Author:

Keywords:

G046823N#57350753, G073418N#54516276, C14/17/012#54270971, global cities, knowledge connectivity, location decisions, R&D, Social Sciences, Management, Business & Economics, Knowledge connectivity, Global cities, Location decisions, FOREIGN DIRECT-INVESTMENT, LOCATION CHOICE, MULTINATIONAL FIRMS, INNOVATION NETWORKS, EMPIRICAL-EVIDENCE, PATENT CITATIONS, HOST COUNTRY, GEOGRAPHY, SPILLOVERS, INTEGRATION, 1402 Applied Economics, 1503 Business and Management, 1505 Marketing, Science Studies, 3507 Strategy, management and organisational behaviour, 3801 Applied economics

Abstract:

We argue that the degree of concentrated ownership of international knowledge connections of a city in the hands of a small number of MNEs reduces the potential for knowledge spillovers and has a negative influence on the attractiveness of a city for new R&D investments. Ownership concentration in international knowledge connections reduces the positive influence of two complementary characteristics of international knowledge connectivity: the international connectedness (“depth”) and the geographical diversity (“breadth”) of the cities’ international knowledge networks. Our analysis of the location decisions for 3,235 new cross-border R&D investments made by 1,599 firms distributed across 71 global cities (2003-2016) provides support for these hypotheses.