Abstract

The growing uncertainty in the markets, also induced by geopolitical instability, affects value chains and subcontracting processes. The paper investigates the competitiveness of subcontracting companies that operate in the Global Value Chains (GVCs) with respect to the ones that operate only in the domestic market, by exploiting the results of a survey conducted on a representative sample of Italian manufacturing firms. The empirical findings show that the subcontracting firms operating in the GVCs are more competitive in terms of digitalisation, green transformation, cohesion and propensity of cooperation with other local firms