This study focuses on a well-known but yet elusive concept: (technological) lock-in. We summarize what is known about the nature of lock-in and offer a critical view on history- dependent processes based on recent contributions to the literature. We discuss if lock-ins are really inescapable,...

The participation of top R&D players to publicly funded research collaborations is a common yet unexplored phenomenon. If, on the one hand, including top R&D firms creates opportunities for knowledge spillovers and increases the chance for a project to be funded, on the other hand, the uneven...

A growing number of studies identify a generalized slowdown in labor productivity growth. The very existence of the slowdown ignited a series of academic debates suggesting that secular stagnation or "mismeasurement" problems are at the root of the observed trends. We posit that the composition...

The economic literature started to recognize the heterogeneity characterizing the nature of different technologies, introducing the concept of General Purpose Technologies. In this paper, we offer a "new view of General Purpose Technologies", building on the historical as well as on the recent...

The idea that market selection promotes survival and expansion of the “fittest” producersis a key principle underlying theories of competition. Yet, despite its intuitive appeal, thehypothesis that companies with superior productivity also exhibit higher growth lacks em-pirical support. One...