Roberto Grandinetti

Italian industrial districts as cognitive systems: Are they still reproducible?

Adopting a knowledge-based perspective, this study develops a framework of how Italian industrial districts (IDs) operate and evolve as cognitive systems. First, we analyse the mechanisms that facilitate knowledge diffusion across firms within IDs, the enabler of cross-firm knowledge transfer (absorptive capacity) and the process of producing new knowledge by combination. Within this analysis, we consider the formation of new firms resulting from the break-away of human resources from existing district firms (spin-offs) as a particular form of knowledge transfer and production within districts. Knowledge production by combination may take place not only within boundaries of IDs, but also involve external sources. We suggest that innovations made by combining internal and external knowledge have played an important role in shaping the evolutionary trajectories of IDs. Finally, again from the cognitive perspective, we address the issue of how globalization impacts on district systems, concentrating on the positive role that two different types of local actors play in their reproduction and evolution: the global–local firms and institutions providing knowledge-intensive business services.

Industrial Districts and the Collapse of the Marshallian Model: Looking at the Italian Experience:

In the last 15 years, Italys industrial districts (IDs) have been undergoing profound changes. Based on a number of empirical studies, this article analyzes several phenomena now amply evident in Italian IDs, including globalization and its effects on the firm population of each district and its fabric of interorganizational relationships; the impact of immigration on how the social structure and the production structure mutually interpenetrate; the shrinking reproducibility of the entrepreneurial factor; the diversification of the local production structure; an increased concentration of the turnover and workforce within the districts; and a weakening of the fabric of relations between enterprises. The combined effect of these phenomena has been to dismantle the Marshallian model that once characterized the majority of Italian IDs. Given this picture, the article focuses on the directions now being taken by these districts. By systematizing evidence emerging from existing studies on various single districts, we identify four scenarios.

Codification and creativity: knowledge management strategies in KIBS

Purpose – The paper aims to analyze the relationships between standardization and creativity in the process of service innovation in knowledge‐intensive business services (KIBS), specifically in those specialized in highly creative outputs (KIBS in design and communication). Studies on knowledge management and on service management emphasize the opportunity to gain efficiency through a standardization of services and organizational processes. However, creative activities are characterized by informality and difficulty to be standardized.Design/methodology/approach – The study adopts a qualitative research approach. Two case studies of medium‐size KIBS specialized in design and communication, localized in Bangalore (India) and in Treviso (Italy) are developed to identify how KIBS approach knowledge management both internally and externally and how firms structure the innovation process.Findings – KIBS can use a suitable knowledge management strategy to balance creative outputs with standardization based on...

Unveiling the growth process: entrepreneurial growth and the use of external resources

– Business research and entrepreneurship literature typically examines external resources as input or output of entrepreneurial (or high) growth. The purpose of this paper is to combine these two perspectives in describing and modeling high growth. , – The study tests the hypotheses on a sample of medium-sized, established manufacturing firms using structural equation modeling. , – Results provide original contributions to the business research on firm growth and entrepreneurship. They are consistent with studies advocating the importance of adopting a process perspective when studying business growth to probe the causal mechanisms behind growth. , – Being quantitative, this study does not address the dynamic interdependencies between proprietary and hybrid growth. However, the literature on entrepreneurship would benefit from qualitative studies that explore how successful and sustainable growth processes combine the two modes of growth. , – Findings partially discard the input and output approach in favor of a vision of entrepreneurial growth as a process that unfolds over time with the development of external relationships. Only the process of collaboration, a core competence of entrepreneurial firms, reduces information asymmetries and agency problems, thus turning the corresponding inter-organizational relationships into formidable feeders of firm growth. Entrepreneurial growth is in fact a process that needs external relationships in order to flourish over time.

Spin-off performance in the start-up phase – a conceptual framework

Purpose – Literature on spin-offs still lacks a thorough understanding of the forces governing spin-off performance. The purpose of this paper is to fill this gap by taking a network perspective. Design/methodology/approach – The paper combines the literature on spin-offs with the network approach to new ventures to proposing a model showing how networking in the pre-entry phases affects a spin-offs survival and early growth. Findings – The intensity and variety of interactions between the future entrepreneur (FE) and other individual actors has a positive impact on spin-off performance in both the incubation and the emergence phases. The degree of overlap between the network of the incubation phase and the network of the emergence phase also reinforces the effects of the intensity and variety of these interactions on performance during the emergence phase. Finally, entrepreneurial innovativeness is an antecedent of spin-off performance in that it requires different degrees of overlap between the network...

