Innovation and e-commerce in clusters of small firms: The case of a regional e-marketplace

Eleonora Lorenzini

Local Economy, 2014, vol. 29, issue 8, 771-794

Abstract: This paper goes into the black box of a Regional Electronic Marketplace (REM) and studies it from a multiplicity of points of view. It identifies the critical success factors for the establishment of an REM and its evaluation, analyses the determinants of firms’ satisfaction and economic performance inside the REM and proposes policy suggestions. The analysis is based on micro-level data collected via a questionnaire submitted to firms, on interviews with relevant agents and accountancy data. Results show that REMs deserve support as an instrument of territorial development in the establishment and in the adoption phase. Policy makers should promote policies aimed at financing the acquisition of know-how and technical infrastructure but also work as ‘territorial animateurs’, identifying possible pilot enterprises characterised by high export orientation, commercial vision and linkages inside and outside the cluster, and then encouraging its adoption amongst less innovative firms.

Keywords: clusters; e-commerce; innovation policy; Italy; Regional Electronic Marketplace; small and medium-sized enterprises (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0269094214556053 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:loceco:v:29:y:2014:i:8:p:771-794

DOI: 10.1177/0269094214556053

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Local Economy from London South Bank University
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().