Encounters between cluster theory, policy and practice in Norway: Hubbing, blending and conceptual stretching

Abstract

For more than two decades, cluster theory has served as a basis for widespread implementation of regional development policies in several countries. However, there are still persistent struggles in academia towards agreement on clear operational definitions of a cluster. In this article, we argue that this definitional haziness, reflected by difficulties in demarcating the scale and scope of clusters, leads to a stretching of the cluster concept when put into practice. We show how actors, through cluster projects, are utilizing strategies of “hubbing” and/or “blending” to develop their own understandings of both what clusters are and what they might or should be. Through studies of three Norwegian cluster projects, we argue that national cluster policies, through translation of an academically vague concept, facilitate a stretching of the original definition of clusters, giving regional stakeholders leeway to integrate other theoretical rationales instead. We argue that this is not taken into account in current policies.

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European Urban and Regional Studies
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DOI: 10.1177/0969776416655860
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European Urban
and Regional
Studies
Introduction
Use of “cluster” and “clustering” concepts has grown
within academia and beyond, with Michael Porter’s
understanding of competitiveness embraced glob-
ally by policymakers, industry leaders and scholars,
leading to an profusion of cluster initiatives and pro-
jects. Theories on industrial clusters have been trans-
lated into concrete policies, and the intention of
several national and regional policymakers has been
to encourage and to strengthen clustering processes.
Encounters between cluster theory,
policy and practice in Norway:
Hubbing, blending and conceptual
stretching
Rune Njøs and Stig-Erik Jakobsen
Bergen University College, Norway
Heidi Wiig Aslesen
BI Norwegian Business School, Norway
Arnt Fløysand
University of Bergen, Norway
Abstract
For more than two decades, cluster theory has served as a basis for widespread implementation of regional development
policies in several countries. However, there are still persistent struggles in academia towards agreement on clear
operational definitions of a cluster. In this article, we argue that this definitional haziness, reflected by difficulties in
demarcating the scale and scope of clusters, leads to a stretching of the cluster concept when put into practice. We
show how actors, through cluster projects, are utilizing strategies of “hubbing” and/or “blending” to develop their
own understandings of both what clusters are and what they might or should be. Through studies of three Norwegian
cluster projects, we argue that national cluster policies, through translation of an academically vague concept, facilitate
a stretching of the original definition of clusters, giving regional stakeholders leeway to integrate other theoretical
rationales instead. We argue that this is not taken into account in current policies.
Keywords
Cluster, cluster policy, scale, scope, stretching
Corresponding author:
Rune Njøs, Bergen University College, P.O. Box 7030, N-5020
Bergen, Norway.
Email: rune.njos@hib.no
655860EUR0010.1177/0969776416655860European Urban and Regional StudiesNjøs et al.
research-article2016
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2 European Urban and Regional Studies
Hence, the cluster has expanded from its original
concept and, in the process, a “stretching” of the
original (although vague) definition has occurred.
This has essentially detached the concept from
Porter’s seminal contribution (Desrochers and
Sautet, 2004; Fløysand et al., 2012; Malmberg and
Power, 2006; Martin and Sunley, 2003; Tödtling and
Trippl, 2005).
As the popularity of cluster theories has spread
beyond academia, the term and concept have gained
content that does not necessarily conform to the
strict theoretical propositions and models, and a
cluster project does not necessarily imply that
dynamic clusters exist, or that they will ever come to
exist, within a particular geographical area. Our
point of departure is that clusters are social construc-
tions produced iteratively between the discursive/
academic world and the material/practical world
(Fløysand et al., 2012). Viewing an entity as a social
construction opens up a high level of contingency
(Granovetter, 1992). This implies, for instance, that
cluster projects are not uniform or homogenous.
Cluster projects have different origins, different pro-
files and different outcomes. Further, a social con-
struction approach also means that understandings
of an entity can be contradictory and contested
(Marston, 2000). Thus, actors will have different
conceptions of what clusters are, and policymakers’
conceptions of a cluster may not necessarily con-
form to the hegemonic academic definition of a clus-
ter. However, the original cluster idea is still
influential in European countries, and both success-
ful and unsuccessful public cluster programmes and
projects have been developed and implemented
across several geographic regions (Isaksen, 2009;
Sölvell et al., 2003; Uyarra and Ramlogan, 2012).
Nevertheless, these programmes do not necessarily
reflect empirical criteria (e.g., Malmberg and Power,
2006) and may not be in accordance with Porter’s
cluster concept. In cluster projects, different cluster
stakeholders, such as cluster facilitators, regional
policymakers, research and development (R&D)
institutions, industry associations and firms, add
new, and often divergent, interpretations of the tradi-
tional academic understanding. Kiese and Wrobel
(2011) argue, for instance, that cluster promotion
represents a mix of differing rationalities between
different stakeholders in the “practical action space”.
Thus, stakeholders promote different ideas of what a
cluster should be and in turn influence how a cluster
project should be designed and practised. Inherent in
any cluster is the agency of its stakeholders. Hence,
in a cluster project, there is room for altering repre-
sentations of not only what the cluster is but also
what it should or could be. More importantly, such
understandings can differ greatly from what
researchers perceive that a cluster is and what it
should be. In other words, when cluster theory,
developed in the academic world, is operationalized
by the applied world, the two do not necessarily
correspond. Through this social process, clusters
become a phenomenon with a life of its own.
In this paper, we discuss the policy implications of
such discrepancies between cluster theory and cluster
practice. However, as cluster policies are context-spe-
cific, the national frame certainly matters. We focus on
cluster initiatives in Norway, and have selected three
projects in the public cluster programme Norwegian
Centres of Expertise (NCE). This is a programme aim-
ing “to enhance sustainable innovation and interna-
tionalization processes in the most dynamic and
growth-oriented Norwegian clusters” (http://www.
nce.no/no/Om-NCE/About-NCE/). The programme is
directed towards specialized, mature clusters with a
strong regional foundation (Isaksen, 2009). The aim of
this paper is to answer two research questions.
