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Currently at the cusp of a new wave of deep transformative innovations, entrepreneurship and innovation are becoming the key drivers of economic growth and prosperity. Gaining and sustaining a position in the international entrepreneurship and innovation arena is becoming a top priority for every country that strives to set the foundations for a future of resilient economic growth. The Republic of Cyprus acknowledges the window of opportunity that lies ahead and it is determined to formulate the necessary conditions that will enable the growth of its scientific, entrepreneurship and innovation ecosystem. The appointment of the first Chief Scientist for Research and Innovation, the establishment of the Cyprus Research and Innovation Framework1 as well as a plethora of recent actions by the Ministries demonstrate a willingness to transform the country towards this direction. For the past twenty years, Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) is the leading worldwide study on entrepreneurship, covering all geographic regions and economic levels. GEM’s conceptual framework encapsulates a comprehensive set of indicators on entrepreneurship, allowing for the construction of detailed profiles of entrepreneurship in each participating economy. These include attitudes of societies towards entrepreneurship, the characteristics, motivations and ambitions of entrepreneurs, and the 12 ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN CYPRUS 2018/19 1 Innovate Cyprus 2019/2023. Available at: https://chiefscientist.gov.cy/wp-content/ uploads/Innovate-Cyprus-CYRI-Strategy-Framework-2019-2023-NBRI-May-2019-2.pdf quality of entrepreneurial ecosystems in different economies. It also extracts data on the conditions of each country’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. Shedding light on the status of the entrepreneurial activity, its characteristics as well as on the factors that affect it, is an important step towards taking informed and effective policy-making decisions that account for the rapidly changing technological, economic and social landscape. This is the third successive year Cyprus participates in GEM, providing in this way retrospective data that enable the identification of changes of the country’s entrepreneurial landscape. The purpose of this year’s national GEM report is to provide an insightful overview of the changing dynamics of Cyprus’ entrepreneurial ecosystem across the recent years, enable the identification of early trends and foster their comparison with identical metrics at European level. GEM Cyprus 2018/2019 results can serve a powerful tool to inform the country’s entrepreneurship and innovation policy-making. On the plus side, societal perceptions towards entrepreneurship have improved compared to the previous years and a larger part of the population perceives that high status is associated to successful entrepreneurs (61.5% in 2017/2018, 67.6% in 2018/2019). Similarly, media attention for entrepreneurship has increased (50.5% in 2017/2018, 54.3% in 2018/2019). The expected impact by entrepreneurial activity in Cyprus with respect to new job positions has improved. Compared to the previous years, a larger number of entrepreneurs in Cyprus foresee one or more job positions arising by their entrepreneurial activity in the following years (34% expects 1-5 new job positions, 22.4% expects more than 6 job positions). In 2018/2019 the physical infrastructure and commercial and services infrastructure remain the most important strengths of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Cyprus. Entrepreneurial education at post-school level has notably improved this year and is also identified as a strength of the ecosystem. Despite these improvements, the population’s confidence with respect to the capabilities to initiate entrepreneurial activity has been reduced across the years (52.4% in 2016/2017, 46.4% in 2017/2018, 45.9% in 2018/2019), whereas fear of failure remains remarkably high as approximately one in two Cypriots fear failure with regards to entrepreneurial activity. This has a direct impact on Cyprus’ Total Early-Stage Entrepreneurial Activity (TEA), as the TEA index value recorded is the lowest across the last three years (12% in 2016/2017, 7.3% in 2017/2018, 3.9% in 2018/2019). Compared to the previous years, nascent entrepreneurial activity has largely been reduced (7.6% in 2016/2017, 3.6% in 2017/2018, 1.2% in 2018/2019). Difficulties in accessing financial resources is one of the most important reasons of business exit, whereas the gender gap with regards to Cyprus’ TEA persists across the years. The country’s entrepreneurial ecosystem urges the need for improving entrepreneurial education at schoollevel as well as improving the visibility of entrepreneurial programs available for new businesses and boosting the access of new businesses to financial resources. Overall, while Cyprus is shifting away from the years of financial recession, GEM 2018/2019 results reveal that its entrepreneurial ecosystem is still affected. Despite all efforts to increase its start-up activity, this activity mainly targets the local market. However, it is necessary for Cyprus to raise the number of transformational entrepreneurs that can be