This paper provides historical evidence about structural change in the Italian brewing industry. After the WWII, the industry gradually became highly concentrated, dominated by multinationals. In the late 1980s, a new wave of entrants, i.e. craft breweries, revolutionized the industry. This paper discusses the causes of rising of concentration and the successive advent of the craft breweries. In the discussion, we highlight how the evolution of the brewing industry conforms to the predictions of the industry life cycle and resource-partitioning models. Various factors played a key role in rising concentration and successive late-stage entries although some of these have been disregarded in the economic literature on industry evolution. The findings and analysis provides important insights and help advance our understanding of the current and future competition and business strategies in this industry.

本文提供了有关意大利酿造业结构变化的历史证据。第二次世界大战后，该行业逐渐变得高度集中，由跨国公司主导。在1980年代后期，一波新进入者，即精酿啤酒厂，彻底改变了该行业。本文讨论了精酿啤酒厂集中度上升的原因和相继问世。在讨论中，我们重点介绍了酿造行业的发展如何与行业生命周期和资源分配模型的预测相符。各种因素对集中度的提高和后期进入阶段起着关键作用，尽管其中一些在产业演化的经济学文献中被忽略了。