterprises with one or more employees; the number of jobs associated with enterprise births and deaths; the survival of newly created enterprises; and the number of high-growth enterprises and gazelles.
Highlights
In 2018, there were 1,138,170 active enterprises in Canada with one or more employees. Of those, 64.8% had four employees or less.
Small enterprises, with one to four employees, contribute the most to the number of active enterprises with one or more employees, the number of births and deaths of active enterprises with one or more employees, the number of jobs associated with enterprise births and deaths, the survival of newly created enterprises, and the number of high-growth enterprises and gazelles.
The professional, scientific and technical services sector had the most enterprise deaths and births.
The mining, quarrying and oil and gas sector had the highest percentage of high-growth enterprises by number of enterprises with at least 10 employees by employment (6.8% of the enterprises in this sector).
The construction sector represents the largest number of high-growth enterprises by employment. With 1,040 high-growth enterprises, this sector accounts for 15.4% of the total.
Births and deaths of enterprises with one or more employees
In 2018, of a total of 1,138,170 active enterprises with one or more employees in Canada, there were 86,650 births and 87,890 deaths.
It was mostly small active enterprises with one to four employees that contributed to the enterprise dynamics: small enterprises with one to four employees accounted for 82.9% of all deaths and 84.4% of all births of active enterprises with one or more employees.
The professional, scientific and technical services sector had the most enterprise deaths and births, representing 16.8% of all deaths and 17.4% of all births of active enterprises with one or more employees.
Survival of enterprises with one or more employees
Among the 78,300 new enterprises with one or more employees in 2017, 63,970 survived from 2017 to 2018, and among the 81,630 new enterprises with one or more employees in 2016, 64,370 survived from 2016 to 2018.
High-growth enterprises and gazelles by employment
In 2018, of all active enterprises with 10 or more employees, high-growth enterprises by the number of employees accounted for 3.3%, and gazelles accounted for 0.6%. The mining, quarrying and oil and gas sector had the highest percentage of high-growth enterprises by employment with 6.8%, followed by the information and cultural industries sector with 6.7%, and the professional, scientific and technical services sector with 5.1%.
High-growth enterprises and gazelles by revenue
In 2018, of all active businesses with 10 or more employees, high-growth enterprises by revenue represented 5.8% and gazelles represented 1.0%. The mining, quarrying and oil and gas extraction sector had the largest percentage of high-growth enterprises by revenue with 11.3%, followed by the information and cultural industries sector with 11.0%, and the construction sector with 10.3%. British Columbia is the province with the highest percentage of high-growth enterprises by revenue with 6.9%.
Note to readers
The Entrepreneurship Indicators Database contains an up-to-date and unduplicated count of enterprises in Canada, based on Statistics Canada's Business Register, as well as concepts and definitions from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and Eurostat.
Entrepreneurship indicators are produced nationally, provincially and territorially by industry and by enterprise-size group.
Data access
The tables are available upon request.
Data definitions
High-growth enterprises, by employment (or revenue), are enterprises with an average annual growth in the number of employees (or revenue) greater than 20% over a three-year period and which have at least 10 employees at the beginning of the observation period.
Gazelles are the subgroup of high-growth enterprises which are up to five years old.
A comparison with previous releases should to be done with caution. Year-to-year variations in enterprise counts or employee counts may represent changes in methodology in the source data rather than economic changes.
Products
The infographic "Active Enterprises in Canada, 2018" is now available as part of the series Statistics Canada — Infographics (11-627-M).
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; STATCAN.infostats-infostats.STATCAN@canada.ca) or Media Relations (613-951-4636; STATCAN.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.STATCAN@canada.ca).
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