2009 - European MAKE Winners

Key Findings

• IKEA is a newcomer to this year’s European MAKE Winner’s circle. Ericsson, Mondragon Group and Siemens, former European MAKE Winners, returned to this year’s list of top companies.
• Enterprises failing to repeat as European MAKE Winners were: Heineken, Repsol-YPF, Schlumberger and Tesco.
• Even in the current global economic recession, this year’s European MAKE Winners have delivered superior financial performance. Return on Revenues average 6.7% – over two times the Global Fortune 500 median. The leaders in this metric were Nokia, SAP and Siemens. Return on Assets average 9.8% – over four times the Global Fortune 500 median. The leaders in this metric were the BBC, Nokia and SAP.
• According to the MAKE expert panel, the European knowledge-based economy is driven by the following key business sectors (based on the number of MAKE Finalists in each industry): diversified manufacturing, food production/retail, oil & gas, and network communications.
• During the past decade European firms have allocated considerable resources to improving their innovation and new product management capabilities, and it appears to be yielding benefits in terms of improved competitiveness and profitability. This MAKE knowledge performance dimension had the highest average Winner’s score.
• Europe MAKE leaders are creating wealth through maximizing enterprise intellectual capital.
• European MAKE organizations are facing leadership challenges in developing knowledge workers. This MAKE knowledge performance dimension had the lowest average Winner’s score. A combination of factors – the retirement of growing numbers of ‘baby boomers’ and difficulties in recruiting talented new knowledge workers from the small pool of ‘Generation Y’ individuals – is forcing European firms to devote significant resources to human intellectual capital management.
• The 9th European MAKE study has revealed that the number of committed knowledgedriven organizations has declined in the face of severe economic disruptions. Those organizations which are continuing to invest in creating and implementing a strategic enterprise knowledge strategy