Abstract
Hidden Champions, little-known global market leaders, are extremely important for the export performance of countries. They are a little-used source of management knowledge. No country has more Hidden Champions than Germany. After a phase of hyper globalization the Hidden Champions are facing new challenges, especially from rising Chinese competitors. They have to increase their R&D activities once again and include unfamiliar areas of knowledge in the process. They need to relocate their centers of excellence to the best place, which is often China. New drivers such as digitalization, business ecosystems and sustainability require them to adapt and open up their traditionally closed corporate cultures. This applies equally to cooperation partners and foreign environments.
Highlights
Hidden Champions are companies that are among the top three in their market worldwide, have revenue of less than 5 billion euros and are little known to the general public
After a phase of hyper globalization the Hidden Champions are facing new challenges, especially from rising Chinese competitors. They have to increase their R&D activities once again and include unfamiliar areas of knowledge in the process. They need to relocate their centers of excellence to the best place, which is often China
Germany has more of these unknown world market leaders than any other country
Summary
Hidden Champions are companies that are among the top three in their market worldwide, have revenue of less than 5 billion euros and are little known to the general public. On a per-capita basis, Austria and Switzerland have a roughly equal density of around 19 Hidden Champions per million inhabitants. Hidden Champions are the reason why among the large countries Germany has by far the highest per-capita exports. Because of their low profile, they are rarely used as a source of management wisdom. This is unfortunate because these companies are extremely successful and do not follow short-term fashions in their strategies. Vol 4, No 1, 2022 appearing on the global stage and are likely to become the fiercest challengers to the German champions
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