Innovation Performance and Clusters

Developed economies require high levels of innovativeness to sustain economic growth. Clusters are one of the building blocks of the European Commission’s innovation strategy. However, they are often not as innovative as expected. While strong quantitative insights into the resource base of successful clusters exist, evidence on soft success factors is anecdotal and dispersed across research streams. Nicole Röttmer sets out to identify and describe these capabilities, their impact on cluster innovativeness in the interplay with (proprietary) cluster resources and their development over time in a comprehensive, dynamic model. In a cross-case setting, she illustrates the applicability of dynamic capabilities to a network setting and the impact of capabilities on cluster performance, providing an impetus for a change in cluster development policies and cluster management practices.