The Role of Personal Factors in the Location Decision of Software Services Start-up Firms

This paper explores the factors which influence the business location decisions of start-ups, focusing in particular on the role of personal factors. Established explanations of industry location emphasize proximity to firms in the same or related industries and proximity to a wider set of business services, though recent research suggests that personal factors may play an important role in explanations of industry location—particularly in technology-enabled sectors. A survey of 97 new firms, founded between 2008 and 2012, in the Irish software services sector, shows that the business location decision is influenced by the personal motivation of entrepreneurs to attain a desired quality of life, and that this outweighs economic factors such as proximity to firms within the same or related industries, proximity to a broader set of supporting business services, infrastructure or the availability of government support schemes. Personal factors are particularly important to firms located outside the Dublin metropolitan area and to home-based businesses. This has important policy implications for national and regional governments seeking to encourage entrepreneurship in technology-enabled service sectors.     

When Firms Take the Lead in Facilitating Clusters

This paper focuses on the role of lead firms and their efforts to facilitate the development of clusters. Several clusters are known for the location of the lead firms that create and shape them, for example, by increasing their skill base, attracting suppliers and creating entrepreneurial activity. However, the literature suffers from insufficient dialogue on the role of lead firms as facilitators of clusters and on how the developmental differences in clusters affect the facilitation performed, and thus the benefits delivered, by lead firms. A key question then is how does the facilitation by lead firms differ in a top-down cluster from that in a bottom-up cluster? The paper is based on a comparative case study investigating the facilitating role of a lead firm within two clusters: Medicon Valley (top-down) and Mechatronics Cluster Denmark (bottom-up). The main conclusion reached is that lead firms in top-down clusters and in bottom-up clusters contribute with quite similar and overlapping cluster benefits, but the way in which these benefits are delivered differs greatly.     

The Role of Leading Firms in the Evolution of SME Clusters: Evidence from the Leather Products Cluster in Florence

Clusters that emerged in the past have changed during the latest decades, so that today the research challenge in economic geography is on their evolution over time. The aim of this paper is to update the evolutionary path of SME Italian clusters, which faced the economic crisis are undergoing a process of decline in the number of firms. Furthermore, changes in the techno-economic landscape and in the competitive environment have generated new challenges. In this context, some leading firms, able to connect local resources (and firms) to global networks, have emerged over time and today they act as a gatekeeper. The focus will be on local networks interacting with leading firms and particular attention will be devoted to the pattern of co-evolution and to the geographical dimension of this co-evolutionary process. To empirically verify if other firms in the cluster may co-evolve with the leading firm over time, a deep analysis of the Gucci network in the leather products cluster in Florence will be carried out.     

Labour Relations and the Transfer of Knowledge in Industrial Clusters: Why do Skilled Workers Share Knowledge with Colleagues in Other Firms?

Industrial clusters are held to offer competitive advantages to firms that accrue from the transfer of tacit knowledge between skilled workers co-located in spatially bound regions. This paper argues that informal knowledge transfers between skilled employees working in spatially bounded industrial clusters might have an association with the labour relationship between employers and employees. In the literature on industrial clusters general knowledge is readily traded through codified texts and collegial networks but high value, tacit knowledge transfers occur less frequently but are critical to the success of firms located in clusters. Tacit knowledge transfers are held to occur when workers move to other firms because of firm death or poaching but less frequently through contacts between colleagues from other firms. Industrial clusters are said to offer labour market advantages for skilled workers in the form of ample job opportunities and rising wages, which engender firm loyalty and discourage the transfer of tacit knowledge of competitive value to other firms. However, the limited empirical evidence available on actual working conditions for skilled workers in regional industrial clusters indicates that this argument is contestable. Some evidence suggests that there are limited wage premiums accruing to the industrial districts, a limited role for geographic proximity, and weak localised returns on seniority and education. We argue that in such circumstances high value knowledge between workers in different firms might be traded as an act of epistemic solidarity or sociability that disregards the interests of employer organisations. Such actions might vary by region and country in relation to the prevailing system of labour relations. Australian labour relations are offered as a case in point.     

Shared Resources and Competitive Advantage in Clustered Firms: The Missing Link

This study examines the mechanism by which shared resources act on clustered firms' strategic resources to impact firm performance. Results indicate that five different kinds of cluster-specific shared resources have significant and positive effects on strategic resources to various degrees. Results also show that four elements of strategic resources have significant and positive effects on competitive advantage of firms. The framework developed in this study thus suggests that internal strategic resources and capabilities of firms mediate the relationship between shared resources and competitive advantage of firms in clusters.     

