Invisible Capital at Work: Evaluating the Impact of Intangible Assets on Company Performance

Research background: The increasing role of intangible assets in the digital economy is significantly transforming business structures in Europe. While the relevance of assets such as software, patents, or know-how is growing, their impact on company performance remains underexplored, particularly in Central and Eastern European countries. Gaps persist in understanding how intangible assets contribute to revenue generation and profit creation across company sizes and national contexts. Purpose of the article: The aim of this article is to analyse the evolution and financial implications of intangible assets in manufacturing companies operating in Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The research investigates the relative importance of intangible versus tangible assets and compares their influence on key performance indicators such as operating revenue and operating profit, with a specific focus on size-based differences. Methods: The analysis is based on data from the years 2018 to 2023, covering a sample of 1,393 manufacturing companies from the ORBIS database. The analysis combines descriptive statistics, year-on-year growth comparisons through paired samples t-tests, Spearman correlation analysis and separate linear regression models for each country. Findings & Value added: The results show that intangible assets are growing faster than total assets, especially in Slovak SMEs and very large companies. While correlations with financial performance are statistically significant, they remain moderate in strength. Regression models explain over 98 percent of revenue variability and confirm the economic relevance of intangible assets, which outperform tangible ones in predictive value. The value added of this study lies in confirming the role of intangible assets as a relevant but not standalone factor in financial performance