Fabio Sforzi

Chinese manufacturing entrepreneurship capital: evidence from Italian industrial districts

ABSTRACT The purpose of this paper is to obtain a better understanding of the presence of Chinese manufacturing entrepreneurship in industrial districts compared to other Italian local economies. Statistical data are used to uncover where Chinese manufacturing entrepreneurs localize their businesses and to what extent this localization is an innovation within the geographical pattern of industrial districts. Data on Chinese manufacturing micro-enterprises (i.e. with less than 10 persons employed) started up in years 2005–2007 and 2008–2010 are cross-tabulated by industrial districts and other local economies to investigate their change over time. The empirical findings show a dominance of industrial districts: those located in Tuscany are on top and Prato district ranks first.

From Administrative Spatial Units to Local Labour Market Areas

The region as the unit of investigation is what distinguishes Regional Economics from other branches of Economics. Edgar M. Hoover, the founder of the Regional Economics, devoted a chapter of his book An Introduction to Regional Economics (Hoover 1971) to the region and its definition.

Chinese Micro-Entrepreneurship in Italy: A Place-Based Explanatory Analysis

The emergence of Chinese manufacturing activities is indeed playing an increasing role in the current debate on the resilience of Italian industrial districts (IDs). From the external point of view, the Chinese fierce competition to the Italian economy is well known. From the internal point of view, it is acknowledged that the transnational migration phenomenon of Chinese people towards Europe and Italy evolves alongside their localised entrepreneurial activity. This chapter examines the emergence of Chinese micro-entrepreneurship in local contexts and whether or not it is associated with specific patterns of specialisation and localisation within Italian IDs in particular.

Territorial servitization in Marshallian industrial districts: the industrial district as a place-based form of servitization

ABSTRACT This paper is the first general study of territorial servitization in Marshallian industrial districts (MIDs). It introduces the novel idea of place-based servitization as a form of territorial servitization, which is then used conceptually to reframe the traditional perspective on MIDs, manufacturing places par excellence. Drawing on comparable quantitative data from Italy and Spain for 1991, 2001 and 2011, the paper then provides generalizable empirical evidence about the stylized facts of servitization in MIDs, casting a light on the transition to services of the MID as one model of place-based servitization.

Pathways of Innovation: The I-District Effect Revisited

The I-district effect establishes the existence of dynamic efficiency in Marshallian industrial districts in the form of a positive innovative differential comparing to the average of the economy. The hypothesis has been empirically validated for the case of technological innovation using patent indicators. Empirical research has assumed that all types of patentable figures (utility models, national patents, EPO, WIPO) have the same weight regardless of its actual or expected market value, which may be questionable given the differences in coverage, protection and cost of each figure. In this article, we question the existence of the I-district effect when each patent is weighted by its expected potential value. As the I-district effect theory predicts, the relative differential effect is maintained even in the presence of the weighting, rejecting that the industrial district specializes only in low-quality patents. However, in this case, the primacy of industrial district as the most innovative local production system can be outpaced by other local production systems.