Zoran Aralica, Anita Harmina (p)

Elisa Panzera

Technological transformation means technology-driven structural socio-economic change which includes various aspects of economic activities as a result of technology use. In the measurement of technological transformation itself, the question of which dimensions should be included in the analysis of technological transformation is rarely present in the literature (Capello, Lenzi, 2022). This is the reason why it is important to define which types of technologies are analysed, which way these technologies appear in a national economy invention and/or adoption, which types of infrastructure and human capital are required for technological transformation, and how these technologies diffuse within economy/society, and on which way technologies create socio-economic impacts. The first objective of the research is to untangle the intricate links among different theoretical, conceptual, and methodological approaches to the measurement of technological transformation whereas the second objective is to propose a new conceptual framework for the measurement of technological transformation in the context of Industry 4.0 at the country level.

Andrea Fracasso (p), Mauro Caselli, Sergio Scicchitano, Silvio Traverso, Enrico Tundis

Anita Harmina

This work investigates the impact that changes in the local exposure to robots had on Italian employment dynamics over the period 2011-2018. It contributes to the debate by providing novel and granular evidence on the impact of robot adoption on new activity-based groups of occupations and by focusing on the overlap between the functional similarities of robot applications and occupations. This framework, consistently centered on workers' and robots' activities, reveals highly heterogeneous effects of robotization, ranging from positive to negative across different groups of occupations, thereby supporting a nuanced and granular reading of this debated phenomenon

Roberta Capello, Camilla Lenzi, Elisa Panzera (p)

Andrea Fracasso

A great interest was devoted to the rise of the Industry 4.0 production model and its impacts. Far less is known about the so-called digital service economy, a multifaceted phenomenon made of a sprawling range of businesses based on digital platforms and redesigning the boundaries of manufacturing towards services. The net socio-economic effects of the digital service economy at the local level are not known yet, and difficult to be measured unless the different value creation models it entails – each involving different players and different sources of value creation and distribution - are not identified. This paper fills such a gap by separating out, on conceptual grounds, specific value creation models within the digital service economy, each presenting distinctive growth opportunities and threats, and, empirically, measuring their spatial diffusion and co-existence in each European region. The taxonomy of European regions obtained serves future research purposes to assess the expected heterogeneous regional socio-economic effects of the digital service economy and its value creation models.