Spatial location patterns of Spanish manufacturing firms**We wish to thank G. Duranton, J. Mateu, J.C. Pernías, D. Tirado, the participants of the 49th Congress of the European Regional Science Association and two anonymous referees for their helpful comments and suggestions. Furthermore, we gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (project ECO2008†06057/ECON), Generalitat Valenciana (BFPI/2007/204 and PROMETEO/2009/068) and Fundació Caixa Castelló†Bancaixa (P1†1B2010†17)

In this paper, we evaluate the spatial location patterns of Spanish manufacturing firms in each industry. We use a distance†based method, Ripley's K function, which allows us to treat space as continuous. With ‘complete spatial randomness’ as benchmark, every sector presents significant concentration whatever the distance considered. If we use the locations of all manufacturing firms as a benchmark, we find dispersion in some sectors and concentration in others, finding also differences in the spatial scale at which clustering occurs. Finally, the use of cities as a benchmark reveals that not only is ‘first nature’ among the location determinants of manufacturing firms but they also include the self†reinforcing advantages of ‘second nature’.