Sustainability, Innovation and Inclusion in the Italian Startup Ecosystem: Survey-Based Evidence from Italy

This working paper investigates how Italian innovative startups integrate sustainability, innovation, and inclusion within their strategic and organizational frameworks. Drawing on a national survey of 1,000 firms registered under the Italian Start-up Act, the study examines the structural, behavioral, and perceptual dimensions of sustainability-oriented entrepreneurship. The empirical analysis combines descriptive, comparative, and multivariate methods—including hierarchical and K-means cluster analyses—to identify typologies of startups that reflect different configurations of technological intensity, environmental commitment, and inclusiveness. The results show that Italian innovative startups are predominantly small, recently founded, and highly research-oriented, with a strong concentration in knowledge-intensive sectors. Sustainability- oriented startups—those identifying as “green†or “partially green†—represent almost half of the sample. They tend to be younger, employ a higher share of R&D personnel, and meet a greater number of legal requirements for innovative status. However, gender inclusiveness remains limited: female participation among founders and managers is low, and only a minority of startups implement formal inclusion policies. Cluster analysis reveals two main archetypes: (1) Technological Mainstream startups—larger, R&D- intensive firms focused on technological performance—and (2) Sustainable and Gender- Balanced startups—smaller but more inclusive and institutionally embedded. Within the subset of sustainability-oriented firms, two additional groups emerge: Tech-Green Operative Firms, focused on eco-efficiency and technological solutions, and Sustainable & Inclusive Champions, integrating environmental, social, and economic objectives. Finally, a set of econometric models was estimated to assess whether sustainability orientation systematically predicts key performance, innovation, and perception outcomes. The results confirm that green and partially green startups display distinct behavioral and strategic patterns even after controlling for size, age, sector, and regional factors.