19th Regional Innovation Policies Conference
23-24/10/2025, Venice School of Management
Programme
"Twin Transition, Ecosystems, and Disruptive Innovation"
We are delighted to invite you to the 19th edition of Regional Innovation Policies Conference “Twin Transition, Ecosystems, and Disruptive Innovation”. The event will take place in Venice, Italy, on October 23rd-24th 2025, at the Venice School of Management - Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, San Giobbe - Economic Campus.
The Regional Innovation Policies Conference has, for nearly two decades, been an important international arena for researchers, policymakers, and practitioners to exchange insights on regional innovation and development, and to debate on current regional policies and challenges.
As the European agenda pushes firms and regional economies toward a transition that integrates digital innovations with more sustainable strategies, this edition will be dedicated particularly to assessing and debating the capacity of regional policies to support combined technological, environmental, and social transformations.
An opportunity to reflect on how innovation ecosystems targeted by recovery and resilience plans are transforming to follow regional trajectories along this direction.
An occasion to understand how regional specializations can be supported in the adoption and upscaling of today's most disruptive innovations meant to reach sustainable goals.
Keynote speakers
Lisa De Propris is Professor of Regional Economic Development in the Birmingham Business School. She has expertise in innovation and technological change; industry 4.0 and twin transitions; manufacturing clusters and global value chain; industrial and innovation policy. She has published in top academic journals such as “Regional Studies", “Research Policy”, ”Cambridge Journal of Economics", “Journal of Economic Geography”, “Journal of International Business Policy”, “Cambridge Journal of RES”. She sits on the Editorial Boards of Regional Studies, Journal of Industrial and Business Economics, and Progress in Economic Geography.
Laurens Klerkx is Professor of Agrifood Innovation and Transition at the University of Talca, Chile, and visiting professor at Wageningen University, The Netherlands. His expertise is in knowledge intensive business services, innovation systems, sustainability transitions, mission-oriented innovation policy, digitalization, and start-up ecosystems, empirically focused on the agrifood sector. He has published in journals such as Research Policy, Environmental Innovation and Societal Change, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Science and Public Policy, the Journal of Rural Studies, Food Policy and Agricultural Systems. He was editor-in-chief of The Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension and is editor of Agricultural Systems.
Provisional short programme
- 8:30-9:00 am: registration
- 9:00-10:30 am: 1st plenary session
- Welcome speech and institutional greetings
- Keynote speaker: Lisa De Propris
- 10:30-11:00 am: coffee break
- 11:00-12:30 pm: 1st parallel sessions
- 12:30-1:30 pm: lunch break
- 1:30-3:00 pm: 2nd parallel sessions
- 3:00-4:30 pm: 3rd parallel sessions
- 4:30-5:00 pm: coffee break
- 5:00-6:30 pm: 4th parallel sessions
- 7:30 pm: conference dinner
Venue
The conference will occur in San Giobbe Campus, Cannaregio 873, 30121 Venice.
Getting to Venice by plane
Arrival at "Marco Polo" airport in Venice (VCE)
From the airport you can reach Mestre or Venice (Piazzale Roma) by land (on a bus or taxi) or take the water route to Venice (Alilaguna boat or water taxi).
Getting to Venice by train
The Venice railway station is “Venezia Santa Lucia”. The main train companies in Italy are Trenitalia and Italo. You can purchase the tickets at the train station or online, directly from the relevant websites.
Getting to Venice by car
Piazzale Roma and Tronchetto are the two areas in Venice that can be reached by car and where you can find the following park terminals:
Getting around Venice
For more tourist information please visit Venezia Unica, the Official City of Venice Tourist and Travel Information website.
Photo "Vaporetto stop Stazione di Venezia Santa Lucia 07 2017 4038.jpg" by Mariordo (Mario Roberto Durán Ortiz) CC BY-SA 4.0.
Call for abstracts
We welcome abstract submissions related to regional innovation policy, in relation, but not limited, to the following themes:
- Policies and agency in twin (and multiple) transitions
- Building functioning regional Innovation ecosystems
- Regional adoption and upscaling of environmental and green technologies
- Disruptive innovation for circular and regenerative economies
- Challenged-oriented Regional Innovation Systems
- Policies failures in addressing Grand Societal Challenges
- Regional Innovation Policies in an era of disruptive changes in the global economy
- The geography of the twin transition (in collaboration with AISRe)
Special track organized by the Agrifood Management & Innovation Lab:
- Disruptive innovation and regional restructuring in the age of the twin transition: perspectives from the study of food systems
Abstracts should have a length of minimum 500 and maximum 1500 words and should not include graphs, figures, or tables. Please indicate a suggested track theme when submitting your abstract.
Support
Scientific committee
- Bjørn T. Asheim
University of Stavanger, Norway - Rune Dahl Fitjar
University of Stavanger, Norway - Monica Plechero
Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy - Cinzia Colapinto
Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy; IPAG Business School, France - Giancarlo Corò
Ca' Foscari University of Venice, Italy - Chiara Rinaldi
Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy