IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/egu/wpaper/2613.html

Firm Interactions and Potential Ecosystems: A Bottom-Up Approach to Territorial Network Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Zoltan Elekes
  • Sandor Juhasz
  • Gergely Magyar
  • Balazs Lengyel
  • Gergo Toth

Abstract

Regional industry clusters enhance firm performance, yet the geography of firm-to-firm transactions underlying this advantage remains unclear. Using nationwide supplier-buyer and labour-flow networks constructed from Hungarian administrative data, we examine how the spatial reach of cluster and non-cluster firms’ supplier, customer, and labour connections relates to firm performance. We find that greater geographic reach in both networks is associated with better firm performance. Among cluster firms, better-performing firms reach more distant customers while drawing from more geographically proximate labour markets. Our findings reveal that the spatial structure of inter-firm networks is a key source of the cluster premium.

Suggested Citation

  • Zoltan Elekes & Sandor Juhasz & Gergely Magyar & Balazs Lengyel & Gergo Toth, 2026. "Firm Interactions and Potential Ecosystems: A Bottom-Up Approach to Territorial Network Analysis," Papers in Evolutionary Economic Geography (PEEG) 2613, Utrecht University, Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Group Economic Geography, revised Aug 2026.
    • Handle: RePEc:egu:wpaper:2613
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://econ.geo.uu.nl/peeg/peeg2613.pdf
    File Function: Version August 2026
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Omar A Guerrero & Robert L Axtell, 2013. "Employment Growth through Labor Flow Networks," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(5), pages 1-12, May.
    2. Vasco M Carvalho & Makoto Nirei & Yukiko U Saito & Alireza Tahbaz-Salehi, 2021. "Supply Chain Disruptions: Evidence from the Great East Japan Earthquake," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(2), pages 1255-1321.
    3. Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg & Rebecca Henderson, 1993. "Geographic Localization of Knowledge Spillovers as Evidenced by Patent Citations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(3), pages 577-598.
    4. Walter Isard & Merton J. Peck, 1954. "Location Theory and International and Interregional Trade Theory," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 68(1), pages 97-114.
    5. Ron Boschma & Simona Iammarino, 2009. "Related Variety, Trade Linkages, and Regional Growth in Italy," Economic Geography, Clark University, vol. 85(3), pages 289-311, July.
    6. Mercedes Delgado & Michael E. Porter & Scott Stern, 2016. "Defining clusters of related industries," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(1), pages 1-38.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bahar, Dany & Rosenow, Samuel & Stein, Ernesto & Wagner, Rodrigo, 2019. "Export take-offs and acceleration: Unpacking cross-sector linkages in the evolution of comparative advantage," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 48-60.
    2. Majid Ahmadi & Nathan Durst & Jeff Lachman & John A. List & Mason List & Noah List & Atom T. Vayalinkal, 2022. "Nothing Propinks Like Propinquity: Using Machine Learning to Estimate the Effects of Spatial Proximity in the Major League Baseball Draft," NBER Working Papers 30786, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Lara Agostini & Federico Caviggioli & Francesco Galati & Barbara Bigliardi, 2020. "A social perspective of knowledge-based innovation: mobility and agglomeration. Introduction to the special section," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 45(5), pages 1309-1323, October.
    4. Evgeniy Kutsenko & Sabyasachi Tripathi & Kirill Tyurchev, 2023. "Does complementarity matter for the emergence of new specialization industries in the regions of Russia?," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 15(9), pages 2126-2155, December.
    5. David Rigby, 2012. "The Geography of Knowledge Relatedness and Technological Diversification in U.S. Cities," Papers in Evolutionary Economic Geography (PEEG) 1218, Utrecht University, Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Group Economic Geography, revised Oct 2012.
    6. Max Nathan & Henry Overman, 2013. "Agglomeration, clusters, and industrial policy," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 29(2), pages 383-404, SUMMER.
    7. Aurélie LALANNE & Guillaume POUYANNE, 2012. "Ten years of metropolization in economics: a bibliometric approach (In French)," Cahiers du GREThA (2007-2019) 2012-11, Groupe de Recherche en Economie Théorique et Appliquée (GREThA).
    8. Ascani, Andrea & Bettarelli, Luca & Resmini, Laura & Balland, Pierre-Alexandre, 2020. "Global networks, local specialisation and regional patterns of innovation," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(8).
    9. Ernest Miguélez & Rosina Moreno, 2016. "“Relatedness, external linkages and innovation”," IREA Working Papers 201603, University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics, revised Apr 2016.
    10. Feldman, Maryann P. & Kogler, Dieter F., 2010. "Stylized Facts in the Geography of Innovation," Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, in: Bronwyn H. Hall & Nathan Rosenberg (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Innovation, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 0, pages 381-410, Elsevier.
    11. Haifeng Qian, 2018. "Knowledge-Based Regional Economic Development: A Synthetic Review of Knowledge Spillovers, Entrepreneurship, and Entrepreneurial Ecosystems," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 32(2), pages 163-176, May.
    12. Favaro, Donata & Ninka, Eniel & Turvani, Margherita, 2012. "Productivity in innovation: the role of inventor connections and mobility," MPRA Paper 38950, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Kalathil, Nikhil & Lanahan, Lauren & Feldman, Maryann & Fuchs, Erica R.H, 2025. "Varieties of agglomeration: Disentangling horizontal and vertical agglomeration within the manufacturing sector in the United States," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 54(7).
    14. Florian Noseleit & Rene Söllner, 2011. "Diversity of human capital and regional growth," ERSA conference papers ersa10p245, European Regional Science Association.
    15. Mark Lorenzen & Ram Mudambi & Andreas Schotter, 0. "International connectedness and local disconnectedness: MNE strategy, city-regions and disruption," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 0, pages 1-24.
    16. Ron Boschma & Víctor Martín & Asier Minondo, 2017. "Neighbour regions as the source of new industries," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 96(2), pages 227-245, June.
    17. Marina Van Geenhuizen & Pieter Stek, 2015. "Mapping innovation in the global photovoltaic industry: a bibliometric approach to cluster identification and analysis," ERSA conference papers ersa15p697, European Regional Science Association.
    18. Seung Hwan Kim & Bogang Jun & Jeong-Dong Lee, 2023. "Technological relatedness: how do firms diversify their technology?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 128(9), pages 4901-4931, September.
    19. George Christopoulos & René Wintjes, 2024. "Identifying Clusters as Local Innovation Systems," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 15(2), pages 9784-9823, June.
    20. Nils Grashof & Dirk Fornahl, 2020. "To be or not to be located in a cluster? A descriptive meta-analysis of the firm-specific cluster effect," Working Papers on Innovation and Space 2020-01, Philipps University Marburg, Department of Geography.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:egu:wpaper:2613. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask the person in charge to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deguunl.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.