disruptive at a global scale. Increasing access to financial resources, especially for early-stage and high-risk entrepreneurial endeavors, is necessary for improving the country’s potential to compete in the international entrepreneurial arena. Similarly, enhancing entrepreneurial-related education at school level can largely contribute in reducing fear of failure, minimizing risk-averseness and in cultivating an entrepreneurial culture from an early stage. Along the same lines, although there is a variety of initiatives by different ministries in supporting the start-up ecosystem and offering entrepreneurship programs, there is currently a lack of orchestration. The forthcoming Deputy Ministry of Innovation and Digital Policy could possibly coordinate all relevant initiatives in the future. Additionally, improving the integration across the different entrepreneurship programs could elevate their visibility and effectiveness. GEM enables the generation of yearly data on Cyprus’ entrepreneurship status and fosters the comparison with several other countries. This year’s report provides insights on Cyprus’ entrepreneurial activity across the last three years and uses European average values benchmarks. Drawing on these results, it provides policy making recommendations. We aspire that the report can serve as a useful tool for boosting the island’s entrepreneurial activity Ministry of Energy Commerce Industry & Tourism PricewaterhouseCoopers

Entrepreneurship is a core driver of economic growth and societal prosperity, as it fosters the innovation necessary for exploiting new opportunities, enhancing productivity, increasing employment opportunities and providing more effective solutions. Aiming for a resilient economic recovery and growth, Cyprus strives to actively participate in the entrepreneurship and innovation global arena. This is reflected in recently formulated mechanisms and policy frameworks that aim to drive the country’s entrepreneurial activity towards growth and internationalization, including the formulation of a Deputy Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digital Policy. The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) has been keeping its finger on the pulse of the state of entrepreneurship since 1999, both in terms of the state of the entrepreneurial mind-set, motivations, activities and ambition, as well as the national framework conditions required to allow entrepreneurship to flourish in an economy. GEM’s conceptual framework contains a comprehensive set of indicators on entrepreneurship, allowing for the construction of detailed profiles of entrepreneurship in each participating country. These include societal attitudes and beliefs towards entrepreneurship, the characteristics, status and expected impact of entrepreneurial activity and also the conditions of each country’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. GEM 2019/2020 Adult Population Survey (APS) included 50 different economies. GEM’s framework is well positioned to assess the current status of entrepreneurship in each country. Our country’s participation in GEM places Cyprus on the global map of entrepreneurship and innovation. This is the fourth successive year Cyprus participates in GEM, which allows for a longitudinal analysis of the evolution of the local entrepreneurial ecosystem. The national GEM report at hand aims to present an overview of the status of entrepreneurial intention and activity, the characteristics of entrepreneurs, the expected outcomes and the advantages and burdens of the national entrepreneurship ecosystems. Furthermore, the report also reflects on the changes recorded across the recent years. In order to serve as a powerful tool for informing the country’s entrepreneurial status, the report also compares Cyprus’ index rates with Greece’s and Luxembourg’s as well as the European average rates. GEM Cyprus 2019/2020 highlight the advantages as the inhibitors of the island’s entrepreneurial activity. On the positive side, societal challenges towards entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial activity in Cyprus have improved compared to the previous years. In 2019/2020 a larger part of the population perceives that entrepreneurship is a good career choice (69.9% in 2018/2019, 7.3% in 2019/2020) and high status is associated to successful entrepreneurs (67.6% in 2018/2019, 76.7% in 2019/2020). Similarly, the perceived capabilities to initiate entrepreneurial activity has improved (45.9% in 2018/2019, 58.2% in 2019/2020). Cyprus’ TEA rate has notably increased this year (3.9% in 2018/2019, 12.2% in 2019/2020). Comparing Cyprus’ TEA with other European countries participating in this year’s GEM, Cyprus’ is ranked 9th. Similarly, Cyprus’ rate of established businesses (6.1% in 2018/2019, 10.1% in 2019/2020) and intrapreneurship (5.4% in 2018/2019, 6.2% in 2019/2020) have both increased. Cyprus’ entrepreneurship ecosystem benefits from its high-quality physical infrastructure and commercial and services infrastructure, which remain the greatest strengths of the local entrepreneurial ecosystem across the years. Entrepreneurial education at post-school level is also a strength of the island’s ecosystem. However, entrepreneurial opportunities, fear of failure, gender gap as well as other