Science Parks contribution to scientific and technological local development: the case of AREA Science Park Trieste

Science and Technology Parks (STPs) have been widely studied in recent years. The majority of the contributions were mainly focused on the economic performances of the firms located in the parks, whilst limited attention has been devoted to the scientific and technological performances of the research centres, laboratories and firms located in these structures and to their impact on scientific and technological local development. In this paper, we propose and apply to the first and most important Italian STP (AREA Science Park – Trieste) a methodology to evaluate this aspect on the basis of established data and indicators of publications, patents and projects. We suggest that this approach can be useful to provide preliminary indications on the park strengths and weaknesses on these important aspects to Park managers and Policy Makers.