Supporting Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Higher Education in Italy by OECD and European Union

Author:OECD and European Union
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: governance/industry/education
Publisher: OECD Publishing
Published: 2019-12-03T00:00:00+00:00

Notes

← 1. The funds that were merged were the Fondo per le Agevolazioni alla Ricerca (FAR); the Fondo per gli Investimenti della Ricerca di Base (FIRB); and Progetti di Ricerca di Interesse Nazionale (PRIN).

← 2. Representatives from the productive sector, along with representatives from Italian HEIs, participated in a stakeholder workshop held in the University of Milan “Bicocca” in May 2019.

← 3. Industrial districts consist in a system of companies, mainly SMEs, characterised by horizontal and vertical integration and productive specialisation, generally concentrated in a specific territory and linked by a common historical, social, cultural and economic experience (OECD, 2017).

← 4. In Siena for instance, the Monte dei Paschi bank alone hired in 2018 16 apprentices and 52 interns; and the only recruitments that were made since 2015 are apprentices at the end of their studies.

← 5. Other interesting examples in the Lombardy ecosystem include: the collaboration between all the universities of Milan and Assolombarda, the local branch of Confindustria; the CORIMAV Consortium for research on materials, created in 2001 by the University of Milan “Bicocca” and Pirelli, funding PhD positions in materials science; the collaboration between Politecnico di Milano and ROLD (innovative firm focused on the introduction of digital technologies in manufacturing processes), where the firm finances inter-departmental research projects and takes advantage of the role of a “broker”, a researcher employed by the company to act as a liaison between the firm and external research centres, including universities.

← 6. One of the contributions of the stakeholder workshop underlined that universities should engage more actively with small and micro firms, which constitute the economic fabric of the country, especially in areas that cannot benefit from dynamic urban agglomerations. So far, this has been one of the limits of competency centres, which privilege the interactions with large firms.

← 7. In this respect, the stakeholder workshop represented an opportunity to identify positive experiences such as that of InVentoLab (http://www.inventolab.com/), a B-Corp that promoted entrepreneurial education activities in the social and environmental sectors.

← 8. As discussed at the stakeholder workshop, Italian research universities should not become central of services for the productive sector. However, it would be important that universities are part of an integrated higher education system that capitalises on the presence of new entities (ITS and professional bachelor’s programmes) to connect research with business and society.

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