Abstract

Construction is one of the major industry worldwide, it makes an important contribution to the European and Italian gdp, as well as this sector is the largest industrial employer in most countries, accounting to around 7 percent of the total employment worldwide. However, during the recent crisis, the sector falls into one of the deeper downturn in its history, for a mix of factors both on the private and public market side. In this context, our paper investigates the long run and more recent strategies pursued by the most influent Italian firms for remaining competitive. In particular, we analyze very recent survey data collected by Italian National Association of Construction Companies and our results show that the international activities represents now the most important share of global turnover of the most important actors on the Italian market.