Marco Delmastro

About me

Marco Delmastro is a social scientist, author of several books and scientific publications. He is also a columnist for newspapers and news websites.

Marco is research associate for Università Ca' Foscari (Venice) and CREF – Enrico Fermi Research Center (Rome). He is also a member of IRIS Academic Research Group.

He works for the Italian Communications Authority (Agcom) as the Head of AI. Before he worked as Managing Director of the Department of Economics & Statistics for several years. Prior to joining Agcom, he was economist at the Italian Competition Authority (Agcm), and case handler of important antitrust cases in the communication sector. He spent few years at Politecnico di Milano and the University of Pavia as Research Fellow. He was invited visiting scholar at the University of Sydney.

He holds a Master’s degree at Collegio Carlo Alberto (Turin), a Doctorate degree in Economics at the University of Pavia, and a Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Warwick (UK).

He is author of several scientific publications and three books (on industrial organization, big data, and measurement of social phenomena).

For his research achievements, he has obtained national scientific qualifications as a Full Professor in Economics, Political Economy, and Applied Economics.

Research interests

Economics

Digital economy

Modelling the Growth of the Network Value (with Antonio Scala), Chaos, 185, 2024

The explosive value of the networks (with Antonio Scala), Scientific Reports, 3, 1037, 2023

The privacy paradox: a challenge for decision theory? (with Jacopo Arpetti), Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, 48 (4), 2021

Big Data (with Antonio Nicita), Il Mulino, 2019

Industrial organization (theory of the firm)

The Economics of Organizational Design: Theoretical Insights and Empirical Evidence (with Massimo Colombo), Palgrave Macmillan, 2008

High performance work practices, decentralization, and profitability: evidence from panel data (with Massimo Colombo and Larissa Rabbiosi), Industrial and Corporate Change, 16 (6), 2007

Delegation of authority in business organizations: an empirical test (with Massimo Colombo), Journal of Industrial Economics, LII (1), 2004

The determinants of organizational change and structural inertia: technological and organizational factors (with Massimo Colombo), Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, 11 (4), 2002

The determinants of the management hierarchy: evidence from Italian plants, International Journal of Industrial Organization, 20 (1), 2002

Some stylized facts on organization and its evolution (with Massimo Colombo), Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 40 (3), 1999

Economics of innovation

Entrepreneurs’ human capital and the start-up size of new technology-based firms (with Massimo Colombo and Luca Grilli), International Journal of Industrial Organization, 22 (8-9), 2004

How effective are technology incubators? Evidence from Italy (with Massimo Colombo), Research Policy, 31 (7), 2002

Technology-based entrepreneurs: Does Internet make a difference? (with Massimo Colombo), Small Business Economics, 16 (3), 2001

A note on the relation between size, ownership status and plant’s closure: sunk costs vs. strategic size liability (with Massimo Colombo), Economic Letters, 69 (3), 2001

Technology use and plant closure (with Massimo Colombo), Research Policy, 30 (1), 2001

Antitrust, regulation and policy

An empirical analysis of the impact of structural changes in the mobile market (with Otello Ardovino), Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, 48(2), 2021

Agri-food economics

Viewpoint: Social Monitoring for Food Policy and Research: Directions and Implications (with Fabiana Zollo), Food Policy, 105, 102147, 2021

The economics of collective reputation: evidence from the wine industry (with Stefano Castriota), American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 97 (2), 2015

Tasters’ bias in wine guides’ quality evaluations (with Daniele Curzi and Stefano Castriota), Applied Economics Letters, 20 (12), 2013

Seller reputation: individual, collective and institutional Factors (with Stefano Castriota), Journal of Wine Economics, 7 (1), 2012

Computational social science

Modelling Infodemics on a Global Scale: A 30 Countries Study using Epidemiological and Social Listening Data (with Edoardo Loru, Francesco Gesualdo and Matteo Cinelli), arXiv, 2025

Dynamics and triggers of misinformation on vaccines (with Emanuele Brugnoli), PLOS ONE, 20(1), 2025

Unveiling the Hidden Agenda: Biases in News Reporting and Consumption (with Alessandro Galeazzi, Antonio Peruzzi, Emanuele Brugnoli, and Fabiana Zollo), PNAS Nexus, 3(11), 2024

Combining Natural Language Processing and Statistical Methods to Assess Gender Gaps in the Mediated Personalization of Politics (with Emanuele Brugnoli and Rosaria Simone), Social Science Computer Review, 2024