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Here Be Startups: Exploring a young digital cluster in Inner East London

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  • Max Nathan
  • Emma Vandore

Abstract

The digital industries cluster known as 'Silicon Roundabout' has been quietly growing in East London since the 1990s. Now rebranded 'Tech City', it is now the focus of huge public and government attention. National and local policymakers wish to accelerate the local area's development: such cluster policies are back in vogue as part of a re-awakened interest in industrial policy in many developed countries. Surprisingly little is known about Tech City's firms or the wider ecosystem, however, and existing cluster policies have a high failure rate. This paper performs a detailed mixed-methods analysis, combining rich enterprise-level data with semi-structured interviews. We track firm and employment growth from 1997-2010 and identify a number of distinctive features: branching from creative to digital content industries, street-level sorting of firms, the importance of local amenities and a lack of conventional cluster actors such as universities or anchor businesses. We also argue that the existing policy mix embodies a number of tensions, and suggest areas for improvement.

Suggested Citation

  • Max Nathan & Emma Vandore, 2013. "Here Be Startups: Exploring a young digital cluster in Inner East London," SERC Discussion Papers 0146, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:sercdp:0146
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Digital economy; cities; clusters; innovation; London; Silicon Roundabout; Tech City;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • L52 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Industrial Policy; Sectoral Planning Methods
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

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