VINNOVA and The Swedish Agency for Economic growth launched a pilot project in order to find out more in detail, advantages with cluster cooperation. The results were presented at the TCI conference in Jyväskylä 2009.

This pilot involved two complementary clusters in Sweden; one within the field of consumer driven packaging and another within printed electronics -The Packaging Arena from the middle east of Sweden and Printed Electronics Arena from the south west. The two clusters were already acquainted with each other and they showed a convincing willingness for cooperation.

As National Agencies we started to look into the following main questions:

• The added value of cluster cooperation?
• What are the key factors for a successful collaboration (for instance cluster management, development steps, financial and competence resources, critical mass etc)?
• Methods of mobilizing and implementing linking activities?

The two clusters received a minor grant for one year for an intense cooperation. The cluster organisations involved cluster actors in a number of meetings, conducted surveys among the actors and matched needs to competences through individual dialogues on different levels. The positive effects of cluster networking became clear in less than a year. Thanks to this pilot we found some general success factors.

The fact that the two clusters were complementary to each other was of great importance for the cooperation. Since The Packaging Arena is close to the market, they could offer market knowledge and contacts and a great experience about market needs. The Printed Electronics Arena, on the other hand, is more research based and has a cutting edge competence within printed electronics. Furthermore, the project had a considerable advantage in that the clusters were able to use each other's test facilities in order to get the right expertise - and infrastructure. The clusters supported each other to fill in the gaps in their respective value chain - and in doing so they could speed up the time to market. They could also offer each other new and different competences since they were not in the exactly same sector.

Another critical precondition was that the companies on both sides were engaged, positive and willing to cooperate with other companies and that they could see the benefits of it. This shows that cluster networking has to be both a bottom up and a market driven process.

The main conclusion of this Pilot is that cluster networking can lead to a faster commercialization as long as the clusters are complementary and willing to cooperate. The Pilot project shows that openness between different actors within and outside the core of cluster is of big importance. Blind competition is not the only way to economic growth - if we are struggling to speed up new opportunities in the business sector we have to open up and exchange knowledge and experiences.

Cecilia Johansson, VINNOVA
Ewa Andersson, Tillväxtverket - Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth

24 August 2010