Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
The growth in the number of parent spinof s since 1997 represents the increasing
international visibility of the cluster. At the introduction of the GSM system, where
local i rms were at the frontier of the technology from the beginning, the interna-
tional focus on North Jutland's wireless industry has increased the number of parent
spinof s from three in 1996 to 15 in 2001. Before 1997, there were mainly local or
national based players behind the parent spinof s. Later, it was foreign companies,
such as L.M. Ericsson (Sweden), Texas Instruments (United States), Motorola
(United States), Siemens (Germany), and National Semiconductors (United States),
which entered through acquisition of or investments in already established local i rms.
Multinationals such as Nokia (Finland), Lucent (United States), Analog Devices
(United States), and Ini neon (Germany) located activities in the region through green
i eld investments.
The three large early i rms, S.P. Radio, Dancom/Dancall and Shipmate/Cetelco have
been the source of many spinof s. In total, these three have been the source of 12 new
spinof s. Employees coming from Dancom/Dancall founded eight of these i rms. Many
of the founders had also been employed at S.P. Radio before going to Dancom/Dancall.
This illustrates how important the three i rms have been as a training ground for found-
ers of new i rms. The spinof s gained the relevant capabilities, routines, and industry
specii c knowledge that helped them to become successful themselves.
6. Discussion
A successful company is not a sui cient condition for the emergence of a cluster. Two
regions with similar initial conditions may develop quite dif erently. The Struer region
in Western Jutland is an example of a region with a very successful company that never
'grew' into a cluster. It is a historical parallel to the NorCOM cluster in North Jutland.
Initially they had some common features, but their development trajectories ended
up being signii cantly dif erent. The i rst i rm, Bang & Olufsen (B&O), grew large and
became very successful in the manufacturing of high-end radios and television sets, but it
only produced a few spinof s, and Struer remained a 'one-company' town.
Peter Bang and Svend Olufsen founded B&O in 1925 in the small rural town of Struer.
Olufsen was born there, while Bang was born in Copenhagen. Olufsen's family hosted
B&O in the i rst years at the family farm. From the late 1920s, B&O grew considerably
and was already in the 1930s an established radio manufacturer and experienced strong
employment growth. The manufacturing activity was contained within one i rm for
many decades and a cluster never emerged in Struer. B&O experienced several spinof s,
but only two of these stayed in the region. The Struer development, which had gained
signii cant international reputation already in the 1950s, never resulted in the creation of
a cluster and had the character of single company concentration.
The emergence of the wireless communications cluster in North Jutland can hardly be
explained by various location-specii c externalities. S.P. Radio was the only company in
the industry in the region for many years. It also seems unlikely that there was a unique
local culture, climate or natural resources that, somehow, were ideal and designed for
wireless communications technologies. Simon Petersen did not decide to found S.P.
Radio in North Jutland to tap into tacit knowledge or to benei t from labour market
pooling, knowledge externalities or specialised suppliers. Likewise, B&O located in
Olufsen's hometown at his parents' farm and did not benei t from concentration of
