Ghinwa Moujaes (p)

Carles Méndez-ortega

Complex technologies rely on a diverse set of capabilities and relatively few countries around the world are able to specialize in them. Complex economies host a broad set of capabilities and specialize in such technologies. The Smart Specialization Strategy (RIS3), EU’s Innovation policy, calls for countries to expand their knowledge core into more complex technologies. As RIS3 gains more political and monetary support across the EU, it becomes essential to study what type of growth do more complex nations witness. Thus, this paper studies the mutually reinforcing relationship between knowledge accumulation, measured through economic complexity, on the local inequality of a country. Due to the policy relevance, and the context-specific nature of inequality dynamics, the paper focuses its analysis on EU countries. By measuring complexity using patent data, the paper finds that more complex nations across the EU are more equal. Furthermore, by implementing a System of Equations (3SLS) model, the paper additionally finds a the mutually reinforcing relationship between the two dynamics: more complex nations are more equal, and more equal nations have a higher capacity to produce more complex economies.

Marinella Boccia (p), Davide Consoli, Annamaria Ferragina

Ghinwa Moujaes

Prior empirical studies concur that Knowledge Intensive Business Services (KIBS) contribute to local economic development but, also, that the beneficial effect exhibits remarkable heterogeneity depending on specific characteristics of the regions. To date, few studies have addressed whether and to what extent the above empirical regularity depends also on specific characteristics of the innovation process. To address this gap the present paper explores the hypothesis that KIBS have differential impacts on regional innovation capacity depending on the stage of technology life-cycle, and of the attending know-how. Our empirical analysis focuses on Italian regions (NUTS 2) over the period 2000-2017. Using patent data to identify the life-cycle stages (from emergence to maturity) and employment data to compute the location quotients of regional KIBS intensity, we carry out fixed and random effects regressions while controlling for a battery of indicators such as share of manufacturing, human capital, R&D investments, and other structural characteristics. Preliminary results indicate a stronger correlation between KIBS endowment and early stages of the innovation life cycle, especially for northern regions in prior to the 2008 great recession.

Josep-Maria Arauzo-Carod, Miguel Manjón-Antolín, Carles Méndez-Ortega (p)

Marinella Boccia

This paper analyses the survival of the Spanish video game firms during the period 1980 to 2018. This means that we observe the survival process of these firms through different life cycle stages and practically the whole life period of this industry. We analyse the role played by firms’ location, firms’ strategies and industry structure on survival to find that both internal and external firms characteristics influence the survival probability of these firms. In particular, we find little evidence supporting the hypothesis that positive locational externalities exist in project-based industries at the local level (De Vaan et al. 2012).