Local/Global Cognitive Interfaces within Industrial Districts: An Italian Case Study.

Purpose – With the advance of globalization the competitive chances of industrial districts depends increasingly on their ability to connect to the cognitive circuits of the global economy. This challenge demands the presence of local actors capable of acting as cognitive interfaces between the district context and the global environment. The paper focuses on a specific category of local/global cognitive interfaces, i.e. the institutions that provide knowledge‐intensive business services (KIBS). The purpose is to explain how institutional KIBS play this role.Design/methodology/approach – The paper develops a detailed analysis of the case of such an institution operating in the chair‐manufacturing district of North‐East Italy. Based on this case study, a model is proposed for interpreting the role of a local/global cognitive interface that institutional KIBS are able to perform.Findings – The first part of the framework shows the cognitive processes hosted by this type of institution and the connection bet...

Foreign direct investments in manufacturing by district firms: evidence from the Italian chair district

Manufacturing internationalisation is a phenomenon that currently involves several industrial districts. While the literature on industrial districts is wide, few works analyse the (manufacturing) internationalisation dynamics. This study tries to fill this lack by analysing forms, motivation, obstacles and results of the foreign direct investments carried out in one of the most important Italian districts. The research shows how some of the district leading firms have recently combined local presence with a strategy of internationalisation that also involves manufacturing activities through foreign direct investments. The readers can comprehend the main features of the international manufacturing path that is involving one of the most important Italian industrial districts, i.e. the chair district. The research offers a contribution to an area rather neglected in literature – the district (manufacturing) internationalisation dynamics.

Market extension and knowledge management strategies of knowledge-intensive business services

The paper aims at analysing the relationship between the market extension of Knowledge-Intensive Business Services (KIBS) and their knowledge management strategies. The literature emphasizes the strong relationship existing between KIBS and their customers in terms of innovation process and knowledge creation. We argue that the knowledge management strategies – in terms of knowledge codification, personalization, and knowledge creation – implemented by a KIBS is related to their geographical market extension. A quantitative approach is developed based on more than 150 Italian KIBS specializing in design and communication. The paper enriches the research framework concerning KIBS by emphasizing also the role of partners other than customers in KIBS’ knowledge management strategies.

Determinants of Market Extension in Knowledge-Intensive Business Services: Evidence from a Regional Innovation System

Several studies have emphasized the role of knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) in fostering innovation in metropolitan areas and regional innovation systems. Such areas are capable of expressing a strong demand for KIBS and consequently stimulate the rise and growth of KIBS. Despite an abundance of literature on KIBS emphasizing the relevance of spatial proximity to customers, many KIBS develop relationships on a broader national or even international scale. No studies have focused explicitly on this apparent discrepancy as yet. The aim of this paper is therefore to fill this theoretical and empirical gap by explaining the firm-level factors relating to the market extension of KIBS within the framework of regional innovation systems. Our analysis is based on a quantitative study on more than 150 KIBS supplying design or communication services located in the Veneto region (north-eastern Italy), an area that can be described as a regional innovation system. Five variables were considered, that is, size, experience, service standardization, investments in network technologies and relational intensity. Our results confirm that three of these variables, but not service standardization and relational intensity, correlate positively with the market extension of KIBS. Policy implications are also discussed.

Internationalization modes other than exporting

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically evaluate a model of the firm‐level determinants of export performance that includes the firms internationalization modes other than exporting.Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses information gathered on 147 Italian manufacturing small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) and applies a structural equation modeling procedure to evaluate determinants included in the model, which are: the firms commitment to developing an international marketing strategy, the organizational structure for exports, international modes other than exporting (foreign direct investment, international alliances, global sourcing), and some characteristics of the firm already extensively explored in other studies (size, age, international experience).Findings – The above‐mentioned firm internationalization methods are shown, as a whole, to have a statistically significant, positive and direct influence on export performance. The same can be said of the strategic...