 How and why is the concept of clusters
stretched through policy application?
 What are the political implications of this
stretching?
To provide conclusive answers, we begin with a
short discussion of what constitutes a cluster accord-
ing to the academic literature. Secondly, we dig
deeper into recent theoretical contributions on cluster
development. We find that the scale and scope of
clusters are widely debated in the literature and that
this is the core issue in the discussion about what con-
stitutes a cluster. Furthermore, we argue that in inter-
plays between meanings attributed by academics and
those added by practitioners, or encounters between
theory and practice, the cluster concept is stretched.
This stretching is related to both cluster scale and
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Njøs et al. 3
scope through various strategies of “hubbing” (utili-
zation of geographical scale) and “blending” (utiliza-
tion of industrial scope). In short, our case studies
illustrate how cluster projects, using different strate-
gies, are stretching and, to some degree, altering the
cluster concept. Accordingly, there seems to be a dis-
crepancy between the theoretical understanding of
clusters, its application in Norwegian cluster policy
and its operationalization through cluster projects.
For example, the national cluster policy is linked to
an understanding of clusters as specialized and
regional, while, at the same time, there are cluster
projects bearing resemblance also to ideas associated
with the development of regional innovation systems
(RIS) and the promotion of sectoral innovation sys-
tems. We argue that this is problematic, as such
stretching might work against the political aims of
the relevant cluster programme.
Theoretical background
What constitutes a cluster?
The literature on industrial clusters is multifaceted
and rich. Porter’s (2000: 15) seminal definition of a
cluster as “…geographic concentrations of intercon-
nected companies, specialized suppliers, service pro-
viders, firms in related industries, and associated
institutions (e.g., universities, standards agencies,
trade associations) in a particular field that compete
but also cooperate” has been important, but as was
pointed out over a decade ago (Martin and Sunley,
2003), a clear and complete definition of a “cluster” is
difficult. The struggle is still ongoing and has, most
prominently, been linked to difficulties in establishing
joint understandings of the spatiality (geographical
scale) of clusters and, more recently, of the degree of
specialization (industrial scope). In economic geogra-
phy, special emphasis has been placed on the spatial
vagueness inherent in Porter’s definition. A host of
contributors have tried to refine the cluster term and
conceptualization, and we find Malmberg and Power’s
(2006) chapter on the conceptual headache of clusters
and clustering to be especially interesting.
Malmberg and Power (2006) claim that clusters
and clustering are vague notions and fuzzy concepts,
and that the “headache” relates to Porter’s vague def-
inition. They argue that the theory in itself offers
something interesting but that, as mentioned, clusters
are difficult to grasp. Malmberg and Power reduce
some, although not nearly all, of the fuzziness by not-
ing that “if one takes cluster theory seriously”, four
criteria for identifying “true clusters” should be ful-
filled: (a) there should be a spatial agglomeration of
similar and related economic activity; (b) these activ-
ities should be interlinked by relations and interac-
tions between local collaboration and competition;
(c) there should be some form of self-awareness
among the cluster participants and some joint policy
action, expressed as “we are a cluster and we are
determined to develop together”; and (d) the cluster
should be successful, through measures such as inno-
vation or competitiveness (Malmberg and Power,
2006: 57). Thus, a “true cluster” is regarded as a spa-
tially bounded agglomeration containing related
activities and based on co-opetition in which the
actors share a feeling of belonging.
However, such cluster conceptualizations do not
necessarily conform to practical use. Originally,
cluster programmes and Western initiatives empha-
sized that clusters were regional and specialized
(Fløysand et al., 2012; Sölvell et al., 2003). For
instance, an international survey of cluster initiatives
found that they “tend to have a narrow geographical
focus … 50% have most of their members within
one hour’s travel distance” (Sölvell et al., 2003: 10),
and Isaksen (2009) argues that strategic networks to
supraregional knowledge sources are important
mechanisms for cluster upgrading and innovation.
More recently, we have witnessed more diverse pol-
icy approaches to cluster development and imple-
mentation (Uyarra and Ramlogan, 2012). In
evolutionary economic geography, the evolution of
clusters is argued to be linked to processes of scale
and scope (see also Njøs and Jakobsen, 2016). This
constitutes the core of the criticism of the cluster
concept: ambiguity inherent in cluster theory is
related to the difficulties in clearly demarcating the
challenges in defining scale and scope.
Scale and scope at the core of cluster
haziness
The issue of cluster scale has been thoroughly
debated in recent literature. The consensus is that
external links are crucial for mature clusters. To be
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4 European Urban and Regional Studies
innovative, strong clusters are dependent on new
knowledge, information and networks, among other
items, to avoid lock-in and decline (Bathelt et al.,
2004; Breschi and Malerba, 2001; Nadvi and Halder,
2005). It has been widely acknowledged that such
ties need to be balanced between the local and the
global; the embeddedness (Hess, 2004) of both clus-
ters and firms within clusters has been extensively
investigated (e.g., De Martino et al., 2006; Fornahl
and Tran, 2010; Kramer and Revilla-Diez, 2011;
Montagnana, 2010; Perkmann, 2006; White, 2004).
Bathelt et al. (2004) argue, for instance, that the co-
existence of intense local networking and a high
number of external linkages facilitate collective
learning processes that trigger innovation in the clus-
ter. Although clusters are considered to be localized,
regional phenomena with extra-regional linkages,
the precise geographical boundary of such entities
remains an empirical question.
Not only has the spatiality of clusters been scruti-
nized (Malmberg and Power, 2006; Martin and
Sunley, 2003), but also the issue of the type of indus-
try actors and associated institutions which should
constitute a cluster—the scope of the cluster—is
increasingly under investigation. As with the debate
over scale, there is widespread discussion about how
specialized or diverse a cluster should be. Porter
(2000) originally argued that a cluster should include
firms and institutions within related industries, while
others have argued that more narrowly defined and
specialized clusters are beneficial for development
(Reve and Sasson, 2012; Sölvell et al., 2003). This is
another definitional question that lacks an operation-
alized consensus among cluster scholars.
