Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • May 2007
  • Article
  • Management Science

Location Strategies and Knowledge Spillovers

By: Juan Alcacer and Wilbur Chung
  • Format:Print
  • | Pages:17
ShareBar

Abstract

Given the importance of proximity for knowledge spillovers, we examine firms' location choices expecting differences in firms' strategies. Firms will locate to maximize their net spillovers as a function of locations' knowledge activity, their own capabilities, and competitors' anticipated actions. Using new entrants into the United States from 1985 to 1994, we find that firms favor locations with academic innovative activity. Other results highlight differences in firms' location strategies suggesting that firms consider not only gains from inward knowledge spillovers but also the possible cost of outward spillovers. While less technologically advanced firms favor locations with high levels of industrial innovative activity, technologically advanced firms choose only locations with high levels of academic activity and avoid locations with industrial activity to distance themselves from competitors.

Keywords

Business Strategy; Corporate Strategy; For-Profit Firms; Knowledge Management; Research and Development; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Disruptive Innovation; Five Forces Framework; Cost Management; Technology; Competition; United States

Citation

Alcacer, Juan, and Wilbur Chung. "Location Strategies and Knowledge Spillovers." Management Science 53, no. 5 (May 2007): 760–776.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Juan Alcacer

Strategy
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • May 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Boutiqaat: Influencing Retail in MENA

    By: Juan Alcacer and Noor Al Qadhi
    • May 2025
    • Faculty Research

    Boutiqaat: Influencing Retail in MENA

    By: Juan Alcacer and Noor Al Qadhi
    • May 2025
    • Faculty Research

    From oneworld to a New World? LATAM’s High-Stakes Alliance Dilemma

    By: Juan Alcacer and Valentina Tarzijan
More from the Authors
  • Boutiqaat: Influencing Retail in MENA By: Juan Alcacer and Noor Al Qadhi
  • Boutiqaat: Influencing Retail in MENA By: Juan Alcacer and Noor Al Qadhi
  • From oneworld to a New World? LATAM’s High-Stakes Alliance Dilemma By: Juan Alcacer and Valentina Tarzijan
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College.