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Technopolis Times Exclusive: Alec L. Hansen, Senior Competitiveness Analyst/Strategist, Economic Competitiveness Group, Inc., Sausalito, California, spoke to the board of the Software Association of Oregon on November 15. According to Hansen, an industrial cluster consists of:

- Key firms exporting goods and services out of the region.
- A network of supplier firms: firms supplying inputs, raw materials, components, parts, and specialized services.
- Economic foundations: human resources, technology, access to capital, business climate, and physical infrastructure.

Some clusters are surprising in their location and dominance:

- Denmark owns 60% of world market for insulin, and 80% of wind turbine electric generation equipment.
- Singapore dominates 40% of the world hard drive market.
- Dalton, Georgia (U.S.) has 45% of world carpet manufacturing capacity.

Hansen cited other successful clusters around the globe: Milan (finance, machine tools); Minneapolis (supercomputers); and Detroit and Turin (automobiles). In each, the critical success factors are: high industry concentration; sense of urgency; vision for the cluster; fact-driven process; public-private cooperation; facilitation skills, financial resources; and collaboration and trust.

Technopolis or cluster? What's the difference? Click here for our opinio n.

Trends

- Re-creating the "Overseas Chinese" phenomenon?
South Korea holds the 1st World Korean Business Convention to "foster close ties among Koreans who work in overseas businesses." See the story, and decide whether you can build trade, investment, and partnerships by leveraging expatriates from your technopolis.
- Health care as an attractor for economic growth?
Business Week reports on 12 small U.S. cities that are resisting recession. Almost all are centers of health care, and many are state capitals. (Oct. 14, 2002, page 102 of U.S. edition; available online for BW subscribers only.) Technopolis Times notes the aging population of affluent health care consumers helps drive this trend. So does the shortage of nurses in the U.S., which makes unemployment statistics in these cities look favorable.
- High tech cities in the U.S. have the greatest inequalities in salaries and wages...
...according to a study by Carnegie-Mellon University and the Austin American-Statesman. Service workers in these cities find it difficult to break into highly paid "creative" jobs, because there are few middle-pay jobs to bridge between the two sectors. Among the study's conclusions: "Those cities with the highest percentage of workers in creative-class jobs -- authors, software writers, top managers, dancers, singers, engineers, lawyers, doctors and scientists -- have the widest gap between high- and low-paid workers.... In the cities of ideas, income inequality is increasing because there are more people making higher incomes, more people earning low wages and fewer in between.... cities with the largest percentage of people in creative occupations also had the highest incomes and the highest population growth in the 1990s.... Creative workers' search for just the right mix of opportunity and amenities is helping to determine the economic futures of U.S. regions."
- Jargon watch
The word “infrastructure,” new to most Americans a decade ago, is now so useful and widespread that in Asia you will hear it abbreviated as “infra.”
- "Buy Local" movement grows.
As predicted in The Technopolis Columns, there is a growing backlash against non-local chain businesses when technopoleis experience sustained recession. Residents understand that in good times, they owe their ability to attract businesses to their distinctive local culture. In bad times, they perceive that chain stores may drive distinctive local stores out of business, destroying the town's chances of rebounding. "Buy Local" campaigns result. Austin's "Keep Austin Weird" initiative (and bumper sticker) is an example. In an ironic twist, a commercial endeavor has tried to capitalize on these freely distributed stickers, and the originator has sued. This last development was reported nationally in the New York Times, December 8, 2002. (You must set up a free account to access NYT online. There is a charge for archived articles more than a week old.)

News

- By hooking into the India-Europe undersea fiber optic cable, the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius has increased its available bandwidth by 40,000% and hopes to leverage its already good educational system to transform its economy. Brainchild of Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth and Germain Comarond, managing director of Mauritius' Board of Investment, the strategy includes "cyber-bus" mobile classrooms and a cyber-city near the capital city of Port Louis. Associated Press, October 28, 2002.
- High Tech in China: Is it a threat to Silicon Valley? Business Week U.S. edition cover story, October 28, 2002. A threat to Taiwan, too, according to the Los Angeles Times (October 28, 2002). As the Chinese economy improves and as their parents on the mainland age, the first generation of Western-educated overseas Chinese seek to return to China, some starting chip factories.
- South Korea's Presidential Advisory Council for Science and technology calls for a high-tech foreign investment zone (Park Bang-Ju, JoongAng Ilbo, October 5, 2002).
- Alexandria Library. The Library of Alexander the Great, the ancients' greatest contribution to knowledge management, will be rebuilt in Egypt. A gorgeous web site posted by UNESCO.
- BioValley Malaysia initiative slow to take off (10/4/02)
- Clouds over Silicon Glen. Scotland's high tech corridor around Irvine loses nearly 600 jobs (Business Week, September 2, 2002, p.49 U.S. edition). Citing a too-narrow strategy aimed at foreign investment in electronics manufacturing, Scottish officials plan to spend US$46 million over 2 years to diversify into additional high tech niches.
- Lufthansa initiates nonstop flight between Portland, Oregon and Frankfurt, Germany, story here.
- Hong Kong aims to becomem Asia's technology center. Finance Secretary Antony Leung notes emphasis on infrastructure such as the Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI) and the Hong Kong Institute of Biotechnology; a new science park; and a Cyberport. World Trade magazine, December, 2002.
- Coming soon: WTO Watch. Meanwhile, the International Herald Tribune has run an excellent series on the Johannesburg agenda for sustainable development, and its implicit conflict with WTO objectives.

You Just Missed

- ASEAN Trade Fairin Bangkok, October 2002. APEC trade summit in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, October, 2002

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