Until recently, the discussion about clusters has
emphasized the importance of industry specializa-
tion, or linking clusters to an industry profile.
However, new lines of research have been more
sceptical (Cooke, 2012a, 2012b), as specialization
can in fact work against innovation. Innovation is
widely understood to involve new combinations of
dissimilar knowledge types (Fagerberg, 2003).
Linked to clusters, related variety (Boschma and
Frenken, 2011) is an informative concept. It has been
claimed that innovations within industrial clusters
grow from differential knowledge shared between
actors both within and between clusters or regions,
while at the same time, knowledge between the
actors should not be too dissimilar (Boschma and
Iammarino, 2009). Regarding cluster mechanisms
that trigger innovation, Aarstad et al. (2016) found
that related industry variety is a positive regional
driver for both innovation and productivity.
Moreover, their studies showed that industrial spe-
cialization is a driver of enterprise productivity but
does not have a significant positive effect on enter-
prise innovation. Relatedness is important also in
Porter’s seminal cluster definition, but how to opera-
tionalize relatedness is still unresolved within the
cluster literature.
In other words, the frontier of cluster research is
struggling to explain what constitutes a cluster along
the dimensions of both scale and scope. A fairly
pragmatic consensus has been reached about the
importance of balancing both scale and scope, and
“mixing” the two dimensions is considered to be at
the core of a true cluster. However, this does not nec-
essarily single out a clear and exhaustive cluster
definition. The haziness of the concept is present in
academia, and considering that clusters are proce-
dural entities in flux, operationalizing them is even
more challenging. Thus, “cluster” is an academically
elastic concept.
Encounters between theory and practice provide
an opportunity for adding new meanings to the clus-
ter concept, because translating theoretical ideas to
practice is in itself an unclear task. The definitional
haziness in the academic literature, prominently
linked to dimensions of scale and scope, further chal-
lenges this translation. Thus, at the interface between
theory and practice, agency is essential to under-
standing how the cluster concept is stretched and
given new meaning. The role of policymakers, prac-
titioners and other institutional actors in shaping the
system has been partly overlooked in the literature
(Isaksen and Karlsen, 2012). However, there are
some exceptions. Uyarra and Ramlogan (2012) iden-
tified extensive heterogeneity in their review of clus-
ter policy strategies, while Borras and Tsagdis (2008)
make a distinction between a narrow and a broad
approach to cluster policy. The first includes the
direct involvement by the facilitator or cluster con-
sultants, while the second includes a broader set of
initiatives that influence cluster development. Aragon
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Njøs et al. 5
et al. (2011) discuss how cluster development strate-
gies need to be linked to the level of development of
the targeted cluster, while Fosse and Normann (forth-
coming) emphasize that applied cluster project devel-
opment strategies should be informed by a cluster’s
life cycle (e.g. Isaksen, 2011). In addition, they
observe that the competence, resources and profes-
sional networks of the cluster facilitator influence the
strategies for cluster development.
Hence, viewing clusters as social constructions
implies that different stakeholders have different
ideas of what a cluster should be, in turn resulting in
different strategies and objectives. Informed by our
theoretical discussion, we introduce the twin terms
“hubbing” and “blending” in conceptualizing how
cluster project stakeholders (i.e., agents) stretch the
cluster concept along the geographical scale and
industrial scope dimensions. A hubbing strategy
means that the cluster establishes new junctions or
assemblage points outside the original geographical
core area of the cluster, and is, as such, linked to uti-
lization of geographical scale. Such strategies are
intended to complement and further develop special-
ized clusters through extra-regional pipelines and
the development of relations with specialized actors
external to the cluster. This resembles the idea of
global pipelines as a driver of innovation within the
cluster literature (Bathelt et al., 2004) and also the
focus on learning through connecting highly compe-
tent and specialized actors within the sectoral system
of innovation approach (Malerba, 2002).
An alternative strategy for cluster facilitation is
blending strategies. The key issue of the blending
strategy is to ensure an upgrading of the cluster and a
strengthening of the innovation capabilities of the
cluster firm through facilitating blending or mixing
of different but related competences. Thus, blending
strategies are concerned with expanding the indus-
trial scope of cluster projects by stimulating co-oper-
ation and learning between firms in related branches
and firms with different but related knowledge. In
practice, blending implies a stronger emphasis on the
regional dimension and is, as such, linked to the theo-
retical concept of RIS and related variety (Boschma
and Frenken, 2011; Cooke, 1992; Cooke et al., 1997;
Uyarra, 2010). In the following empirical investiga-
tion, we elaborate on different stretching practices in
our three cases chosen from the Norwegian NCE pro-
gramme, exemplifying how hubbing and blending
strategies are utilized to different degrees.
Empirical investigation
In Norway, the development and implementation of
cluster programmes have been very closely linked to
Porterian thinking. As shown by evaluations of the
NCE programme (e.g., Røtnes and Jakobsen, 2012),
Norwegian cluster programmes are very loyal to this
theoretical approach, employing Porter’s definition
and an understanding of clusters as (sub-national)
regional entities consisting of firms, R&D institu-
tions, government organizations and support institu-
tions within the same/similar industries and where
external pipelines are considered crucial for cluster
development. Thus, in the Norwegian case, cluster
policies represent an attempt to apply, through trans-
lation, the theoretical concept of clusters.
NCE is a public programme for mature and par-
ticularly strong clusters that are internationally com-
petitive. Cluster programmes are one of the central
pillars of Norwegian innovation policy, and the NCE
programme is one of three national cluster pro-
grammes, grouped under the heading Norwegian
Innovation Clusters. The ARENA programme is
aimed at emerging, immature and potential clusters,
and is intended to explore and to structure industry
clusters in an early phase of development. Status and
financing is given for 3–5 years. The NCE pro-
gramme, initiated in 2006, is designed for mature
clusters with a strong international position.
