Laura Bottazzi (PhD. MIT) is Professor of Economics at the University of Bologna, Italy, and fellow of the Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Research, IGIER.-Bocconi University. Her research interests include International Economics and Finance, Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics, Innovation and Growth. Winner of the Hicks-Tinbergen medal in Economics in 1998 and of the Nasdaq Award for the best paper on Capital Formation in 2006.