Knowledge Transmission in Industrial Clusters: Evidence from EuroClusTex

Covering the knowledge economy scenario, this article attempts to illustrate the analysis of the employment of knowledge transmission channels in the EuroClusTex, cross-border textile and clothing cluster between northern Portugal and Galicia. Therefore, an exploratory research was conducted. Primary data were obtained through participation in events, from interviews with key informants (entrepreneurs, leaders of cluster support institutions and government representatives). The secondary data were provided by the cluster support institutions, international organizations and the literature review. The results showed that EuroClusTex contributes to the competitiveness of regions, boosting trade relations between Galicia and northern Portugal. The most effective knowledge transmission channels in EuroClusTex were identified as: imitation, relationship with suppliers, public policy and human resources training. Experiences similar to EuroClusTex can be considered and served as examples for the development of clustering policies in other countries.     

How Relational Dimensions Affect Knowledge Redundancy in Industrial Clusters

This paper focuses on the effects of social capital on industrial clusters. Close networks with strong ties provide benefits for the companies involved in terms of knowledge flow; however, they can also have some negative effects such as knowledge redundancy and obsolescence. We propose an explanatory model to study factors and mediators affecting the redundancy of transmitted knowledge. The model has been applied to a sample of 152 companies in two Spanish industrial clusters. Findings suggest that although strength of ties was associated with redundancy, structural dispersion and local institutions have a negative effect on knowledge redundancy. The findings have a number of relevant implications for individual firms and their policies.     

Competition and Cooperation in Industrial Clusters: The Implications for Public Policy

Alfred Marshall believed that, while the benefits of clusters resulted from cooperation between firms, competition was an important driving force. In contrast, contemporary theories of clusters place most emphasis on collective action. This article seeks to distinguish processes of competition and cooperation within clusters, through a critical reading of different theoretical approaches. This distinction has important implications for the scale and nature of public policy. An emphasis on competitive processes implies a more macro-economic role for public agencies in seeking to raise investment in innovation while the fostering of cooperation implies measures to support decentralized public-private research collaborations.     

The Role of Location and Regional Networks for Biotechnology Firms in Israel

This article presents results of a study of the Israeli biotechnology sector. The findings of the study show that despite the small geographical size of the country, the Israeli biotechnology industry tends to a great extent to cluster around leading research institutes. Based on a survey of 109 high-tech projects, the study suggests that the relatively weak business background of the entrepreneurs, the fact that most of them have worked at research institutes and that most new biotechnology firms were originated from ideas that came out of universities or research institutes, can provide possible explanations for this geographical concentration. The research emphasizes the relative importance biotechnology entrepreneurs ascribe to networking, both in very early stages as well as in advanced stages of the firm development process. It is argued that although the focus of the network changes over time, both geographically and in content, its links to local research partners are maintained. It is suggested that earmarked regional support policies are crucial to the development of networks required by new biotechnology firms.     

关于我国旅游业国际竞争力的思考

研究旅游业国际竞争力具有十分重要的意义。本用波特国家竞争优势理论对我国旅游业国际竞争力现状进行了分析,认为我国旅游业虽具有某些优势,但现有的国际竞争力较弱。同时,作认为研究旅游业国际竞争力应具有多相测度。     

Industry Clusters in Ireland: An Application of Porter's Model of National Competitive Advantage to Three Sectors

This paper examines the importance of industrial clusters, and the relevance of Porter's diamond model, in the context of the small open economy of Ireland. It analyses the experience of three relatively successful Irish indigenous sectors and it considers to what extent have clusters of related or connected industries been important in accounting for the degree of success attained in Ireland. We do not find evidence of well-developed clusters of the type described by Porter, and our study provides support for some previous critiques of Porter's model. It is concluded that Irish industrial policy does not need to be focused strongly on developing the type of industry clusters described in Porter's model. At the same time, different elements of Porter's model do prove to be relevant and we find that companies in Ireland benefit from being part of some form of wider grouping of connected or related companies and industries, although these groupings can differ from Porter's clusters in significant respects.     

The Resilience of Clusters in the Context of Increasing Globalization: The Basque Wind Energy Value Chain

In this paper, we study how globalization impacts on the structure and governance patterns of value chains and on the resilience of local clusters. We study the value chains related to two Basque (Spain) companies in the wind energy industry, Iberdrola and Gamesa, and the local cluster to which they belong. We find that firms within the cluster have different types of relationships with lead companies depending on their competences and the complexity of their products. As a consequence, firms also present different potential for growth and/or resilience: some have the capacity to internationalize their operations and/or shift to the offshore wind market, others are vulnerable to competition from providers in the emerging countries. Against this context, we discuss how the cluster responds to these challenges and the role of policy.     