Financing is granted for up to 10 years. The intention
of the programme is to enhance innovation and inter-
nationalization in the most dynamic and growth-ori-
ented Norwegian clusters. In June 2015, there were
12 active NCE cluster projects in operation. In 2014,
another cluster level was initiated: Global Centres of
Expertise (GCE). There are three GCE projects run-
ning in Norway (October 2015), all of which were
previously NCE projects. Status and financing is
granted for up to 10 years.
Our cases are selected from the NCE programme.
This programme aims to “better the conditions for
increasing value creation and strengthen [the clus-
tered firms’] position in national and global value
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6 European Urban and Regional Studies
chains” (Norwegian Innovation Clusters, 2014: 2,
our translation). The NCE projects are required to
encompass “a clear concentration of firms, both
SMEs and large specialized suppliers and a large
share of globally oriented firms”. Moreover, it is
required that the “cluster has an established position
as an important national, and usually an international
value creation environment within its value chain or
technology base” (Norwegian Innovation Clusters,
2014: 2, our translation). The programme also high-
lights the importance of co-ordination and strength-
ening of vertical integration in value chains as one of
the key characteristics of dynamic clusters. Hence, it
can be claimed that the NCE programme emphasizes
specialized clusters with a narrow scope.
In our analysis, we focus on three selected NCE
projects: NCE Maritime, NCE Oslo Cancer Cluster
(OCC) and NCE Subsea (Figure 1).1 When selecting
the cases we draw on our insight on Norwegian clus-
ter policy and prior studies of cluster initiatives (see,
for instance, Fløysand et al., 2012; Isaksen, 2009;
Jakobsen and Onsager, 2008; Røtnes and Jakobsen,
2012). Our intention has been to select cases that illus-
trate different, but typical, features of the phenome-
non we want to explore (George and Bennett, 2005),
that is, strategies for cluster development that illus-
trate stretching of the cluster concept. The selected
projects aim to develop mature clusters. The projects
have been ongoing since 2006/2007, and have
launched several cluster development initiatives.
Based on our prior knowledge, they employ different
strategies for cluster development. In other words,
these cases illustrate cluster project strategies that we
believe exemplify how the cluster concept is being
stretched within a cluster programme, that is, we
study “… what is considered to be a typical set of val-
ues, given some general understanding of a phenom-
enon” (Gerring, 2007: 91). Thus, we represent these
cases not as statistically defined but rather as exhibit-
ing various characteristics typical of the phenomena
under study.
One of the strengths of qualitative case studies is
the high level of conceptual validity that they offer
through in-depth examination of descriptive indica-
tors and variables. Use of qualitative case studies is
an appropriate method for research that aims to
contribute new knowledge about complex, causal
relationships or to provide nuances to theoretical
assumptions (George and Bennett, 2005; Yin, 2009).
Our main data source was semi-structured inter-
views with cluster project stakeholders (i.e., cluster
facilitators, regional authorities, personnel at R&D
institutions, cluster firm representatives, regional
politicians and individuals within business organiza-
tions). In the NCE Maritime cluster project, we
interviewed the cluster facilitator on two occasions,
as well as individuals at eight cluster firms and seven
other regional cluster project stakeholders; these
combined 17 interviews were conducted from May
2011 to March 2014. In the NCE Subsea cluster pro-
ject, we conducted eight semi-structured interviews
from October 2011 to February 2014 with the cluster
facilitator, individuals at five cluster firms and two
other cluster stakeholders. Finally, seven interviews
Figure 1. Location of the three cluster projects.
Source: Google Maps.
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Njøs et al. 7
were conducted in the OCC project from August
2013 to February 2014, including two with the clus-
ter facilitator and five with individuals at cluster
firms. Our interviews covered questions on cluster
evolution (both present and future), regional embed-
dedness, intra- and extra-regional cluster relations
(networks), the geography of the cluster and firms’/
cluster linkages to other (related) industries.
Secondary data from strategy documents, annual
reports, the projects’ home pages, newsletters and
other analyses were also used in our analyses of all
three cluster projects.
The maritime cluster in Sunnmøre:
Dynamic and strong
The Sunnmøre area in the county of Møre og
Romsdal in north-western Norway has been known
for centuries as a region with a distinct entrepreneur-
ial spirit and a solid restructuring capacity character-
ized by strong industry interconnections (Halse,
2014). Beginning in fisheries, the region has contin-
uously restructured to cope with changing macro-
and meso-economic shifts. Today, the Sunnmøre
area’s dominant industry is maritime, and it also has
a strong foothold in fisheries and furniture produc-
tion. Maritime is presently one of the global leaders
in designing, building and operating advanced and
sophisticated offshore vessels, primarily for the
petroleum industry.
This region is characterized by knowledge shar-
ing and an eagerness to innovate. For instance, it is
said that “you can nail a Sunnmøring to the wall, and
he still gets fat.” This reputation is complemented by
a culture emphasizing knowledge sharing and entre-
preneurship. An informant explains:
I think this dates back to prehistoric times. I think that
when the fishermen were out fishing, and had filled
their boat with a catch, they could either let go of the
rest, or they could give it to their neighbour, hoping
that he would return the favour next time.
In other words, close linkages and high levels of
trust between the actors have been built over a long
period. This has formed the foundation for a region-
ally embedded maritime cluster, the activities of
which span design, building and operation of custom-
made vessels. This is strongly related to past indus-
trial activities, most notably fishing. Moreover, in
both the cluster and the region, there are long tradi-
tions for co-operation across sectors and industries,
through both formal and informal relations. As stated
by one informant, “In this region there is indeed a
practical understanding of what industrial develop-
ment is all about. It is a joint understanding.”
The maritime cluster in the Sunnmøre region is
complete, consisting of shipping companies, design-
ers, shipyards, suppliers, higher education institu-
tions, R&D institutions and finance institutions. The
cluster consists of nearly 220 companies and repre-
sents a complete value chain from subsuppliers to
shipping companies, employing more than 20,000
individuals (Oterhals et al., 2014).
