Small data that have a big impact on businesses. This was first published in Business Strategy Review, Volume 25, Issue 4 - 2014. Subscribe today to receive your quarterly copy delivered to your home or work place. http://bit.ly/BSR-subscribe

1. Small data
It really is a numbers business
© Copyright 2014 London Business School

2. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 2
The OECD’s first skills survey of 24 countries, in
2013, tested 166,000 adults to assess the skills of
724 million people. Japan topped the all-adults
numeracy and literacy skills tables. Although, for 16-
24 year-olds, Japan had the second highest
proportion of young people with no computer
experience. The UK was the only country where the
55 to 65 age group outperformed the 16-24 group in
both literacy and numeracy.
Source: oecd.org

3. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 3
The value of 1,400 art-works discovered in the flat of
Cornelius Gurlitt in Munich, and revealed to the
world in November 2013, was estimated at £846m.
That’s a sizeable splash in a global art market worth
some £36bn. The cache of 121 framed and 1,285
unframed works includes paintings by Pablo
Picasso, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Marc Chagall
and Henri Matisse.
Sources: bbc.co.uk; European Fine Art Foundation

4. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 4
Late in 2013 India joined an elite group of nations
that have sent spacecraft to Mars. Barring problems,
the Mars Orbiter Mission should take 300 days to
travel along its 680 million km trajectory to the red
planet. Cautious optimism is required. Of some 40
Mars missions since 1960, over half failed. The cost?
A comparatively inexpensive £45m.
Sources: bbc.co.uk; thehindu.com

5. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 5
The World Bank launched its first bond aimed at
helping businesses owned or run by women in
emerging economies. The five-year, triple-A rated
bond was issued by the International Finance
Corporation and raised $165m. A third of all
emerging market SMEs are owned by women.
Source: reuters.com

6. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 6
PwC asked 500 top business leaders with
operations in at least one of the Asia-Pacific
Economic Cooperation’s 21 economies what the
main skills shortages were in the Asia-Pacific region.
Managerial (57 per cent) and executive (52 per cent)
were top of the list. While the most critical shortage
(49 per cent) was in technical skills, such as IT and
engineering.
Source: PwC

7. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 7
Just as London Business School starts its new
Luxury Management MBA elective, the luxury goods
market is thriving, with a 2013 sales total of $318bn
worldwide. That’s three per cent up on 2012. Most of
the growth comes from emerging markets such as
China, India, Indonesia and Malaysia.
Source: Euromonitor

8. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 8
Work harder, get poorer. A growing economy no
longer guarantees greater individual prosperity,
apparently. The share of national income captured
by the workforce is steadily declining in OECD
nations, down to 62 per cent from 66 per cent in the
early 1990s. Increased productivity doesn’t mean
increased wages. It does mean the providers of
capital are prospering, however.
Source: economist.com

9. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 9
A UN Environment Programme report on waste
management estimates that 1.3 billion tonnes of
solid waste is collected worldwide. That’s a lot of
rubbish, or alternatively a big business opportunity.
The global waste market is estimated at $410bn a
year, with over 500,000 people employed in
recycling in the EU alone.
Source: recyclingportal.eu

10. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 10
While cyber security and resilience are high up the
organisational agenda, following the Edward
Snowden NSA leaks, German officials can rest easy.
According to Hans-Christoph Quelle, CEO of
Secusmart, which supplied German government
secure smartphones, complete with encryption
chips, “Theoretically, it would take 149 billion years
to crack this code based on today’s technical
standards… the universe itself isn’t even that old.”
Source: eweek.com

11. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 11
A census of billionaires revealed a global billionaire
population of 2,170 individuals in 2013. Europe has
the most billionaires, the US the wealthiest
billionaires. Sixty per cent of billionaires are self-
made. Based on the numbers, an average billionaire
is 63, has $3bn net worth, four homes, is worth
around $20m and has luxury assets and personal
holdings of $136m, including a $14m art collection.
Sources: billionairecensus.com; wealthx.com

12. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 12
OPEC has revised upwards predictions of total world
oil demand by 2035 to 108.5 million barrels a day.
The revision is partly due to an accelerating increase
in car ownership in China, rising by 380 million
vehicles to 2035. A rise in OPEC’s output to 37.5
million barrels a day over the same period requires
$7.5trn worth of infrastructure investment, meaning
petrol prices are unlikely to fall in the short term.
Source: opec.org

13. BUSINESS STRATEGY REVIEW 13
This was first published in
Business Strategy Review
Volume 25 Issue 1 2014
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