In 2009 the business population in Veneto closed with a slight decline in the number of active businesses, in line with what occurred on a national level. Veneto's active business continued to make up 8.7% of the national total, ranking third together with Lazio in the regional rankings.
The difficulties of the downturn sharpened the decrease in the number of sole traders, which still at the end of 2009 made up 59.9% of the entrepreneurs in Veneto; the vitality of corporations, however, held up and grew during 2009.
Among the sectors that felt the effects of market stagnation the most were two of the most important in Veneto's production system: manufacturing and the primary sector. The active businesses in these sectors decreased over the course of 2009 by 2.5% and 3.2% respectively. A negative variation was also recorded for the construction sector, which in one year saw a decline of 1.4% in its active businesses. In 2009 the tertiary sector held its own.
In 2007, 8,954 groups of firms were present in Veneto, of which 7,268 had their parent in Veneto. Even though less than 5% of the firms in Veneto belong to groups, they have nearly one-third of all the employees of firms in Veneto.
In 2007 in Veneto, there were 21,667 multi-location businesses, which accounted for 5.3% of its total number of active businesses. On average, they had 2.7 local units per multi-location business.
The entrepreneurial sector is also that which contributes the most to investment in Research & Development. In 2007 in Veneto 1,232 million euro were spent on R&D, a figure that puts the region in fifth place among Italian regions, but second in growth, with an increase of 29.4% compared to the previous year, which is second only to the Autonomous Province of Bolzano and Valle d'Aosta; these two, however, are of much smaller size.
(Chapter 10 in figures)