The NCE Maritime project
In 2006, the maritime cluster was awarded status as a
NCE, and the cluster facilitator NCE Maritime was
founded. In its application for NCE status, the
regional actors wanted to include the regional indus-
trial environment, not just the maritime sector,
towards carving out a cluster reflecting the interlink-
ages between the historically dominant regional
industries (furniture, fisheries and maritime being the
most notable). This was to reflect the importance of
knowledge sharing between different sectors, through
which the regional tradition of cross-sectoral interde-
pendence was implemented. This element of the
application was rejected by the programme commit-
tee because the NCE programme emphasizes indus-
try specialization. However, the cluster facilitator and
regional development actors encourage interaction
between industries and sectors in the region through
cluster project facilitation and arrangement.
The NCE Maritime project is led by Ålesund
Kunnskapspark (ÅKP), a regional development
agency. ÅKP is jointly owned by private companies
and municipalities, the Møre & Romsdal county
administration, and government corporation Industrial
Development Corporation of Norway (SIVA). ÅKP
facilitates several projects, including NCE maritime,
LEGASEA (a bio-marine cluster project), Norwegian
Rooms (a furniture cluster project), ECOWindS (a
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8 European Urban and Regional Studies
project on offshore wind) and several incubators. In
other words, NCE Maritime is one of several regional
development projects facilitated by ÅKP, and the
importance of the regional industry activity is reflected
by this configuration. NCE Maritime is not treated as
an isolated cluster project, and a key informant in the
cluster highlighted the importance of seeing the dif-
ferent ÅKP projects in relation to each other:
ÅKP is a regional innovation system with an incubator,
with NCE [focusing on the maritime sector], with bio-
marine, and international projects. And all of this is
interconnected. [The role of ÅKP] is to create a
functional region. And that is one of the weaknesses of
these NCE projects; they are assumed to live a life of
their own. I think that is wrong.
The regional industrial heritage is again high-
lighted, in which regional development actors par-
ticipate in broad activities that underscore
cross-sectorial linkages and a wider understanding
of regional development. This is also emphasized by
one of the cluster stakeholders:
It is exciting that you have a petro-maritime cluster
that, together with the marine, with offshore and with
renewable wind energy, as examples, is moving along
several dimensions. There is elasticity along several
dimensions. It would have been much weaker if you
only had one of the dimensions.
This is also exemplified by one of ÅKP’s strate-
gies, which highlights the importance of increasing
cluster scope to avoid lock-in. The term “ocean
space” has been conceptualized by ÅKP and other
regional development stakeholders, suggesting that
the cluster consists of more than a petro-maritime
dimension. The concept, in which “ocean space”
consists of more than shipbuilding, is a striking illus-
tration of the broadening of a cluster’s scope and the
avoidance of narrow specialization. It incorporates
development of the bio-marine industry, offshore
wind, and fisheries—everything over, under or on
the ocean surface. This is exemplified by a key actor
in the cluster:
If, maybe, possibly, in 50 years, we are out of oil and
gas, then I am sure we will still be doing strange things
on the seabed that no one has thought of today. Because
it is more about the thinking related to ocean space, and
how this can form a basis for coming up with new
things.
We argue that the NCE Maritime cluster project
approach represents a blending strategy with a
strong focus on the regional dimension and a widen-
ing of cluster scope through stimulating co-opera-
tion between related branches. This strategy bears a
resemblance to RIS theory, where also the stake-
holders’ intention is to develop a RIS with linkages
to strong national and international knowledge
environments.
The cancer cluster in Oslo: Strong roots in
the region
The cancer cluster is located in the Oslo region,
Norway’s dominant research and higher education
region. Oslo represents an urban agglomeration char-
acterized by heterogeneity of a wide range of indus-
trial sectors and public institutions (Aslesen and
Isaksen, 2007; Foyn et al., 2011; Herstad and
Ebersberger, 2014; Onsager et al., 2010). This capital
region has a long history in the field of cancer diag-
nostics and medicine and, as such, the roots of the
cancer cluster can be traced to strong historical fac-
tors dating back to the 1932 establishment of the
Radium Hospital. As the world’s first cancer hospital,
the Radium Hospital is now one of Northern Europe’s
largest cancer treatment facilities. Furthermore, in
the 1950s, the Cancer Registry of Norway and the
Institute for Cancer Research were established. In
1986, the Norwegian Radium Hospital Research
Foundation was established with an aim of strength-
ening cancer research and financing start-ups through
a Technology Transfer Office (TTO). However, in
2007, the TTO was phased out following a merger
between The Norwegian Radium Hospital and
Rikshospitalet University Hospital. A new TTO was
established, and the Foundation continued as a “…
pre-seed investor and project developer focused on
cancer”2 with the aim of strengthening cancer
research at Rikshospitalet University Hospital,
including The Norwegian Radium Hospital. Today,
the Foundation facilities the OCC.
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Njøs et al. 9
Small Norwegian-owned biotech firms represent
the largest group in this cluster. Most of these firms
are highly specialized in developing cancer diagnos-
tics and medications and are characterized as spin-
offs from technology and knowledge developed at
the Radium Hospital, the University Hospital and the
University of Oslo. These firms can potentially gen-
erate radical innovations, and their knowledge is
highly sought internationally. Often small compa-
nies, they are dependent on interaction and collabora-
tion with hospitals, other academic institutions and
industry and expert environments to grow and remain
in compliance with strict and long-lasting regulatory
phases for drug development. Development of new
drugs usually takes from 10 to 15 years, and
Norwegian biotech firms are often dependent on
international pharmaceutical companies to complete
drug development. This is because of high costs and
because the population of Norway is insufficient to
produce valid results in some trials (Aamdal, 2012).
