Definition of the Essence of the "Enterprise Development" Notion

The article considers the issue of development of an enterprise, which is one of the most urgent today for Ukraine. In order to ensure a continuous process of economic development, each enterprise strives for the rational use of resources, improvement of the quality of products, satisfaction of social requirements of their employees and population of the region where it functions and has a final goal - profit increase. The article studies scientific works of domestic and foreign scientists, in which they consider the problem of enterprise development. It provides main directions and derives main variants of enterprise development under modern conditions. It considers development as a process, which is influenced by factors of external and internal environment. It characterises and graphically presents stages of the enterprise life cycle, each of which makes its impact of enterprise development. It analyses possibilities of development of an enterprise under crisis. It defines the essence of the "enterprise development" notion and proves importance and urgency of a detailed study of this issue with the aim to ensure a certain level of enterprise competitiveness.