This paper provides an extensive empirical evaluation of a policy introduced in Italy at the end of 2012 to incentivize young innovative start-up firms. Using a Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD) we estimate the causal effects of the policy on the firms' share of intangible assets, turnover,...

Financing technology poses a special challenge to economic institutions for several reasons. First, the uncertainty surrounding all the investment decisions is particularly acute and pervasive in the case of R&D, as well as developing and testing process and product innovation. Second, while the...