The OCC project: Developing a narrow
niche in a global system
In 2004, the Oslo Life Science (OLS) project was
initiated and, in 2006, an application for NCE status
was submitted. The project was rejected by the pro-
gramme committee on the basis of being too broad
(Isaksen and Karlsen, 2012) and including too many
activities within the field of life science. The part-
ners therefore decided to focus exclusively on cancer
and the creation of a new cluster organization, the
OCC, focused on oncology (the study and practice of
treating tumours), representing a more narrow niche.
OCC received NCE status in 2007, and the cluster
project has approximately 70 members employing
around 1500 individuals in cancer-related activity
(Furre and Flatnes 2010). The members include bio-
tech companies, pharmaceutical companies, R&D
institutions, university hospitals, universities, sup-
port organizations, financial institutions and regional
development actors in the field of cancer R&D.
OCC’s main aim is to develop a leading global
oncology cluster. The cluster project’s strategies
have matured in recent years, with special focus on
attracting seed capital, internationalization and
development of international partnerships. Since its
inception, OCC has grown both geographically and
through the inclusion of service firms.
OCC represents a fairly well-developed and for-
malized innovation system, with a wide range of
actors specializing in different parts of the value
chain (e.g., production, services and research) (Furre
and Flatnes, 2010; Isaksen and Karlsen, 2012).
According to Skåholt et al. (2010), actors have dif-
ferent roles across the long-lasting development
phase. The biotech firms are the core entities, R&D
institutions serve as “facilitators” and the global
pharmaceutical firms are potential collaborators for
product commercialization and marketing. Hospitals
are important actors in the development phase,
because this is where medical practice is carried out,
and they are thus an important source of innovation-
relevant knowledge.
This may suggest a way in which the regional
scope of OCC is challenged, because its dependence
on actors beyond the merely interdependent region-
alized firms is crucial for development of both the
firms and the cluster. Small biotech companies need
big pharma to move into late development stages,
such as clinical development (Kleyn et al., 2007),
gaining visibility and positioning themselves in rela-
tion to global actors. As few big pharma companies
are located in the region, the OCC strategy is to link-
up formally with other European oncology knowl-
edge hubs. This is manifested through various
international partnerships between OCC and other
clusters. In 2009, the European Oncology Partnering
Platform was formed and organized in close collabo-
ration with the main partner Cancer-Bio-Santé
Cluster in France. According to OCC, this partnering
platform has been further developed with the
Swedish–Danish Medicon Valley Alliance in 2011
and the Paris-based Cancer Campus in 2012 and
2013. These formal international efforts can be seen
as indications of how specialized knowledge-inten-
sive activities in this narrow discipline must be com-
plemented by resources beyond those available in
the Oslo region.
According to Skåholt et al. (2010), OCC has also
gained a more strategic role in promoting and posi-
tioning the cluster internationally as a leading oncol-
ogy agglomeration. OCC has a role as “spokesman”
or mediator in promoting the cluster’s expertise
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10 European Urban and Regional Studies
internationally, through working to establish formal
arrangements with other specialized agglomerations
and facilitating conferences. For the core biotech
firms, it seems that the cluster’s most important
internal activities are what it does externally. Hence,
the OCC project can be considered to be a construc-
tion seeking to utilize the scale dimension through a
narrow scope, that is, a hubbing strategy.
The OCC cluster project reveals a way of think-
ing based on sectoral systems of innovation rather
than mere cluster-based thinking. A sectoral system
of production and innovation includes a set of new
and established products for specific uses and the set
of agents carrying out market and non-market inter-
action for the creation, production and sale of those
products. Such systems include both firm and non-
firm organizations (e.g., R&D institutions, financial
institutions, government agencies, etc.). There is a
strong focus on how to stimulate knowledge devel-
opment and learning processes within the system
(Malerba, 2002).
The NCE Subsea cluster in Hordaland: A
new cluster in a new industry
The Bergen region in the county of Hordaland is on
Norway’s westernmost coastline and is known as a
region with an industrial base in maritime and
marine, with an emphasis on petroleum.
Approximately 11% (28,000) of the Hordaland
workforce is petroleum related (Blomgren et al.,
2013). Within petroleum, the region is a global
leader in subsea maintenance, modification and
operation (MMO).
The subsea industry is relatively new and has
grown in importance since its beginning in the 1980s.
The national oil companies Statoil and Hydro, which
have since merged, were pioneers in developing tech-
nology for subsea oil and gas extraction. Based on
their work, world-leading technology and expertise
have since been developed in Norway, giving the
country a strong position in the global underwater
industry. The subsea industry is experiencing rapid
growth and in recent years has been proclaimed to be
among the most innovative sectors of the petroleum
industry (Sasson and Blomgren, 2011). As develop-
ment of offshore oil and gas fields have become
increasingly complex, because of deeper waters and
larger distances from land, among other things, sub-
sea extraction of oil and gas has become increasingly
important. In addition, the aftermarket is experienc-
ing rapid growth, leading to a development boom.
The key actors in the subsea cluster are the opera-
tor companies, system suppliers and sub-suppliers.
The cluster consists of around 140 companies,
employing approximately 12,000 individuals.3
However, the Hordaland subsea cluster is, relatively
speaking, lacking a technology development focus.
Equipment and technology development, such as
systems engineering, is conducted mostly in eastern
Norway, where many of the large subsea firms are
headquartered or have located their technology
development activities. This is summarized by one
of our informants, “We have very, very good opera-
tional competence, that is, everything from installa-
tion to maintenance, modification, re-fabrication and
so on. In that field we are a leading global environ-
ment”. With this as a basis, an application was sub-
mitted for NCE status.
The NCE Subsea project
The subsea cluster was granted NCE status in 2006.
