Technological proximity and place-based innovation policy outcomes: University–industry alignment in Italian provinces (2000-2022)

This paper examines whether pre-policy technological alignment between university research and industrial-sector technology profiles is associated with heterogeneous territorial dynamics following Italy’s post-2011 academic-entrepreneurship reforms. Drawing on Regional Innovation Systems and the Knowledge Spillover Theory of Entrepreneurship, we conceptualise technological proximity as an observable component of territorial absorptive capacity. We analyse province-sector panel data for Italian NUTS-3 territories over 2000–2022 using an interaction between a post-2011 indicator and a cosine-similarity measure constructed from 2000–2010 university patent specialisation and sector-specific technology profiles. Greater pre-policy alignment is associated with comparatively stronger post-2011 changes in high-technology employment and in the number of active innovative firms. The wage association is not directionally robust: it is positive in the baseline specification but becomes negative when province-sector fixed effects are introduced. Because patents are geographically assigned using the applicant institution’s recorded address, the analysis does not identify campus-level knowledge production. The findings therefore document heterogeneous post-2011 associations rather than a causal reform effect and identify applicant-address-based technological alignment as a correlate of territorial innovation dynamics.