Innovation Filieres and the Geography of Innovation

This concluding chapter reviews the empirical evidence presented in Chapters 5 to 8 on national and sectoral differences in the organization of innovation filieres. It compares patterns of technology transfer in the electronic components and flow measurement industries and considers the interdependence between the factors which were responsible for changing patterns of technology transfer and the geographical construction of innovation filieres. The evidence shows that the resulting geographical forms which filieres took in each sector and in each country were quite varied. At the one extreme, innovation filieres were geographically focused on centres of excellence, were strengthened by a plurality of different sources of innovation (see Metcalfe 1993 cited in Cowling and Sugden 1998, 257) and included interactions which incorporated flows of information acquired through networks of innovators in other countries. At the other, filieres were geographically static consisting primarily of externalized interactions with a narrow range of institutions within the national system of innovation. In between were loosely constructed filieres which were spatially diffuse and constructed of an eclectic set of interactions with Participants drawing on information from different places at different times as the need arose.