At this stage, the cluster was relatively immature,
and the facilitator worked intensively on both build-
ing relations between the clustered firms and build-
ing a regional understanding of what a cluster is. The
aim was obviously to stimulate collaboration and co-
operation. In many ways, NCE Subsea was discov-
ered and initiated from a top-down perspective
(Fløysand et al., 2012). Given that the subsea indus-
try is relatively new and in many ways can be
regarded as a subsector of the broader petroleum
industry, there are few specialized subsea firms in
the cluster. In 2013, NCE Subsea consisted of 120
members, mainly from the industry, but also R&D
institutions and the public sector. However, previous
studies have found that only about 20% of the subsea
firms in Hordaland operate exclusively within the
subsea market (Jakobsen and Fløysand, 2011). Many
are, or have been, active in other segments of the
petroleum industry. Hence, NCE Subsea has a
diverse member population. One of the informants
explained:
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Njøs et al. 11
To define the cluster as “this” or “that” is very hard,
because the firms are very different. And that makes
the cluster very complex; you have everything from the
large system suppliers such as FMC, Aker Subsea, to
even personnel agencies.
However, since NCE status was awarded, the cluster
has developed a distinct strategy for subsea industry
aftermarket specialization. This both has served as
structuring for the direction of the cluster’s develop-
ment and has helped to create a common identity and
understanding among the clustered firms.
In its present strategy, NCE Subsea emphasizes the
importance of increased co-operation with other seg-
ments within the Norwegian subsea industry. The
cluster project seeks to unite and to promote the
national subsea industry as a whole and is intending to
take a leading role in the Norwegian subsea industry,
encompassing a complete subsea value chain. The
intention is to expand the cluster geographically by
linking the cluster project in Hordaland to other areas
of Norway by building satellites along the west coast
of Norway, to the systems engineering agglomeration
in eastern Norway and to the strong technical R&D
environment in Trondheim (central Norway). The aim
is to build a physical presence, or “subclusters”, in
regions of Norway that have subsea activity, recruit-
ing central actors with important expertise in different
geographical contexts as members/partners.
We have had this discussion in the board and the idea is
to diffuse where it is easiest. In other words, along the
coast. That will put us in a stronger position, generating
a constructive and uniting umbrella organization which
also includes more of the environments in Eastern
Norway.
In other words, this strategy is consistent with
that of “hubbing”, in which NCE Subsea intends to
utilize scale through the development of “satellites”
and “subclusters” in other regions. Asked directly
about this, one of the informants elaborated,
Well, the definition of a cluster is this geographical
dimension, right. And then the question is if it is not
better to take a global perspective on this, defining
Norway as a cluster. But it is hard to answer. This [new
strategy] is almost like some hybrid [cluster construction].
Comparison
We have presented three encounters between
national cluster policy and cluster practice, exempli-
fying how the haziness of the cluster concept leaves
opportunities for cluster stakeholders to stretch the
concept along the scale and scope dimensions. The
NCE Maritime cluster project approach has been a
blending strategy, a stronger focus on the regional
dimension and a widening of scope. As argued in the
theory section above, this strategy bears resemblance
to ideas drawn by theories on RIS (Figure 2).
Secondly, OCC has its geographical core area in the
capital region, but the cluster project shows clear
ambitions of developing into a Sectoral System of
Innovation within oncology. This implies stretching
through a hubbing strategy, in which a strong focus
is on attracting external seed capital and develop-
ment and nurturing of linkages to international
knowledge agglomerations. Lastly, the approach of
NCE Subsea bears similarities to the hubbing strat-
egy of OCC. However, NCE Subsea has a national
focus, trying to strengthen linkages to other parts of
the Norwegian subsea industry by developing satel-
lites and subclusters in different geographical areas.
That project also intends to unite and promote the
national subsea industry as a whole. The inclusion
of other subsea sector areas in Norway implies a
minor expansion of the scope of the sector (different
Figure 2. Stretching of the cluster concept.
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12 European Urban and Regional Studies
subclusters have different specialties). Still, the
approach resembles the rationale of developing a
national Sectoral System of Innovation. Figure 2
illustrates how these three projects, through their
practice, have stretched the cluster understanding on
which the Norwegian cluster policy is built.
Concluding discussion:
Implications for cluster policy
Our three case studies illustrate how cluster projects,
employing different strategies, are stretching, and to
some degree altering, our understanding of a cluster.
There seems to be a discrepancy between the theo-
retical understanding of clusters, the understanding
of clusters found in national cluster policies and the
understandings traced in the different cluster pro-
jects. This heterogeneity in the Norwegian cluster
discourse corresponds well with observations in
other studies. A recent review of a number of cluster
programmes in European countries concluded that
“cluster policy is multi-dimensional, multi-instru-
ment policy, informed by a mix of rationales. The
development of clusters therefore means different
things in different places” (Uyarra and Ramlogan,
2012: 35; see also Kiese and Wrobel, 2011). This is
in correspondence with a conception of clusters as
social constructions, implying that, as noted by
Granovetter (1992) and Marston (2000), there is
room for the actors involved in its operationalization
and practical use to fill the concept with context-
specific meaning. Thus, we believe that the haziness
of the concept gives cluster stakeholders room for
promoting alternative representations of what a clus-
ter should be, that is, informing why this stretching
practice is taking place in Norwegian policies. The
cluster concept provides different meaning and dif-
ferent opportunities for the actors involved (Fløysand
et al., 2012; Kiese and Wrobel, 2011), and our cases
illustrate how cluster stakeholders launch strategies
that they believe are advantageous for the member
firms.
The haziness of the cluster concept, and the impli-
cations of this haziness, are not fully considered in
cluster policy and cluster programmes. As our inves-
tigation shows, the cluster projects address short-
term industry challenges. In addition, these projects
seem to provide a suitable framework for improving
networking and innovation within the participating
firms (Furre and Flatnes, 2010; Jakobsen et al.,
2012). Cluster programmes in Norway, such as the
NCE, are linked to the development of regional, spe-
cialized industry agglomerations by stimulating
upgrading mechanisms, such as networking and
learning (Fløysand et al., 2012; Isaksen, 2009;
Sölvell et al., 2003). However, the projects that we
selected challenge both Porter’s original academic
definition of co-located firms in related industries
and the hegemonic definition in Norwegian policy of
a cluster as a specialized regional industry agglom-
eration. The selected projects’ strategies are not nec-
essarily strongly linked to Porter’s ideas about
cluster theory but they do bear resemblance to other
theories on how to support regional industrial devel-
opment, for example, RIS and Sectoral Innovation
Systems theories. The question is: does it really mat-
ter that the actors operate “outside the box” as long
as the projects provide financial value?
