Recent (2020–2022) studies by researchers in many countries confirm the previously formulated hypothesis that high-growth companies (HGCs) make a significant, if not decisive, contribution to employment growth and economic growth dynamics. A new topic became the study of the behavior of HGCs in crisis situations. Interest in this topic is primarily associated with the COVID-19 pandemic and the search for ways out of the crisis provoked by the pandemic. Researchers note the increased resistance of HGCs to crisis phenomena and even their ability to find additional incentives for further rapid growth in these difficult conditions.
In this regard, during the pandemic, different countries continued to actively develop and launch support programs for HGCs, both at the national and regional levels. In particular, in the UK and the Scandinavian countries, interesting new programs have begun to be implemented, which use the “scalerator” toolkit in their design (development of an accelerator concept for mature scaling companies). However, the most large-scale and systemic-wide program, penetrating almost the entire national economy, was launched in China: in 2022, it received the highest levels of political support and became a key priority for the country’s economic and innovative development.
The sample of HGCs reviewed in the report included 28,617 companies: this represented 0.76 % of the total number of Russian companies, or 15 % of the initially selected companies with more than 10 employees. Such a small share of HGCs (0.76 %) is explained not so much by the fact that other firms are growing slowly, but by the fact that 95 % of Russian legal entities have less than 10 employees.
In Russian HGCs, as in all Russian companies as a whole, small and micro business dominates (83 % of all companies). At the same time, an extremely small share of medium-sized companies (9 %) is noticeable. For the majority of Russian HGCs (40 %), over the three analyzed years, revenue grew by 20–30 % annually. At the same time, the combined share of companies that have grown at an impressive rate of over 50 % annually is over a quarter (27 %) of all HGCs. An analysis of the age of companies shows that although the largest share (45 %) of HGCs belongs to relatively young companies (under 10 years old), while only 7 % of them are very young (under six years old). The leading positions in the distribution by regions are taken by the Volga Federal District (19 %, 5,427 companies) and the Central Federal District excluding Moscow (18 %, 5,102 companies), as well as Moscow (18 %, 5,033 companies).