This paper examines how the nature of the technological regime governing innovative activities and the structure of demand interact in determining market structure, with specific reference to the pharmaceutical industry. The key question concerns the observation that - despite high degrees of...

In this paper we present a history-friendly model of the changing vertical scope of computer firms during the evolution of the computer and semiconductor industries. The model is “history friendly”, in that it attempts at replicating some basic, stylized qualitative features of the evolution...

In this paper we present a model of the long term dynamics of market structure and innovation in the pharmaceutical industry in a history friendly way. Our results show a strong increase in concentration in each therapeutic area, but a rather low level of concentration in the overall market....

In this paper, we explore the effects of alternative policies, ranging from antitrust to public procurement, open standards, information diffusion and basic research support on the dynamics of two vertically related industries in changing and uncertain technological and market environments. The...

The history of a number of industries is marked by a succession of eras, associated with different dominant technologies. Within any era, industry concentration tends to grow. Particular eras are broken by the introduction of a new technology which, while initially inferior to the established...

The claim of the paper is that industrial clusters need to be studied from a dynamic perspective. The complexity of cluster formation may be ascribed to its multi-dimensional and multidisciplinary character. The former refers to the co-involvement of individuals’ decisions, firms’ activities...

Simulation techniques have proliferated a lot in the last years. In economics the industrial dynamics approach makes use of simulation techniques to understand the complexity of the industrial process of continuous change. Among these models, a new branch of studies called “History-friendly”...

The paper examines the determinants of scientific productivity (number of articles and journals’ impact factor) for a panel of about 3600 French and Italian academic physicists active in 2004-05. Endogeneity problems concerning promotion and productivity are addressed by specifying a...

Notions of social capital have loomed large in the literature on academic careers, but it has proved difficult to disentangle the various benefits social capital bring to individual scientists. Besides, most of the relevant literature is quite US-centric and provide little clues on how the...