factors inhibit Cyprus’ entrepreneurial activity. Approximately two in five individuals in Cyprus perceive that there are available opportunities for initiating entrepreneurial activity (38.5%) while the index rate has decreased compared to last year (45.9%). Along the same lines, although fear of failure has decreased compared to the previous years, in 2019/2020, 36.4% of the population expressed their fear of failure related to entrepreneurial activity. There is also a disproportionate involvement of females and males in entrepreneurial activity (0.6 ratio). The gender gap ratio remains unchanged across the years, highlighting the need to take further action. The country’s entrepreneurial ecosystem lacks sufficient entrepreneurial education at school stage, funding and R&D transfer. Most of these inhibitors persist across the years, highlighting the need for additional and more effective policies. Overall, Cyprus’ status of entrepreneurial activity has improved, while positive changes have also been recorded on societal perceptions. Despite these improvements, GEM 2019/2020 also shed light on the weaknesses of the ecosystem. The results underline the need for a disruptive shift from an economic, cultural and educational perspective. Indeed, the availability of financial resources needs to be increased, both for high-risk early stage endeavors as well as for more mature start-ups in need of venture capital. The risk-averse culture of the population needs to be altered through enhanced life-long education, whereas enhanced media attention and entrepreneurship programs could further contribute to increasing female entrepreneurship. Education at school stage also needs to be transformed to promote creativity, risk-taking and international orientation from an early-stage. The formulation of a Deputy Ministry of Innovation and Digital Policy is the first step towards orchestrating the different government initiatives and providing more targeted support for the start-up ecosystem. This year’s special section exhibits the aims and strategies of the deputy ministry and describes its planned actions. Cyprus’ annual participation in GEM provides useful and comparable insights on the country’s entrepreneurial status and makes policy recommendations. We aspire that GEM results can serve as a useful tool for further elevating and enhancing the country’s entrepreneurial activity. Ministry of Energy Commerce Industry & Tourism PricewaterhouseCoopers

Entrepreneurship is the principal mechanism for materializing the impact of technological innovation on economies and societies. Technological innovation is, in turn, the ultimate source of productivity improvement and the main driver for economic growth. Consequently, innovation and entrepreneurship have become top policy priorities in the national agendas of countries that strive to deliver prosperity for their citizens through economic growth, job creation and poverty reduction. What are the factors that determine the status of entrepreneurship in societies around the world? How can we observe and measure those factors and track their evolution in time as societies and economies evolve? Addressing those questions is the goal of the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), the leading worldwide study on entrepreneurship. GEM was initially conceptualized in 1997 and is currently considered as the most authoritative and informative longitudinal study on entrepreneurship in the world, covering all geographic regions and economic levels. The GEM conceptual framework is based on the assumption that national economic growth is the result of the personal traits and capabilities of individuals to identify and seize opportunities, and that this process is affected by environmental factors that influence individuals’ decisions to pursue entrepreneurial initiatives. Therefore, GEM seeks to capture the attitudes of societies towards entrepreneurship, the characteristics, motivations and ambitions of entrepreneurs, and the quality of entrepreneurial ecosystems in different economies. GEM accounts for specific contextual factors, which are considered influential in creating unique business and entrepreneurial contexts, such as social, political, and economic. Measuring and understanding the factors that affect the status of entrepreneurship is important in order to drive policy-making that can lead to solid productivity improvements and a positive change in economic activity. Policy making in the modern world is particularly challenging, as it needs to take into account the rapid and profound changes brought by exponential progress in technology, the unprecedented acceleration of globalization and the onslaught of climate change. Exponential progress in knowledge and technology makes most new technologies obsolete very fast. The cycle of innovation, which comprises experimentation, learning, knowledge application, and assessment of success or failure - is becoming shorter than ever. Automation, Artificial Intelligence, and the 4th Industrial Revolution are disrupting whole economic sectors and threaten to render a variety of blue and white collar jobs across numerous sectors obsolete. Globalization is leading to the acceleration of global flows of information, knowledge, people, commerce and finance, making