The Survey on the Use of Information and Communication Technologies and e-Commerce in Companies (ETICCE) is an annual sample based survey conducted by the INE for the whole of Spain. On the basis of a collaboration agreement with the INE, Idescat extends on the results offered by this operation for Catalonia.
The ETICCE was conducted for the first time in 2002 (referring to 2001), using harmonised methodological criteria, both to draft the questionnaire and to estimate the variables. The methodology used is widely accepted internationally, which enables international comparison of the results obtained.
Regulation 808/2004 of the European Parliament and Council, of April 21, 2004, sought to establish a common framework for the production of Community statistics on the information society and for the production of indicators in this area. Every year, Eurostat produces a document that details the study area and variables for inclusion in the questionnaire to enable the collection of the statistical information necessary to produce the indicators on the implantation and use of ICT and e-commerce in the reference framework.
The main objectives of the survey are:
- to show the implantation and use of ICT by companies with activity in the Spanish territory.
- to show the use of e-commerce made by companies.
- to obtain comparable information between autonomous communities, Spain and other countries.
1. Population scope
The target population for this study was made up of companies whose main activity is described in sections C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, L, the divisions of 69 to 74 of section M, and section N and group 95.1 in accordance with the CCAE-2009.
Economic activity groups included in the EICTCE in accordance with the CCAE-2009
- Industry (codes 10–39)
Food; beverages; tobacco; textiles; dressmaking; leather and footwear; wood and cork; paper; graphic arts and reproduction on recorded media (codes 10–18)
Oil refinery; pharmaceutical products; rubber and plastics; non-metallic mineral products (codes 19–23)
Metallurgy; manufacture of metal production and steel production; (codes 24–25)
Computer products, electronics and optics; electric material and equipment; mechanical machinery and equipment; motor vehicles; transport material; furniture; miscellaneous manufacturing industries; furniture and other manufacturing industries; repair of machinery and equipment (codes 26–33)
Energy and water (codes 35–39)
- Construction (codes 41–43)
- Services (codes 45–63; 68–74 and 77–82; 95.1)
Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorbikes (codes 45–47)
Transport and storage (codes 49–53)
Accommodation and food and beverage service activities (codes 55–56)
Information and communications (codes 58–63)
Property activities (code 68)
Professional, scientific and technical activities (codes 69–74)
Administrative activities and auxiliary services (codes 77–82)
Repair of computers and communication systems (code 95.1)
2. Temporal scope
The ETICCE is an annual survey with a double time reference to guarantee the international comparability of the results. The reference period of the variables on infrastructures, equipment and use of ICT is the first quarter of the year in which information was collected (2022), while the period of reference for the variables of e-commerce, interaction with Public Administration, staff specialized in ICT, Big Data analysis, invoicing and data on general business information is the whole of 2021. The employment data is an annual average for 2021 and the economic data in relation to purchasing and sales refer to the whole of 2021.
3. Geographic scope
The Geographic scope of the research consists of the whole of the Spanish territory. However, the survey does offer some results for each of the autonomous communities.
The exploitation for Catalonia contains information on all of the statistical units located in Catalonia.
4. Statistical units
The statistical unit of analysis is the company with an economic activity that is included in the Population scope as described above. The company is also the informant unit.
A company is understood to be any legal entity that constitutes an organisational unit for the production of goods or services, and that enjoys certain autonomy in its decisions, mainly in terms of the assignation of the resources it possesses. A company can exercise one or more activities in one or more establishments.
The data contained in the questionnaire refers to the whole company, i.e. it includes all establishments that the company has in different places to its head offices.
5. Sample design
The population framework for the survey is the Central Company Directory (DIRCE). This is an organised registry of information that contains data on the identities, locations, territorial distribution and classification by size and economic activities of companies. This data is obtained from administrative sources (Tax agency, Social Security, etc.) and is complemented with information provided by different INE statistical operations. The DIRCE is updated on an annual basis by incorporating new information.
