The new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) represent an important challenge for SME. Especially in the context of local productive areas, this topic may be relevant as a new opportunity of competitiveness for the system as a whole. In this working paper, the focus is on the...

This paper will discuss two fundamental concepts of industrial policy devel-oped by Sebastiano Brusco: the role of real services to support district firms and the role of real services needed to transform groups of isolated firms into systems of firms; and the promotion of widespread changes at...

In the first months of 2003, the Presidency of the National Research Council (CNR) entrusted to the CERIS the realization of an innovative information system concerning Public and Sme’s R&D institutions in Italy. The system - at first called Re@Search, then become Ricerc@.it - had to satisfy...

The new information and communication technologies represent both an important challenge and an opportunity for small and medium enterprises. In case of the industrial districts, low-price technologies, easy to implement and flexible to use could give a new impulse to the competitiveness of...

Along the last two decades Italian industrial districts have been touched by two main phenomena: internationalization of production and international migration. While the first has been extensively studied, the latter has not received the same degree of attention. This paper shows that...

Since the second half of the �90s, investment incentives channeled through the Law 488 have represented the main policy instrument for reducing territorial disparities in Italy. From 1996 to2003, the total amount of funds distributed to industrial firms has accounted for 16 billions of Euro...

This paper provides a statistical overview of the extent and composition of publicly-funded loans granted by banks to Italian firms. The analysis is based on the universe of reports to the Central Credit Register (CR). Between 1998 and 2007 the subsidized loans recorded by the CR amounted to...