Motives and influencing factors of corporate regional engagement: industry and company specific patterns

Traditionally, regional endowments are viewed as external variables when it comes to location choices of companies. In most concepts on location choices and regional economics companies are thought to view the local labour market, the local innovation system or the general quality of life in a region as given and chose the location that best suits the company’s needs. Increasingly however, scholars from different research fields are providing arguments to reverse that view and show that there can be good reasons for a company to engage in improving its location despite implicit externalities. In this paper we try to systematically analyse issue of corporate engagement in regions. We will show how strong and in which fields companies engage in their respective region, how this engagement can be related to their existing regional integration and what differences appear between industries and types of companies in this respect. In this study we draw upon extensive interviews with over thirty companies from three industrial sectors in the Austrian region of Styria: the metals industry, which dates back to medieval times and has gone through a deep process of economic restructuring, the automotive industry, the first industry in which a comprehensive cluster policy approach was applied in Austria and the software industry, a rather young industry that experienced high growth rates in the past years. We will conclude that even though there are differences between the industries and types of companies in terms of scope and scale of regional integration and regional engagement, there is a strong correlation between the two: the higher the regional integration, the higher corporate regional engagement and vice versa.

Von Innovationsnetzen, Ausbildungsprogrammen und Sportvereinen

Kulturelle Aspekte, wie die Einbettung in und das Engagement von Unternehmen für die Region, werden heute als zentrale Faktoren fürdie regionale Entwicklung betrachtet. Wie stark und in welchen Bereichen engagieren sich Unternehmen wirklich und bestehen Unterschiedezwischen Sektoren und Unternehmenstypen

Motives and influencing factors of corporate regional engagement. Industry and company specific patterns.

Traditionally, regional endowments are viewed as external variables when it comes to location choices of companies. In most concepts on location choices and regional economics companies are thought to view the local labour market, the local innovation system or the general quality of life in a region as given and chose the location that best suits the company's needs. Increasingly however, scholars from different research fields are providing arguments to reverse that view and show that there can be good reasons for a company to engage in improving its location despite implicit externalities. In this paper we try to systematically analyse issue of corporate engagement in regions. We will show how strong and in which fields companies engage in their respective region, how this engagement can be related to their existing regional integration and what differences appear between industries and types of companies in this respect. In this study we draw upon extensive interviews with over thirty companies from three industrial sectors in the Austrian region of Styria: the metals industry, which dates back to medieval times and has gone through a deep process of economic restructuring, the automotive industry, the first industry in which a comprehensive cluster policy approach was applied in Austria and the software industry, a rather young industry that experienced high growth rates in the past years. We will conclude that even though there are differences between the industries and types of companies in terms of scope and scale of regional integration and regional engagement, there is a strong correlation between the two: the higher the regional integration, the higher corporate regional engagement and vice versa.Series: SRE - Discussion Paper

Innovation and knowledge sourcing in the Vienna ICT manufacturing sector

The aim of this paper is to investigate the nature and geography of innovation and knowledge sourcing activities in the ICT manufacturing sector in the region of Vienna. Vienna is often regarded as a prime example of a fragmented metropolitan regional innovation system. Fragmented regional innovation systems are characterised by a strong endowment with knowledge infrastructure elements and other innovation relevant institutions, but they suffer from a lack of local networking and knowledge circulation. In this paper we examine for Vienna whether this key deficiency of the regional innovation system, i.e. fragmentation, is also a crucial feature of knowledge based sectors such as the ICT manufacturing industry which exhibit an analytical knowledge base. Drawing on 18 face-to- face interviews with firms and an analysis of 207 knowledge links and 264 knowledge transfer channels we will show that local collective learning processes are vital for innovative companies in the Vienna ICT manufacturing sector, whilst at the same time they rely heavily on international knowledge sources. The significance of the local level as interaction space for knowledge exchange found in the ICT manufacturing sector indicates that at least for this knowledge based industry, Vienna's innovation system is of a less fragmented nature than previous studies have suggested. Knowledge based sectors are characterised by a high level of localised knowledge circulation which underpins radical innovation. (authors' abstract)Series: SRE - Discussion Paper