Business structure

Welsh Government estimates of business structure provide data on business counts by employee size band, broad industry heading and area within Wales, together with related employment and turnover aggregates.

These estimates have been derived from a number of sources, primarily a detailed extract taken from the Inter-Departmental Business Register (IDBR) maintained by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). This gives details of all enterprises active in Wales, including employment estimates, as well as details of the individual sites or plants within the enterprise. The IDBR also includes identifiers for industry (using the Standard Industrial Classification), and geographical location of each enterprise.

Although the IDBR covers a very high proportion of the employment in the UK, it excludes most of the very large number of smallest businesses that operate below the VAT threshold, so that its coverage in terms of a count of enterprises is only partial (around 50%). In order to adjust for this, the business structure estimates include approximations for unregistered enterprises together with their related employment and turnover, derived from the IDBR in conjunction with other sources.

The business structure estimates cover all non-government organisations (known as enterprises) which are active in Wales, even if the enterprise is head-quartered outside Wales. This is the headline measure of Welsh business structure, with further datasets available which relate only to those enterprises which are head-quartered in Wales; and also which relate to the separate sites or plants within the enterprises active in Wales.

Statistical headlines, releases and bulletins

Size Analysis of Welsh Business, 2013

StatsWales

Detailed datasets are available on the StatsWales website.

StatsWales website: Business Structure Statistics

Please send any queries or comments by e-mail to economic.stats@wales.gsi.gov.uk