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| dc.title | Supporting Firms in the Digital Age: The Case of Investment Promotion |
| dc.contributor.author | Volpe Martincus, Christian |
| dc.contributor.author | Sztajerowska, Monika |
| dc.contributor.orgunit | Productivity, Trade and Innovation Sector |
| dc.coverage | Latin America |
| dc.coverage | The Caribbean |
| dc.date.available | 2026-05-18T00:05:00 |
| dc.date.issue | 2026-05-18T00:05:00 |
| dc.description.abstract | Public agencies that support firms operate today amid a difficult combination of challenges. Geopolitical realignment, supply-chain reconfiguration, and rising market volatility have raised the value of timely and tailored intelligence on cross-border opportunities. Public budgets, particularly in developing economies, are under sustained pressure. At the same time, digital technologies are reshaping how information is gathered, shared, and acted on. Together, these shifts bear most directly on policies that support firms by addressing market and coordination failures, particularly those associated with information frictions. Trade and investment promotion agencies (TPAs and IPAs), whose work mainly consists of providing information-intensive support to firms operating across borders, are a leading example. A closer look at how IPAs adopt and use digital tools therefore offers a useful illustration of how digitalization is reshaping firm-support policies more broadly. This report presents new, comparative evidence on this digital transformation of investment promotion. Drawing on a unique survey of 50 IPAs in advanced and developing economies, the report examines: (i) the long-term evolution, and the patterns, of digital tool adoption by IPAs; (ii) the resources, tools, and strategies IPAs use to digitize, including the choices that have allowed agencies with more limited resources to keep pace with peers in advanced economies; and (iii) how digital adoption is associated with the effectiveness of IPA interventions. It also presents a set of digitalization indices that can support agencies' self-assessment and cross-country comparison, and inform the policy dialogue, capacity-building, and operational work of international organizations. |
| dc.format.extent | 163 |
| dc.identifier.doi | http://dx.doi.org/10.18235/0014044 |
| dc.identifier.url | https://publications.iadb.org/publications/english/document/Supporting-Firms-in-the-Digital-Age-The-Case-of-Investment-Promotion.pdf |
| dc.language.iso | en |
| dc.publisher | Inter-American Development Bank |
| dc.subject | Investment Attraction |
| dc.subject | Digital Technology |
| dc.subject | Budget |
| dc.subject | Trade and Investment Promotion |
| dc.subject | Labor Force |
| dc.subject | Information and Communication Technology |
| dc.subject | Pandemics |
| dc.subject | Investment |
| dc.subject | Investment Promotion Policy |
| dc.subject | Small Business |
| dc.subject.jelcode | F01 - Global Outlook |
| dc.subject.jelcode | O24 - Trade Policy • Factor Movement Policy • Foreign Exchange Policy |
| dc.subject.jelcode | P33 - International Trade, Finance, Investment, Relations, and Aid |
| dc.subject.jelcode | F23 - Multinational Firms • International Business |
| dc.subject.keywords | Digital age;Investment Promotion;Investment promotion agencies |
| dc.type | Monographs |
| idb.identifier.pubnumber | IDB-MG-01351 |
| idb.operation | RG-E1937 |