For each Autonomous community, the population of EICTCE target companies is stratified by cross-comparing variables:
- Size of company in terms of wage earning employees. The following intervals are considered:
- From 0 to 2
- From 3 to 9
- From 10 to 19
- From 20 to 49
- From 50 to 99
- From 100 to 199
- From 200 to 499
- From 500 or more
- CCAE-2009 activity groups listed in the table in the Population scope section.
The sample selected in Catalonia for this edition of the survey according to size of company was the following:
- Companies with 0 to 9 employees: 712
- Companies with 10 or more employees: 1,975
6. Data collection
The questionnaire used was sent to all companies in the sample (although the sub-population of companies with less than 10 employees is considered optional by Eurostat).
The questionnaire is structured in different blocks.
Block B includes questions on the use of computers and open-source software.
The next block covers issues relating to specialist ICT workers, which are staff that, within a company, have a job related to ICT, and ICT training activities.
Block D contains questions related to businesses' access and use of the Internet. Information is requested on the different types of Internet connection (fixed and mobile) and the maximum download speed contracted. It also asks about the availability of a website, Internet meetings and remote access, teleworking and if the companies use social media such as social networks (Facebook, Linkedin, etc.), blogs or microblogs (Twitter, Blogger, etc.), websites that share multimedia content (Youtube, Flickr, etc.) or wiki-based knowledge-sharing tools.
The following blocks, E and F, cover issues related to artificial intelligence and big data analysis.
An extensive module on ICT security follows, containing questions on the availability of ICT security measures, the people responsible for them, employees' awareness of these measures, whether the company creates documents with ICT security measures, procedures or practices, and whether any incidents related to ICT security have occurred.
Block H is devoted to robotics. Specifically, it asks whether and what kind of robots companies use and why they decided to use them.
The next block, I, covers issues related to ICT and the environment: the implementation of measures to reduce paper usage and energy consumption, the environmental impact of ICT services, and how they deal with ICT equipment when it has become redundant.
Block K contains information in relation to e-commerce and differentiates between purchases and sales. In the case of purchases, the data requested is the percentage that they represent of the total amount of turnover. Both purchases and sales are structured into two blocks: those made via the website and those made via electronic data exchange. Purchases are broken down by geographical area (Spain, other EU countries and the rest of the world) while sales are broken down by customer type: to other companies (B2B) and to the Public Administration (B2G), and by geographical region.
Two last blocks aim to measure the expenditure that companies have made in such information technologies as computers and peripheral equipment, programs, telecommunications services and the hire of ICT equipment, among others, and the carrying out of in-house R&D activities.
Data collection is done in the first quarter of 2022, by Internet and regular mail. Informants from companies are recommended to fill in the questionnaire using the Internet. However, those informants that prefer to receive a printed copy of the questionnaire can request this.
7. Concepts
- Main economic activity of the company
Main economic activity is understood to mean that which generates the greatest value added. If the company does not have this data, the main activity is considered to be that which generates the greatest turnover, or if this information is also missing, that which employs the highest number of people.
- Staff employed by the company
This is the number of people that work for the company, inside or outside of its buildings, and that are compensated for doing so. This includes both paid and unpaid workers
- Paid employees
Those that are associated to the company by means of a permanent or temporary labour contract and that are paid by means of fixed or periodical amounts in the form of wages or salaries, payment in kind, etc. This includes paid owners, students with a formal commitment that contribute to the production process in return for payment and/or educational services, staff on strike or that are on short-term leave. Excluded from this category are workers associated to a temping agency and those that are on long-term leave.
- Unpaid employees
Those that participate actively in the company without any kind of fixed payment or salary. This includes the owners, autonomous shareholders and family assistants. This does not include capital shareholders or the owners' relatives that do not play an active role in the company, or people that are on the payroll of another company that is the one where they perform their main activity.
- Turnover
Income invoiced by the company during the year of reference for the provision of services and the sale of goods (not included VAT) that are the object of the company's activity. This is accounted for in net terms while deducting refunds and sales discounts and not deducting cash discounts nor sales discount for immediate payment. Turnover does not include the sale of fixed assets or subsidies for the production of good and services.
- Net purchases of goods and services
Represent the goods and services acquired during the year of reference. This includes merchandise, prime materials, other supplies, work done by other companies or professionals and expenses in the outsourcing account. The purchases are valued at the price of acquisition (without deductible VAT) and are accounted for in net terms while discounting purchasing discounts and discounts or refunds to suppliers derived from quality defects.
- E-commerce
The ETICCE used the broad definition of e-commerce as considered by the OECD. An electronic transaction is the purchase or sale of products (goods or services), between companies, homes, individuals, administration or other public or private organisations, by means of telematic networks. Payment for the goods or services acquired by e-commerce can be made by means of these same networks or by other means. Orders made by telephone, fax or manually written e-mails are not considered e-commerce.
- Web-based sales or purchases
Sales made via an online store or using forms on the company website or extranet.
- EDI-based sales or purchases
Sales made via electronic data exchange messages, the term EDI being understood generally to define the sending or receiving of sales information in an agreed format that can be treated automatically (EDIFACT, UBL, XML, etc.).
- Free/open-source Systems
Software developed under an open-source licence. This type of licence allows the source code to be modified or redistributed under certain conditions without paying the original author.
- Mobile Internet connection for business use
Internet connection with laptops or mobile devices (laptops, or other devices such as Smartphone, PDA phone, etc.) with Internet access through cellular networks fully or partially paid by the company. Not considered the only devices that connect via Wi-Fi.
- Social media
The use of social media refers to the use by the company of applications based on Internet technologies or communication platforms for connecting, creating or exchanging online content with clients, suppliers/partners, or within the company. It is considered that companies that use social media are those that have a user profile, account or user license, depending on the requirements and type of social media used.
- Big Data Analysis
Use of techniques, technologies and software tools to analyse data generated from activities carried out electronically and from machine to machine (M2M) communications (data generated from social media activities, processes, etc.). This type of data has the following characteristics: significant size (large quantity of data generated over time), variety (different complex data formats) and speed (generation speed, availability and variation in time).
- Artificial intelligence
This refers to systems using technologies such as: text mining, computer vision, speech recognition, natural language generation, machine learning and deep learning to collect and/or use data to predict, recommend or decide on, with varying levels of autonomy, the best action to achieve specific objectives. These systems can be purely software-based (virtual assistants based on natural language processing, facial recognition systems based on computer vision or voice recognition systems, machine translation software, etc.) or embedded in devices (autonomous robots for warehouse automation or production assembly work, autonomous drones for production monitoring or package handling, etc.).
- Robotics
Depending on their intended application, robots can be either industrial or service orientated.
- Industrial robot: an automatically controlled, reprogrammable, multi-purpose machine with three or more programmable axes, which may be stationary or mobile, for use in automated industrial processes.
- Service robot: a machine with a degree of autonomy capable of operating in complex and dynamic environments that may require interaction with people, objects or other devices, excluding its use in automated industrial processes.
- ICT security
It refers to the measures, controls and procedures applied to ICT systems used to ensure the integrity, authenticity, availability and confidentiality of data and systems.
8. Tabulation and publication of results
Idescat undertakes a tabulation of the EICTCE survey that expands on the results offered by the INE for its autonomous community.
In order for the published data to be comparable with that which is offered by the INE and other official statistics bodies, the results are structured into two sections:
- Companies with 10 or more employed persons
- Companies with less than 10 employed persons
The published results have been obtained in consideration of all of the activity groups included in the population area of the survey, apart from the division 56 and group 95.1.
In the tables that present the results for companies with 10 or more employed persons, the information is presented disaggregated by the following characteristics:
- Number of employed persons
- From 10 to 49
- From 50 to 249
- From 250 or more
- Activity sector
- Industry
- Construction
- Services
The results for the companies with less than 10 employees are only disaggregated by activity sector.
In the Research · Technology section of the Idescat website the information on these statistics can be consulted for other years.