The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, to explore to what extent being located in a territory is value-relevant for a company. Second, to understand if a company is aware of, and how it can sustain, the territorial tangible and intangible assets present in the economic area in which it is located. Design/methodology/approach – The study presents an empirical multiple case-study, investigating ten mid-/large-sized Italian companies in manufacturing sectors.\ud The results indicate that the sampled manufacturing companies are intertwined with the environment in which they are embedded, both in their home country and in host ones. The domestic territorial capital has provided, and still provides, enterprises with workers endowed with the necessary technical skills that they can have great difficulty in finding in other places. In turn, companies support territorial capital generation through their activities

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This paper provides an analysis on the diffusion of the last generation digital technologies (Industry 4.0) in SMEs of Veneto region, one of the main manufacturing territory in Italy. Our attention focuses on factors that enable firms to adopt these technologies, with attention to three main aspects: the human capital endowment, the international openness, and the financial structure. Empirical analysis is based on a sample of firms that operate in manufacturing, construction and business services. Our analysis shows a heterogeneous diffusion of Industry 4.0 technologies through different industries, allowing distinct technologies frontiers among sectors. The Logit regression shows a positive relation between the adoption of digital technologies and the openness to international markets, as well as with a skilled human capital. The digital users show better productivity indexes than other firms, but at the same time financial performances are less clear. Hence, the firms that adopt new digital technologies have a more balanced financial structure, but they do not show higher profitability ratios than non-users. This result depends on a longer run return on investment and in a different distributive policy inside the firm.

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