https://hdl.handle.net/10419/202096 Tue, 15 Sep 2026 02:55:56 GMT 2026-09-15T02:55:56Z https://hdl.handle.net/10419/322018 Title: Financing EU health innovation: The role of venture capital Authors: Veugelers, Reinhilde; Amaral-Garcia, Sofia Abstract: The EU is challenged by a persistent leadership gap in the global health innovation landscape, with the US leading in corporate health innovation and venture capital (VC) funding. The EU health innovation landscape is more concentrated in older "incumbent leading firms," while the US has a more dynamic landscape with higher R&D growth rates. Financing constraints are highly relevant in the health sector, particularly for startups and scale-ups with risky breakthrough ideas and technologies. The EU-US gap in dynamic innovative performance in health may be partly due to differences in access to risk finance, particularly venture capital. This paper analyzes trends in VC financing for health-related innovations in Europe compared to the US, using data from Dealroom. The results show that the weakness of the European health VC market continues to hold in the early and late stages, where less progress seems to have been made. Some of the main findings include the following: the EU is lagging behind the US in the number of health VC deals, with a larger gap in late-stage deals; European deal sizes are below the US, with a larger gap in late-stage deals, the EU has a lower occurrence of co-investment deals, which does not help reduce the gap in health VC deals. Overall, the European health VC market is particularly missing larger-sized investors (investment funds) with late-stage deals. To address this gap, policy attention is needed to identify and reduce barriers for European health VC investors to grow to a critical scale and engage in a higher number and larger-sized deals. All in all, Europe should further develop and strengthen its strongest asset, i.e., its Open Single Market, reducing the fragmentation in flows of venture capital, reaching a truly single European Venture Capital market. For an EU open strategic autonomy industrial policy for health, an open single market for health remains the critical instrument to further develop and monitor. Wed, 01 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://hdl.handle.net/10419/322018 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10419/322089 Title: Small-world networks, dynamics and proximity in investment decisions Authors: Zhen, Ni; Testa, Giuseppina; Compañó, Ramón Abstract: Using deal-level micro data from the Dealroom database, we construct a dynamic co-investment syndication network to examine the influence of cultural proximity and geospatial proximity between investors and start-ups, as well as the network position of global VC firms on investment decisions in European-based start-ups. By applying a linear probability regression model with highdimensional fixed effects over the period 2015-2022, we confirm that both cultural and spatial proximity significantly facilitate VC investment. Moreover, our analysis reveals that a prominent network position - characterized by how well-connected (degree centrality) and how influential (Katz centrality) within the co-investment network- substantially enhances VC investments on account of the facilitated sharing of information, contacts, and resources among investors. Furthermore, our findings reveal that small-world networks, characterized by high clustering coefficients, facilitate investments in distant start-ups, helping to overcome spatial constraints-an aspect largely overlooked in the literature. Small-world syndication networks foster trust among members, complementing each other through differentiation and specialization in industrial knowledge and local markets, potentially altering risk-averse behaviour and enabling investments that transcend geographical boundaries. Wed, 01 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://hdl.handle.net/10419/322089 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10419/334955 Title: M&As, innovation and superstar firms Authors: Martinez Cillero, Maria; Napolitano, Lorenzo; Rentocchini, Francesco; Seri, Cecilia; Zaurino, Elena Abstract: Rising market concentration and the dominance of 'superstar' firms have sparked concerns about declining competition and innovation. While technological change and globalisation are key drivers, mergers and acquisitions (M&As) may also play a role. This paper investigates whether firms use technological M&As - acquisitions of innovative subsidiaries with patent portfolios - to enhance market power. Using a global panel of 8,314 publicly listed firms from 2008 to 2020 and a staggered difference-in-differences approach, we find that such acquisitions increase acquiring firms' markups by 2% on average. Effects are stronger among top R&D investors, US-based firms, and those in high-tech manufacturing. The main mechanism appears to be greater insulation from competitors via acquired patents, which limit knowledge spillovers and raise entry barriers. These findings highlight the need for antitrust policies that balance innovation incentives with the risks of growing market power. Wed, 01 Jan 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://hdl.handle.net/10419/334955 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z https://hdl.handle.net/10419/301914 Title: Economic complexity and the sustainability transition: A review of data, methods, and literature Authors: Caldarola, Bernardo; Mazzilli, Dario; Napolitano, Lorenzo; Patelli, Aurelio; Sbardella, Angelica Abstract: Economic Complexity (EC) methods have gained increasing popularity across fields and disciplines. In particular, the EC toolbox has proved particularly promising in the study of complex and interrelated phenomena, such as the transition towards a greener economy. Using the EC approach, scholars have been investigating the relationship between EC and sustainability, proposing to identify the distinguishing characteristics of green products and to assess the readiness of productive and technological structures for the sustainability transition. This article proposes to review and summarize the data, methods, and empirical literature that are relevant to the study of the sustainability transition from an EC perspective. We review three distinct but connected blocks of literature on EC and environmental sustainability. First, we survey the evidence linking measures of EC to indicators related to environmental sustainability. Second, we review articles that strive to assess the green competitiveness of productive systems. Third, we examine evidence on green technological development and its connection to non-green knowledge bases. Finally, we summarize the findings for each block and identify avenues for further research in this recent and growing body of empirical literature. Mon, 01 Jan 2024 00:00:00 GMT https://hdl.handle.net/10419/301914 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z