From a firm or industry perspective, it may not
matter at all, but from a policy angle, we believe that
several implications merit reflection. The first is justi-
fication of the policy. Regarding targeting groups,
cluster policy can be placed somewhere between a
nationally oriented industry policy that promotes a
narrowly defined set of industries, or “national cham-
pions”, and a broad regional innovation policy prior-
itizing the development of regional capabilities and
regional institutional thickness (Boekholt and
Thuriaux, 1999; Jakobsen and Onsager, 2008; Uyarra
and Ramlogan, 2012). The intention of cluster poli-
cies borrowing from Porter and others has been to
stimulate the competitiveness of geographical con-
centrations of similar and related firms and associated
institutions. It can be argued that OCC and NCE
Subsea, with their narrow industry scopes, are closer
to a traditional industry policy promoting national
champions, insofar as it is used as a rather narrow and
isolated policy tool. The complexity of industrial
activity highlighted by the RIS literature is, thus, sub-
ordinate. It can similarly be argued that NCE
Maritime, with its rather broad scope and regional
focus, is closer to the regional innovation policy
thinking with its attempt to build constellations and
constructions facilitating a more complexity-informed
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Njøs et al. 13
understanding of innovation and industrial develop-
ment. Until now, the justification of Norwegian clus-
ter policy has been that it is a suitable instrument for
stimulating competitiveness and innovation among
co-located firms. Instead, our selected cases seem to
promote development of national industry champions
and establishment of efficient RIS. Both objectives
are important for a national economy, but whether this
should be the intention of national cluster policies
needs to be debated. Seen from an academic perspec-
tive, an industry-driven policy may lead to path exten-
sion rather than encouragement of novel solutions and
new development paths (Njøs and Jakobsen, 2016. In
other words, it may hamper long-term innovation and
value creation. It can also be argued that it is difficult
to find an appropriate balance between national and
regional innovation policy instruments when cluster
projects represent something other than the intention
of cluster policies. Moreover, consistency between a
programme and its projects is important when it
comes to linking policy instruments to the grand chal-
lenges of a nation, such as environmental issues, the
centre–periphery nexus and the tension between
growing and declining regions. Industry-driven clus-
ter initiatives may indeed emphasize “more of the
same” rather than stimulating economic renewal.
A second policy implication of stretching is pol-
icy evaluation. Development of policy instruments
requires an ability to synthesize experiences and
results across various initiatives, as well as from
related policy instruments. However, there are chal-
lenges associated with both how to compare hetero-
geneous initiatives and the potential benefits of
learning between projects when the initiatives are
quite disparate and built on differing rationales. It is
also difficult to identify best practices when different
objectives are sought through different strategies.
A third implication, closely related to the learning
issue, is policy support for cluster initiatives. Our
selected cases are part of the NCE programme oper-
ated by Innovation Norway, a public innovation
agency. In order to ensure an efficient programme,
there is a need to develop guidelines and practical
advice for cluster projects, their operation and how
to ensure financial value. Such advice and guidelines
should be informed by the rationale upon which the
programme is based, in addition to experiences from
completed initiatives and other related programmes.
When the practice of the actors diverges from the
original cluster idea on which the programme was
originally built, development of efficient support
systems needs to be informed by broader theoretical
frameworks, not just cluster theories. As we have
shown, guidelines may also be needed on how to
develop RIS and how to ensure the establishment of
efficient value chains and well-functioning sectoral
innovation systems.
Our paper adds to the theoretical debate on indus-
try clusters by illustrating how the cluster concept is
being stretched through implementation. Clusters
are not static but are social constructs imbued with
specific meaning by practitioners in order to achieve
their ambitions. The stakeholder’s role in defining
the cluster concept has until now been largely over-
looked in the literature. We believe that such stretch-
ing practice needs to be reflected upon in cluster
policy and programmes. Certainly, a strong argu-
ment can be made that different regional challenges
call for different solutions and, consequently, differ-
ent cluster strategies (Cooke, 2012b; Tödtling and
Trippl, 2005). We also know that cluster projects
must be strongly embedded among clustered firms
and institutions to achieve legitimacy and to have
any meaningful contribution to their development
(Fløysand et al., 2012). On the other hand, “unlim-
ited stretching” makes it difficult to justify the policy
and to evaluate how it fits with other instruments for
innovation at both the regional and national levels.
Such stretching also makes it difficult to use cluster
policy as an instrument for solving significant prob-
lems, such as regional renewal, regional imbalance
and environmental issues.
We argue that this conceptual haziness illustrates
the need for the development of an innovation policy
that does not rely exclusively on the vague concept
of “cluster”, and further research should investigate
the practical implications of the conceptual stretch-
ing on processes of regional development. The strug-
gle to develop joint understandings of clusters in
theory and practice has been ongoing for more than
20 years, indicating that it may be more fruitful to
look for a wider selection of concepts when seeking
to promote regional development and to increase
innovation through national policies.
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14 European Urban and Regional Studies
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the reviewers and the editor for
helpful comments that enabled us to improve the paper.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial
support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of
this article: This work was supported by grants provided
by the Research Council of Norway.
Notes
1. At the time of submission of this paper, all three of
our cases had NCE status. However, NCE Subsea and
NCE Maritime have since been granted GCE status.
This necessarily led to changes in the two cluster pro-
jects’ strategies. In our empirical investigation, we
report on observations of the projects when they were
under NCE status.
2. http://www.ous-research.no/ccc/index.php?aid=
6103&k=ccc/forside&mid=1
3. http://www.ncesubsea.no/article/16135/NCE_
Subsea_gjennom_naloyet
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