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Strategic Management Journal Vol. 35 No. 7 2014

Agglomeration and clustering over the industry life cycle: Toward a dynamic model of geographic concentration

Liang Wang1; Anoop Madhok2,3; Stan Xiao Li2

1 School of Management University of San Francisco San Francisco California U.S.A. · 2 Schulich School of Business York University Toronto Ontario Canada · 3 Department of Management and Organization Vrije University Amsterdam Netherlands

open access

Abstract

Research on agglomeration finds that either a higher survival rate of incumbent firms or a higher founding rate of new entrants, or both, can sustain an industry cluster. The conditioning effects of time on the two distinct mechanisms of survival and founding are, however, rarely examined. We argue that the forces driving geographic concentration vary across the industry life cycle. Data from Ontario's winery industry from 1865 to 1974 demonstrates a dynamic model of geographic concentration: agglomeration attracts more new entry in the growth stage only, whereas it contributes to firm survival in the mature stage only. The results not only establish the importance of understanding the temporal dynamics underlying agglomeration externalities, but also provide a possible explanation for the mixed empirical results found in previous studies .

DOI
10.1002/smj.2141
Volume
35
Issue
7
Pages
995-1012
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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