Clusters, Power and Place: Inequality and Local Growth in Time–Space

The argument of this paper is that a deeper appreciation of the nature of the power relationships between firms and the circuits of power that bind them together is key to understanding how clusters function — including how they might emerge and how they might decline. We begin to develop a conceptualization that allows us to generate a deeper understanding of the processes that enable the production and reproduction of enterprise clusters under some combinations of circumstances but not others. The sections of the paper explore: (1) concepts of power and circuits of power including their spatialities; (2) the temporarily stabilized relationships which occur in clusters of economic activity; (3) the openness and permeability of clusters as a way of understanding conditions that foster cluster growth; (4) a tentative integration of concepts. From this reading of the concepts of clustering and power we draw the conclusion that clusters are, at any particular point in time, temporary and transient conjunctures of interfirm relationships. They depend on specific circumstances in 'time–space' and, because of their very transience and specificity, those conditions might be very difficult if not impossible to create through the blunt instruments of policy.     

In Search of Regional Industrial Culture: The Role of Labour Organisations in Old Industrial Regions

This paper examines the ways in which the institutions of organised labour contribute to the formulation of regional industrial culture. We argue that industrial culture is fundamental to an understanding of uneven regional development. This industrial culture is dynamic, both product and constituent of negotiated social activities that involve the traditions and capacities of labour as an actor in its own right. We address the question of precisely how these connections between economy and culture are made. This is done through a detailed case study of the way in which one labour organisation—the national steel labour union in the UK, the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation (ISTC)—has both shaped and been influenced by the industrial culture of Teesside in northeast England. There, we argue, nationally led centrist labour politics came together with paternalistic capital-labour relations and localistic forms of self-identification to create a distinctive regional industrial culture. We focus in particular upon four processes: the social construction of work in the steel industry; relations with other steel regions within the UK; fragmentation in collective bargaining; and the ISTC's recent reorientation towards community unionism. We conclude that much remains to be done given the powerful legacies from decades of innate conservatism, but that it is now at least possible to begin to address important questions about the future direction of the local economy. Thinking in terms of the contingent interaction between cultural and economic attributes, centrally incorporating labour, is useful because it opens up the concepts of adaptability and institutional blockage to wider interpretations.     

The Location and Concentration of Businesses in Britain: Business Clusters, Business Services, Market Coverage and Local Economic Development

An important debate has recently developed around the significance of business clusters for the development of the economy. This paper assesses the extent to which concentrated clusters of businesses exist in Britain, using the fine spatial mesh of postcode districts. It identifies the major clusters using a development of the methodology to define local labour market areas. The paper demonstrates the high degree of localization and uneven development of businesses in Britain. It also shows that business service firms are even more highly localized and clustered than other businesses. Moreover, the larger the business centre, the more localized and clustered the firms. The pattern suggests that there is a strong influence of increasing returns of scale, and that, as well as local clusters, much of the British economy is covered by one metacluster. Implications from these results are drawn for the likely future development of the economy, the location of business service suppliers in order to develop their market coverage, and local economic development policy.     

The Role of Regional Policies in Promoting Networking and Innovative Activity: Evidence from Small Finnish High-tech Firms

The success of high-technology firms is strongly dependent on their innovation capacity and network relationships. There is a growing recognition that few firms are able to innovate in isolation. Cooperation can provide access to a complementary knowledge base and resources, and speed up the innovation process of firms. Regional developers are criticized for their inadequate ability to integrate themselves into the regional networks and innovation processes of firms and their ability to determine firms' needs for innovation and networking. The research topic of this study concentrates on the possibilities of regional developers of influencing the operational environment of high-tech firms through the development of networks and innovation activity of firms. Of particular interest are the micro-level policies and concrete actions by regional developers for meeting the needs of firms. The data used are based on interviews addressed to high-tech firms located in Jyväskylä Science Park in Finland.     

Power and Scale: The Shifting Geography of Industrial Relations Law in Australia

Abstract: In an increasingly complex literature exploring the geographies of socially constructed scale, interest has focused on the relationship between scale, power and the contested political terrains through which these relations are played out. In this paper, I argue that these interactions must be understood in specific contexts, where shifts in scale are inextricably linked to shifts in the sources and instruments of power. By applying a scale perspective to the analysis of recent industrial relations legislation in Australia, I show that the nature and direction of rescaling is “fixed” by the powers of institutional actors and the scope of their jurisdictions. I then draw on the distinctively scaled relations of the Australian context to assess the extent to which Australia's national rescaling processes can be seen as representing a process of convergence toward universal “spaces of neoliberalism”.