Effects of Regional Cooperation Among Small and Medium‐sized Firms on Their Growth in Japanese Industrial Clusters

Abstract

We examine the effects of regional inter‐firm cooperation on firm growth by estimating the firm growth function, using the data of a questionnaire survey for three major industrial clusters in Japan, namely, Tama, Kinki and Hokkaido. We focus on the specific content of cooperative activities for two aspects: that is, three production stages of R&D, commercialization, and marketing for cooperation and different types of alliance partners. The findings for our study areas demonstrate: i) vertical cooperation, the most prevalent with suppliers and customers, does not contribute to firm growth; ii) the clusters do not enjoy “urbanization economies arising from agglomerating a variety of different industrial sectors”; iii) the alliances with “universities” and “cross‐industry exchange organizations” show positive effects on firm growth; and iv) both contributions and limitations are identified for the cluster‐promotion policies in Japan.

Prospects for Irish regions and counties: scenarios and implications

“…However, employment growth in high-tech SMEs has been found to be much faster in clusters, but that the spatial scale over which the clustering benefit operates differs across sectors (Fingleton et al, 2004). Finally, co-operation with universities was found to impact positively on enterprise growth (see Arita et al, 2006).…”

Identifying Endogenous and Exogenous Indicators to Measure Eco-Innovation within Clusters

“…The proposed model brings together diverse factors that foster eco-innovative activities as identified by the research of world-renowned eco-innovation authors. Several studies on eco-innovation in cluster structures highlight the work of Arranz et al [67] that fosters cluster creation due to the impact of Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in activating national economies, for which the European Union created multiple strategies to promote and strengthen the economies of conglomerates to make them competitive on an international scale and gain worldwide visibility, as seen when analyzing cluster experiences in India, Pakistan, Japan, and China [11,68]. Arita [11] stresses the role of the capabilities generated, especially when there is an innovation support system for such initiatives and business growth [69].…”

“…In this sense, several authors have contributed a diversity of analytical concepts wherein they claim that cooperation with other businesses may be a way to share resources (see Table 2). The cooperation between businesses and their close relationships with knowledge institutions, such as universities and research centers, are fundamental generators of eco-innovation [11]. A study carried out in Romagna (Italy) shows that cooperation with universities and suppliers is the main driver of eco-innovation [15].…”

“…Furthermore, the development of a high level of cooperation between members of a cluster leads to the development of technologies, research-derived marketing, creation of new areas for demand, and increased capacity as the system becomes adaptive to the changes in the external economy. The cluster's high level of growth and innovation results in the cluster's success [11,52].…”

Untitled

“…мента развития производства. При этом оцениваются взаимосвязь сотрудничества фирм и их роста (Arita et al, 2006;Han, Wang, 2015), перспективы и ограничения применения принципов совместной экономики на предприятиях в условиях цифровизации (Плещенко, 2019), возможности модернизации производства за счет встраивания в существующие ЦСС (Eriksson, 2011;Joudeh, 2018). Большое внимание исследователи уделяют вопросам повышения эффективности производства в контексте развития производственной кооперации (Скопина, Скопин, 2007;Beviá, Corchón, 2009;Li et al, 2020).…”