RampD productivity and the organization of clust

Authors: Junichi Nishimura Hiroyuki Okamuro

Publish Date: 2010/01/14

Volume: 36, Issue: 2, Pages: 117-144

PDF Link

Abstract

Industrial clusters have attracted increasing attention as important locations of innovation Therefore several countries have started promotion policies for industrial clusters However there are few empirical studies on cluster policies This paper examines the effects of the “Industrial Cluster Project” ICP in Japan on the RD productivity of participants using a unique dataset of 229 small firms and discusses the conditions necessary for the effective organization of cluster policies Different from former policy approaches the ICP aims at building collaborative networks between universities and industries and supports the autonomous development of existing regional industries without direct intervention in the clustering process Thus far the ICP is similar to indirect support systems adopted by successful European clusters Our estimation results suggest that participation in the cluster project alone does not affect RD productivity Moreover research collaboration with a partner in the same cluster region decreases RD productivity both in terms of the quantity and quality of patents Therefore in order to improve the RD efficiency of local firms it is also important to construct widerange collaborative networks within and beyond the clusters although most clusters focus on the network at a narrowly defined local level However cluster participants apply for more patents than others without reducing patent quality when they collaborate with national universities in the same cluster regionThis research received financial support from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science JSPS GrantinAid for Scientific Research C No 16530147 and A No 20243018 The authors are grateful for this support Earlier versions of this paper were presented at RENT Research in Entrepreneurship and Small Business XXII Conference in Covilha Portugal in November 2008 AEA Applied Econometrics Association 97th International Conference “Patent and Innovation Econometric Studies” in Tokyo Japan in December 2008 DRUID Society Summer Conference 2009 on Innovation Strategy and Knowledge in Copenhagen Denmark in June 2009 the 36th Annual Conference of EARIE European Association for Research in Industrial Economics in Ljubljana Slovenia in September 2009 and the seminar at the Development Bank of Japan in Tokyo Japan in September 2009 The authors would like to express their gratitude to the participants of these conferences for their valuable comments and suggestions The comments by the anonymous referees greatly contributed to improving this paper The usual disclaimer applies

Keywords: