The Research "Startups, scaleups and employment in Italy: impact and trends" is conducted by the Hi-tech Osservatori Digital Innovation of the Politecnico di Milano on behalf of the Italian Tech Alliance. The main objective of the Research is to investigate and photograph the state of the art of the Italian startup ecosystem from an employment perspective, in order to understand their impact on the national economy and to suggest initiatives to support their growth.

Analyzing the population of Italian hi-tech startups financed in venture capital (913), during the two-year period from 2020 to 2022, the number of employees employed in startups increased by 59%, reaching more than 15,300 compared to the 9,640 recorded in 2020.

In particular, the startups analyzed show an annual growth rate of jobs employed during the two-year period of analysis of 26.2% annually, significantly higher than Large, Medium and Small enterprises (which stand at 4.3%, 3.2% and 6%). In addition, startups that received a Late stage funding round, i.e., greater than 15 million euros, showed shown significantly greater growth than those that received smaller amounts of funding. The startups belonging to the Late stage funding round bracket, in fact, create an average of 19 jobs per year, while those belonging to the Pre-seed bracket, or less than €1 million, create an average of 1.36 jobs per year. Examining the distribution of the jobs generated by the sample of startups analyzed, we find that 80% of the jobs employed in total comes from about a quarter of the startups, a distribution that confirms the "power law" phenomenon. This phenomenon is often observed in the startup and venture capital world and suggests that a few successful startups can lead to returns very high for investors, while most other startups may not be as profitable; the same phenomenon is also noted in terms of employment.

These data already highlight the strategic importance of supporting and promoting the Italian startup ecosystem. This support would not only stimulate national economic growth, but also the creation of new job opportunities, with the added benefit of nurturing essential skills to face global competition.

The Research also presents a specific insight related to the world of scaleups, understood as startups with at least 10 employees that already have a validated and scalable business model and grow by more than 20 percent in terms of revenue and/or number of employees in the next three years. Specifically, Italian scaleups total 117, about 11% of the total number of startups analyzed.

The phenomena already highlighted above are confirmed even more strongly: the growth rates of the corporate population of scaleups (32%) are higher than those of other business categories. In addition, scaleups contribute 50% of the jobs employed by startups in 2022, confirming their crucial and impactful role in the country's economy. These data underscore the urgency of not only supporting the emergence of startups but also encouraging their conversion into scaleups. This step is crucial to achieve an initial maturation of the Italian startup ecosystem, ensuring sustainable and lasting and maximizing the impact on the country's economy.

In the sector analysis, the comparison of the average startup-employee numerosity shows that deeptech sectors, are not only more "capital intensive" but also more "human intensive."

Indeed, not only can scaleups generate new jobs, but they can trigger interesting dynamics that can act as a flywheel effect for the ecosystem. One example of this is the outflow of employees: almost all scaleups surveyed in the Research report that their employees, once they leave the organization, continue their career within Corporate. This dynamic makes it possible to contaminate, stimulate and innovate the culture, the way of working typical of traditional companies: thanks to this flow, Corporate can in fact draw on skills and talents that bring with them not only technical-scientific or industry-specific know-how, but rather a wealth of values and agile methodologies typical of the startup world. The 38% of the scaleups surveyed also say that at least one of their employees who left the organization continued their path either in other startups, or even, started a new entrepreneurial activity (19%), also stimulating the so-called "second time founder" phenomenon.

Within these overall positive dynamics, however, it is necessary to pay attention to some warning signs warning signs. Indeed, the scaleups interviewed state that among the most sought-after and, above all, hardest-to-find profiles appear technical-scientific or managerial profiles that also possess technical skills related to the core technology on which the proposed solution is based. These data do not surprise us: the percentage of ICT specialists in Italy with respect to the total employed appears to be lower than the European average (3.8% vs. 4.5 %), as stated in the European Commission's Digital Economy and Society Index (DESI) 2022." These are data that should give us pause for thought, and above all encourage the discussion and implementation of initiatives, including at the at the institutional level, that support the reduction of this gap. A further wake-up call is represented by the outflow out of our country of skills and talents, who seek far more competitive offers in foreign countries, in terms of average salary and of growth opportunities.

Therefore, to ensure the full development of the Italian startup ecosystem and close the gaps with other European economies, we need targeted action by institutions and investors. Promoting the growth of startups toward scaleup status and addressing the shortage of technical and scientific expertise requires a coordinated and synergistic approach between the public and private sectors, involving actors that populate this ecosystem, such as investors, corporations, universities and research centers. Only through such a commitment together can the Italian ecosystem continue to thrive and contribute significantly to the national economy.