Necessarily global

Given its small home market, Swiss business has always needed to be international to survive. The same goes for Scandinavia, which comes third after America. The position of the next three, Britain, Belgium and the Netherlands, partly reflects the imperial and trading heritage of these relatively small countries. Germany, Spain, Italy and Austria are all below the average for 25 European countries, though Germany has about 500 small and medium-sized (Mittelstand) companies that are world leaders in tiny niche markets, as well as a strong car industry and corporate giants such as Siemens and BASF, the world's biggest chemical conglomerate.

So why does America lead in the fast-growing high-tech sectors, and why does Europe hold its own only in more mature industries? Europe's computer companies of the 1960s more or less disappeared but America's survived, albeit consolidated into fewer groups. Britain's ICL, Italy's Olivetti and the Netherlands' Philips have all left the IT industry; the only surviving computer-hardware company in Europe is a joint venture with Japan, Fujitsu Siemens, and the only leading international software house is SAP. America's giants—IBM, HP, Intel, Microsoft, Oracle and Google—dominate IT globally.

Hans-Paul Bürkner, global president of Boston Consulting Group, sees a clear difference in approach between Europe and America that helps to explain why American high-tech businesses are so much more successful. In the 1970s, he says, many Americans started to get out of more traditional industries and into IT hardware, software and biotech. He thinks one of the biggest obstacles to progress in Europe is a desire to preserve the status quo. But despite this conservatism, he points out, Germany has remained the world's leading exporter, with companies that put together products and services from all over the world.

In a forthcoming book, Don Sull of London Business School identifies two contrasting approaches to corporate strategy: absorption and agility. Strategic agility means that a firm is able to exploit changes in the environment faster and more effectively than rivals. Absorption describes management's way of protecting an organisation from such changes by, for instance, diversifying out of the core business or growing “too big to fail”.

The difference between the two approaches is illustrated by the most famous boxing match of the 20th century. The “rumble in the jungle”, staged in (then) Zaire, pitted George Foreman, the world heavyweight champion, against the veteran Muhammad Ali, who was making a comeback bid. Ali's normal style was agility personified—“float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.” But faced with the younger Foreman, Ali spent six months learning to absorb heavy punishment. From round two he went defensive, leaning on the slackened ropes to absorb blows. In the eighth round, when Foreman had exhausted himself, Ali sprung off the ropes and knocked him out. His blend of absorption and agility had paid off.

As an example from the world of business Mr Sull quotes Pepsi, which uses a skilful mix of absorption and agility to try to overtake Coca-Cola. In fast-moving consumer goods, agile Procter & Gamble of America thrives on its streamlined product range whereas Europe's Unilever is panting to keep up, with too many brands in too many markets. America, by and large, stands for agility; Europe for absorption.