the world hyperconnected and interdependent with markets, businesses, governments and societies interwound more tightly together than ever. Climate change raises unexpected challenges and threats that may require radical solutions to problems of great complexity and scale; such solutions might call for the deployment of innovative inventions, in synchrony with the mobilization of society and a radical change of mindset at a global scale. The aspiration of the Cyprus GEM National Report is to analyze the status and evolution of entrepreneurship in Cyprus through the lens of modern-world challenges. We believe this is important for informed, timely and agile decision-making. What are the key observations from the 2017/2018 survey? On the positive side, we observe that there is a constantly positive perception about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial opportunities in Cyprus, and that an encouraging percentage of the population expresses entrepreneurial intention. Physical, commercial and legal Infrastructures are considered to be on par with the European average, while government policies regarding taxes and bureaucracy are considered more positive to entrepreneurship than the EU average. In comparison to 2016/2017, it seems that an improved awareness about entrepreneurship is helping Cypriots to develop a more pragmatic view of the challenges involved in undertaking entrepreneurial activity. However, this is combined with an increased fear of failure and a weaker access to finance in comparison to the respective EU averages. Moreover, the riskreward balance offered in Cyprus appears rather limited, due to the small size of the country, the lack of highly specialized talent, and the sparsity of networks that connect local entrepreneurs and innovators with global finance and big markets. These factors can deter the up taking of high-risk or unconventional entrepreneurial activities. The GEM surveys for Cyprus of the last two years depict a country in transition from the financial crisis of 2012- 2013 into a future that is still uncertain. Total Early-Stage Entrepreneurial Activity (TEA) seems weaker compared to last year (7.3% in 2017/2018, 12% in 2016/2017). Most of the TEA entrepreneurs in Cyprus are opportunity-driven rather than necessity-driven. However, there is still a notable gender gap between female and male TEA entrepreneurs as the ratio between females and males involved in TEA is 0.6. Most of TEA is recorded in Wholesale and Retail sectors (45.4%), whereas rapidly growing sectors with strong innovation potential in globalized marketplaces, like ICT, renewable energy and intelligent manufacturing, have a modest contribution to TEA. Also, entrepreneurs involved in TEA do not foresee substantial creation of new jobs (46.6% expect no new jobs). Few entrepreneurs consider that their TEA activity is internationally oriented (10%), whereas activity relevant to medium-tech or high-tech is very limited (4.9%). These can be a source of concern for the future of economic competitiveness and job creation in dynamic economic sectors. Beyond the impact of entrepreneurship on Cyprus’ economic competitiveness and job creation, entrepreneurship can largely contribute to the altering of climate change and the protection of the environment. This year’s guest section emphasizes on green entrepreneurship. Drawing on international best cleantech practices, it provides recommendations to assist Cyprus in becoming a regional Cleantech Innovation and Entrepreneurship Hub for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Cyprus’ participation in GEM fosters the generation of data on the country’s entrepreneurship status across time and allows the comparison with other countries. This year’s GEM report analyzes the status of the entrepreneurship in Cyprus as it has evolved between 2016/2017 and 2017/2018 and compares it to corresponding European average values. It then outlines several policy making recommendations organized in respect to the following categories: Education, Government process, Financial support and Business Processes. We aspire that GEM 2017/2018 can be a practical and valuable tool for improving the status of entrepreneurship in Cyprus. Ministry of Energy Commerce Industry & Tourism Bank of Cyprus

The 2016/2017 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) survey represents the 18th consecutive year that GEM has derived insights on entrepreneurial activity including characteristics, motivations and ambitions of entrepreneurs, attitudes societies have towards entrepreneurial activity, phases of entrepreneurial activity, profiles of entrepreneurs and conditions of the entrepreneurship ecosystem. The 2016/2017 GEM survey included 65 economies, capturing 68.2% of the world’s population and 84.9% of the world’s GDP1. This is the first year that Cyprus participates in GEM. Each economy participating in GEM collects data from two surveys: the Adult Population Survey (APS) and the National Expert Survey (NES). The Adult Population Survey (APS) involved a random representative sample of 2001 adults between 18 and 64 years old. APS measured the individual participation across the phases of the entrepreneurial process. In the National Expert Survey (NES), 36 experts provided their informed opinions on