High-Growth Firms: Facts, Fiction, and Policy Options for Emerging Economies

This report explores the key characteristics of High-Growth Firms (HGFs), focusing particularly on those aspects that have been or can be used as filters for policy action. The report then discusses a range of likely correlates of the success of HGFs, including productivity, innovation, agglomeration and networks, skills and managerial experience, global linkages (trade and foreign direct investment [FDI]), and financial development. Finally, it reviews the public policies used in developing countries to support the creation and scaling up of HGFs and the evidence on the effectiveness of mechanisms to screen and identify high-potential firms, concluding with a blueprint for a reorientation of public policies aimed at facilitating firm growth.