Innovation and Networks in Industrial Clusters: Empirical Results from Three Large Cities - Technopolis: Best Practices for Science and Technology Cities - page 257

preexisting regionally or locally delineated cluster of small and medium-sized
enterprises. They have a lengthy tradition of interacting and learning from one
another, successfully competing on the basis of, as needed, cooperative innovation
practices. Examples of such endogenous innovative networks are to be found in
southern Germany (e.g., Baden Wuerttemberg) and the Third Italy (e.g., Tuscany
or Emilia-Romagna).
The other is the exogenous innovative network, which takes the form of
technopoles or science parks. They tend to emerge under two kinds of circum-
stances: (a) when large firms fragment their production structure and relocate R&D
activities to functionally specialized zones where synergies are expected to arise
from collocation (as in Sophia Antipolis or Lille in France), or (b) by planned
innovative milieu established to promote collaboration between universities and
SMEs (as in science parks in the UK and USA).
Industrial clusters are often localized, giving rise to networks and specific
innovation patterns in regions. Regions differ in their preconditions for innovation
such as qualification of the labor force, universities, research institutions, tech-
nology-based firms, knowledge externalities, and spillovers. Cooperation in clus-
ters has increasingly become a requirement for success. Without cooperation, firms
almost never innovate in isolation (Roelandt and den Hertog 1999 ). Moreover,
cooperation offers a direct way to improve economic performance and reduce costs
(Guinet 1999 ). Many of these embedded factors in regions are immobile, giving
some regions advantages over others.
In many countries, clusters of innovative firms are driving growth and
employment (Guinet 1999 ). They are more concentrated in some cities rather than
others (Simmie 2001 ). That is why innovation is dependent on high quality pro-
fessional and technical labors. High quality labors are one of the stickiest local
factors of production. The primary cities in each regional economy therefore tend
also to be the major national concentrations of such labor. Scale advantages in
large cities, urbanization, and localization economies are seen as the main reasons
for the clustering of innovative activities in metropolitan regions.
3 A Descriptive Analysis of the Survey Results
3.1 Background and Methodologies
3.1.1 Background
This chapter is focused on the innovation activities and clustering of the
mechanical parts and materials industry of Busan, Information and Communica-
tion Technology (ICT) industry in Daejeon and photonics industry of Gwangju.
The industrial clusters of Korea can be found in the regions which have the
national or regional industrial complexes. Currently, there are 585 industrial
complexes with 30 national complexes, 213 regional complexes, and 342 rural