the environmental features that have an impact on entrepreneurial activity. This report reflects on the results of the Adult Population Survey (APS) and the National Expert Survey (NES) conducted in Cyprus and discusses them with respect to the results of other economies. The objective of this report is to determine the extent and the characteristics of entrepreneurial activity in Cyprus, understand the factors that encourage or hinder entrepreneurial activity and provide recommendations to policy makers. Section 2 of this report provides more information on the economies participating in GEM and provides an overview of the methodology that has been employed. Section 3 and Section 4 summarize the results of the Adult Population Survey (APS) and the National Expert Survey (NES) respectively. Section 5 outlines the policy recommendations for Cyprus based on the 2016/2017 GEM results. Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism Bank of Cyprus Presidency, Unit of Administrative Reform European Commision

International audience; Cloud Computing provides simplicity to its consumers by saving them the efforts to deal with their own infrastructure, environments or software. This simplicity relies on the shifting of problems from the client to the provider, introducing new paradigms (virtualization, scalability, flexibility, pay-per-use, etc.). This simplicity comes with a price for the consumer that may accurately, or not, reflect the costs of the provider. In this paper we propose to identify the different points, in the Cloud Computing architecture, where the costs are generated , how their reduction/optimisation are considered, and finally we point-out which of these key points need to be further investigated, according to their foreseeable efficiency.; Cloud Computing fournit la simplicité à ses consommateurs en leur permettant d'économiser les efforts pour faire face à leurs propres infrastructures, d'environnements ou logiciel. Cette simplicité repose sur le déplacement des problèmes du client au fournisseur, l'introduction de nouveaux paradigmes (virtualisation, l'évolutivité, la flexibilité, pay-per-use, etc.). Cette simplicité est livré avec un prix pour le consommateur qui peut précision, ou non, refléter les coûts du fournisseur. Dans cet article, nous vous proposons d'identifier les différents points, dans l'architecture Cloud Computing, où les coûts sont générés, comment leur réduction / optimisation sont considérés, et, enfin, nous soulignons-savoir lequel de ces points clés doivent encore être étudiées, selon leur rendement prévisible.

The popularity of open-plan offices has been on the rise recently and expanded to all sectors of working life. While moving to open-plan offices brings savings to companies, open-plan offices have been connected with various different negative consequences, such as noise. Noise has been found to be a central cause of dissatisfaction towards working in an open-plan office and lead to subsequent negative outcomes, such as decreased self-perceived health and weakened cognitive performance. Therefore, it is important to study the ways and technologies that could possibly mitigate the negative effects of noise on work well-being and work performance. This explorative study investigates both the objectively measured and subjectively perceived effects of adopting noise cancellation earplugs by openplan office workers in a software company. In physiological measurements, the usage of noise cancellation earplugs was not found to affect work stress or work strain nor affect the stress-recovery balance. In psychological measurements, the perceived effects of using the earplugs on work well-being and work performance were small but rather negative than positive. This could be due to negative perceived comfort and usage experiences with the earplugs. Besides open-plan offices, the findings are mostly generalizable to other office settings as well. peerReviewed

A demand exists for the increasing understanding of consumers’ motives and habits related to exercising and the influence of sport and wellness technology on everyday lives. This study aims to shred light to the different types of users of sport and wellness technology by examining the influential aspects of sport and wellness technology and gamification. By thematically analyzing data from 16 indepth interviews, one group interview, and one set of observation, the study highlights the unique characteristics of the sport and wellness technology users by grouping them into ideal types that represents data as extensively as possible. An ideal type is an analytical construct to ascertain deviations and similarities of concrete cases in an individual phenomenon. This study discovered five ideal types of sport and wellness technology users: On-Off Exercisers, Confidence Seekers, Intrinsic Exercisers, Performance Improvers, and Sport Addicts. The formed ideal types are the main theoretical contribution of this study. The main practical contribution follows from suggesting the characteristics of sport and wellness technologies that are most important for each ideal type and the related gamification aspects. The providers of these technologies can utilize these insights in determining the technologies most suitable for each ideal type. peerReviewed