The economic performance of a country depends, among other things, on the strategies and structures of its firms. In the framework that is designed by institutions and policies and determined by technology and macroeconomic cycles, entrepreneurs decide how to allocate available resources in...

To evaluate the effect of an R&D subsidy one needs to know what the subsidized firms would have done without the incentive. This paper studies an Italian programme of subsidies for the applied development of innovations, exploiting a discontinuity in programme financing due to an unexpected...

The lag in innovation in Italy vis-�-vis the other main industrial countries is one of the effects of the fragmentation of the production system into many small firms that have trouble bearing the high cost of R&D and taking the related risks. Such other causes as shortages in human capital...

This paper provides some empirical evidence of the impact of two policy measures designed to support innovation in small and medium firms in an Italian region, both financed using the European Structural Funds but managed at regional level. The first measure was a concessional loan to promote...

Investment in public research in Italy is below the European average as a percentage of GDP. Nevertheless, in relation to expenditure and the number of researchers, the output is high, and the quality of research, conducted in universities and research organizations, is close to that of such...

Following the constitutional reform of 2001, which gave increased autonomy Italian regions, and the new European guidelines from the Lisbon Agenda, there has been an upturn in regional legislative activity concerning innovation, leading to a critical review of the instruments adopted, mainly...

The paper explores the long run evolution of Italy's performance in technological innovation as a function of international technology transfer, reconstructing the different phases and dimensions of Italian innovative activity, tracking the transfer of foreign technological knowledge through a...

The Italian and European regulatory framework for patents would benefit from further improvements in order to foster dynamic competition between Italian firms. At the national level the exclusive allocation of the right to patent inventions to universities, rather than to researchers, would...

The paper explores the long run evolution of Italy's performance in technological innovation as a function of international technology transfer, reconstructing the different phases and dimensions of Italian innovative activity, tracking the transfer of foreign technological knowledge through a...

Small firms encounter difficulties in raising external finance owing to greater information problems. For small innovative firms, whose activity is more difficult to evaluate, the cost of external finance could be even higher. This paper examines special features of the financial structure of...