Employee Ownership and Technological Innovation: Do Worker Cooperatives Innovate?, with Thibault Mirabel, Applied Economics Letters, 1–7.
Abstract: This article examines the relationship between employee ownership and technological innovation. The impact of worker cooperatives' democratic governance on innovation is debated—some highlight financial constraints and slow decision-making as disadvantages, while others emphasize participatory structures and knowledge-sharing as advantages for innovation. Using a balanced panel of French worker cooperatives from 2014 to 2018, we find nuanced relationship: the share of worker-owners among workers positively influences innovation, whereas the share of worker-owners among owners negatively impacts innovation, providing empirical evidence for both the advantage and disadvantage hypotheses. Regional spillover effects also play a significant role. These findings challenge the notion that worker cooperatives are inherently less innovative than conventional firms and highlight the importance of ownership distribution and external conditions in shaping innovation outcomes.
Cluster and Local Science-Industry Collaborations: Evidence from a Place-based Innovation Policy, The Journal of Technology Transfer, 1-43
Abstract: Place-based cluster policies have been widely adopted to foster regional innovation by promoting R&D collaborations. While previous research highlights the behavioral additionality of these policies, evidence regarding their effectiveness in fostering science-industry (S-I) collaborations remains limited. This paper examines the impact of the establishment of the French Competitive Cluster Program in 2005 on S-I collaborations. Leveraging a novel dataset of collaborative patents from 2000 to 2018, the results show that the cluster policy increases S-I collaborations within targeted regions. Additional analyses suggest that the effect is strongest in knowledge-intensive sectors and is associated with higher patent quality. Furthermore, the cluster policy induces a shift in innovative search strategies, with greater reliance on prior knowledge, suggesting a move toward incremental innovation. The findings contribute to the literature on the effectiveness of place-based cluster policies on science-industry collaborations and offer new insights into how to promote new collaborations through direct R&D subsidies and the diffusion of academic research into industrial applications.
Crowd and the Gender Gap in Evaluating Entrepreneurship, Small Business Economics, 1-22.
Abstract: Does relying on the crowd mitigate differences in evaluations between male-and female-led entrepreneurial projects? Drawing on the wisdom of the crowd and the gender stereotype theory, I examine gender differences in crowd evaluations and the role of gender identity in assessing quality using data from an online platform. I find that female-led projects do not receive lower evaluation scores, but female evaluators are more supportive of female founders. However, a gender gap persists across sub-criteria, with male-led projects receiving higher scores on traits associated with masculine stereotypes, while female-led projects garner more support for traits aligned with feminine stereotypes.
Crowd-Based Feedback and Early-Stage Entrepreneurial Performance: Evidence from a Digital Platform, Research Policy, 52(7), 104792
Abstract: The ability to identify early-stage venture potential, which has traditionally relied on experts, is challenging due to the uncertainty of new ideas. However, an alternative judgment from a large number of evaluators can effectively identify promising ventures. This paper empirically studies whether crowd-based information generates informative feedback for entrepreneurs as well as seed investors. Using data on about 701 early-stage founders of new ventures examined by 2,600 evaluators, I estimate the effects of crowd-based ratings on survival and securing seed funds. I find that the rating from the crowd is uncorrelated with subsequent financing events from seed investors but increases a venture’s probability of continuation by 3.1 percentage points. This effect becomes stronger as the number of evaluators increases. This highlights that the aggregation of judgments offers information for nascent founders of ventures.The Impact of Market Regulation on Innovation: An Analysis of Direct and Indirect Effects, Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, 22(3), 429-456.
Abstract: The effects of competition regulations on innovation are, in theory, ambiguous. Using a panel of twenty-five OECD countries over 1995–2015, we estimated how domestic and foreign competition affects innovation. Reducing regulation intensifies domestic and foreign competition, increasing R&D expenditure and patenting. Accounting for interaction between these two sources of product market competition, we find that domestic regulation directly led to growing R&D expenditure and patent production, whereas competition from foreign regulation influences innovation toward its effect on domestic competition.University-Industry Collaborations’ Technological Diversification over the Business Cycle. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2025, No. 1, p. 14534). Valhalla, NY 10595: Academy of Management.
Abstract: This paper explores the effect of the business cycle on university-industry collaborations and technological diversification within 218 European regions from 1990 to 2018. I find that university-industry collaborations increase during economic expansions, with the most pronounced effects observed in the exploitation of technologies already known to the region. In contrast, the exploration of new technologies is also positively associated with economic growth, albeit to a lesser extent. The analysis further shows that the effects of R&D investments on university-industry collaborations vary by sector over phases of the business cycle: private sector R&D expenditures are countercyclical, driving collaboration during recessions, while government R&D spending is procyclical, supporting exploratory activities during economic booms.
Innovation Performance and the Signal Effect: Evidence from a European Program, with Nadine Levratto, Working Paper 2021-34, EconomiX-CNRS, Université Paris Nanterre
Abstract: This paper seeks to estimate the effect of a European policy that subsidizes innovation investments. By carefully selecting observables, we compare recipients of the program with non-recipient firms to overcome the endogeneity of R&D grants. We conduct a difference-in-differences design on the universe of a unique firm-level dataset of European SMEs between 2008 and 2017. We find a significant effect of proof of concept grants, which implies an increase in the number of patent applications and the probability of patenting. There are positive impacts on credit financing, which suggest a signal effect to investors about the project quality of young firms.High-Tech Clusters and Productivity: A European Perspective