Cluster life cycles – the role of actors, networks and institutions in emerging, growing, declining and renewing clusters.

Ample research has been done on functioning clusters. In contrast, the way how clusters evolve over time, i.e. how clusters actually become clusters, how and why they decline, and how they shift into new fields, is largely disregarded. To close this gap, the main objectives of this collaborative research project are (1) to analyse the processes, factors and dynamics that are responsible for the cluster life cycle and distinguish the life cycle of the cluster from that of the respective technology or industry; (2) to distinguish between endogenous drivers through the cluster life cycle and those which are exogenous, but nevertheless influence the cluster life cycle; (3) to give policy advice to develop stage-specific measures to create environments that are more targeted in order to contribute to the emergence of new clusters, prevent existent clusters from decline and transform declining clusters into new clusters.

Funded by the European Science Foundation.