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Imperialism Economy Essay

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A historical perspective on Belgian economy
Since its independence in 1830, Belgium’ economy has mainly been based on manufacturing capabilities. The country was the first in continental Europe to undergo the Industrial revolution, starting even before its independence. The main industrialized activities were centred around a few cities. Throughout the 19th century, Belgium was a major intermediate goods producer such as steel. However, after the Second World War, heavy manufacturing and mining activities started declining, a trend which has continued until today. The downward course has been compensated, however, by the rise of the service sector, whereby the Belgian economy started switching to producing finished products. Belgium derives its economic strength mainly from its central …show more content…

There are a limited number of large companies with local decision power in Belgium, which implies that the potential for decisions on corporate deals is limited. The flip-side of this challenge is obviously that companies need to think internationally from the start and are ‘born global’ by necessity.
• The country faces a limited and declining supply of top level engineering talent. While engineering schools are very good, too few students choose to pursue information technology as a degree, which implies that companies need to attract foreign talent or move some of their activities to other regions.
• Only a handful of private venture capital firms and business angels are active in Belgium, and thus limited financing capability is available especially in the seed and early stage.
Still, a number of ICT companies have managed to become global players that dominate their niches, such as Clear2Pay. An analysis of its track-record and key differentiators illustrates some of the strengths of the

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