The aim of this website is to provide access to the work-in-progress of scholars who work on different kinds of private business organizations in the preindustrial world. Large-scale enterprises such as the English or Dutch East India Companies loom large over the business history of preindustrial socieities because they pioneered the legal form of the modern corporation. In reality, the majority of private business enterprises, whether in the commercial or manufacturing sectors, maintained a family basis. They were normally organized as sole proprietorships or general partnerships, that is, private enterprises in which owners and managers had the same decision-making power and shared equally all profits and losses. This website gives access to the work of scholars documenting this variety of business forms.