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The Annals of Regional Science

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01-12-2005 | Original Paper

Geographical and sectoral clusters of innovation in Europe

Authors: Rosina Moreno, Raffaele Paci, Stefano Usai

Published in: The Annals of Regional Science | Issue 4/2005

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Abstract

In this paper we attempt to provide empirical evidence on the phenomenon of cluster agglomeration of innovation activities throughout time and space in European regions. More specifically we try to assess whether there are some forces which support the development of technologically specialised regional clusters. In particular we want to determine the spatial extent of these forces, their dynamics along the eighties and nineties and their connection with production clustering. We have started from a mapping of innovation activity in European regions by means of an exploratory spatial analysis based on global indicators of spatial dependence. As a result, in a second step, we check the hypothesis that innovation concentration can be a result not only of the geographic concentration of production but also of the development of technologically specialised clusters in neighbouring regions. The analysis is based on a databank set up by CRENoS on regional patenting at the European Patent Office spanning from 1978 to 2001 and classified by ISIC sectors and on the Cambridge Econometrics database on production activity. Among the main results, it is shown that specialisation in innovative activity is positively and significantly influenced by specialisation in production activity. Additionally, it is obtained that innovation tends to cluster more in sectors in which the neighbouring regions are also technologically specialised.

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Additional to the possibility of externalities crossing geographical barriers of regions due to proximity in space, interregional spillovers may take place due to other reasons such as the volume of trade between each pair of regions or their economic similarity.

Note that since 2000 there is an important initiative called European trend chart on innovation which provides several indicators on innovation (based on input and output data and on the CIS survey) at the regional level and a synthetic measure of them. Unfortunately, the time and the sectoral dimension of such a database are rather limited. Nevertheless for the time being this database is going to become more and more a crucial point of reference for the analysis in this field.

It should be noted that R&D statistics provide other interesting information concerning the origin of the expenditure. R&D statistics are, as a matter of fact, usually divided into categories such as business, university and government.

For instance, the headquarter of Enichem, the Italian petroleum and chemical multinational, is located in Milan (Lombardia) but the innovative activity (as indicated by the residence of the inventors) is much more dispersed due to the presence of several plants in other regions (e.g. Veneto, Sicilia, Liguria and Sardegna).

Eurostat classification list four categories of territorial units: 15 NUTS 0 nations; 77 NUTS 1 regions, 206 NUTS 2 regions and 1031 NUTS 3 regions.

The perfect territorial unit is difficult to be found since administrative units do not necessarily reflect economic phenomena. Better territorial units used in the empirical literature are the functional urban region just for main urban centres at the European level (Cheshire 1990), the local labour system in Italy (Paci and Usai, 1999) or the basin d’emploi in France (Combes, 2000).

The original YTC was conceived by Evenson et al. (1991). Updates to the YTC have been programmed by Daniel Johnson who kindly provides downloadable conversion tables and detailed explanations on the procedures at the Internet address: http://faculty1.coloradocollege.edu/~djohnson/jeps.html.

Throughout the paper patents per capita are used, even though main results do not change if one uses the absolute value of patents.

This phenomenon is partly due to a shift of patent applications by European firms from National patenting offices to the European one.

Scatter maps for other periods not reported in the paper are available on request.

Other specifications have been estimated to assess for the presence of a relationship between innovative specialisation of one region and productive specialisation in contiguous regions but results were not significant. Similarly, some attempts to evaluate the presence of different coefficients for each macro-sector by means of interactive dummies have not provided interesting results, probably due to the aggregate nature of our data.

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Title: Geographical and sectoral clusters of innovation in Europe
Authors: Rosina Moreno
Raffaele Paci
Stefano Usai
Publication date: 01-12-2005
Publisher: Springer-Verlag
Published in: The Annals of Regional Science / Issue 4/2005
Print ISSN: 0570-1864
Electronic ISSN: 1432-0592
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00168-005-0021-y

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