Geographic Proximity and Firm-University Innovation Linkages: evidence from Great Britain

Laura Abramovsky and Helen Simpson

The Centre for Market and Public Organisation from Department of Economics, University of Bristol, UK

Abstract: We investigate evidence for spatially mediated knowledge transfer from university research. We examine whether firms locate their R&D labs in proximity to university research departments, and whether those that do are more likely to co-operate with, or source information from universities in the course of their innovative activities. We find evidence that pharmaceutical firms locate their R&D facilities near to frontier chemistry research departments, consistent with accessing localised knowledge spillovers, but also linked to the presence of science parks. In industries such as chemicals and vehicles there is less evidence of immediate co-location with universities, but those innovative firms that do locate near to relevant research departments are more likely to engage with universities.

Keywords: Innovation; Geography; spillovers; public research (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O3 R11 R13 I23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-ent, nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-ipr, nep-knm, nep-mic, nep-tid and nep-ure
Date: 2008-06
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http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmpo/publications/papers/2008/wp200.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Geographic proximity and firm-university innovation linkages: evidence from Great Britain (2009)
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bri:cmpowp:08/200

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