Abstract

Abstract This article provides an empirical examination of high-tech firm location data from 1953 to 1990 to show a dramatic shift in geographic centre of what is now called Silicon Valley. Universities (most notably Stanford), venture capital and law firms acted as magnets for divisions of established firms and local start-ups. These institutions combined with the Santa Clara County’s available land to pull the high-tech region’s epicentre south-eastwards from San Francisco, an early source of investment capital and legal expertise. These findings add another element (spatial change) for consideration in explaining the evolution of industry clusters. Keywords: High-tech clusters, industrial location, geography, regional Silicon Valley Notes 1. Scott, ‘Economic Geography,’ 486. 2. Porter, The Competitive Advantage of Nations; Saxenian, Regional Advantage; Scott, Regions and the World Economy. 3. Scott, ‘Economic Geography,’ 492–493. 4. Wal and Boschma, ‘Co-evolution of firms, industries and networks in space,’ 4. 5. Cooke, Knowledge Economies, 194. 6. Miller and Cote, ‘Growing the Next’; O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge, 1. 7. Sturgeon, ‘How Silicon Valley Came’; Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley; Norberg, ‘Origins’; Adams, ‘Arc of Empire’. 8. Hanson, The New Alchemists; Rogers and Larsen, Silicon Valley Fever; Malone, The Big Score. 9. Malone, Big Score, 8. 10. Rogers and Larsen, Silicon Valley Fever, 28. 11. Madrigal, ‘Not Even Silicon Valley,’ 1, 2, 6. 12. Saxenian, Regional Advantage; O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge; Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley. 13. Storper, et al., The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies. 14. Adams, ‘Growing Where.’ 15. Tajnai, ‘From the Valley of Heart’s Delight’; Alpers, ‘Valley of Heart’s Delight.’ 16. Malone, The Big Score, 428. 17. Rogers and Larsen, Silicon Valley Fever, 28. 18. Saxenian, Regional Advantage, 11. 19. O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge, 97. 20. Matthews, Silicon Valley, Women, 137–140. 21. Saxenian, Regional Advantage, 12. 22. McWilliams, California, 31–33, 216–218, 229–232. 23. Olmstead and Rhode, ‘An Overview’; David and Wright, ‘Increasing Returns’. 24. Carlton and Coclanis, ‘The Uninventive South,’ 322–323. 25. Adams, ‘Born on Third,’ 17–18. 26. Sturgeon, ‘How Silicon Valley,’ 34–38. 27. O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge, 18–19. 28. Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley, 21–30, 53–55. 29. Gillmor, Fred Terman, 161–167; Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley, 95–100. 30. Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley, 30, 40, 100; Sturgeon, ‘How Silicon Valley,’ 41–44. 31. Findlay, Magic Lands, 125–126. 32. O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge, 70. 33. Ibid, 68. 34. Storper and Walker, Capitalist Imperative, 73. 35. Adams, ‘A Garage, an Idea, and an Ecosystem.’ 36. Findlay, Magic Lands, 140. 37. Adams, ‘Growing Where,’ 373. 38. Klepper, ‘Silicon Valley,’ 85. 39. Findlay, Magic Lands, 119. 40. Ibid, 151. 41. Ibid, 152. 42. Ibid, 157. 43. Storper and Scott, ‘Rethinking human capital,’ 147. 44. Findlay, Magic Lands, 152. 45. Ibid, 152. 46. Storper and Scott, ‘Rethinking human capital,’ 162. 47. Adams, ‘Stanford and Silicon Valley,’ 40. 48. Adams, ‘Their minds will follow,’ 23. 49. ‘The Second Decade of Achievement,’ 3, 22; Adams, ‘Stanford and Silicon Valley,’ 41. 50. ‘The Second Decade of Achievement,’ 3, 22. 51. Adams, ‘Their Minds Will Follow’, 26. 52. Sturgeon, ‘How Silicon Valley,’ 20, 45–46. 53. Kenney and Florida, ‘Venture Capital,’ 106–109; Lécuyer, ‘Making Silicon Valley,’ 166. 54. Ibid, 115. 55. Cooke, ‘Regional Innovation Systems,’ 967. 56. Sturgeon, ‘How Silicon Valley,’ 35, 40; Flehr, Inventors; Adams, ‘A Garage,’ 6–9. 57. Suchman, ‘Dealmakers,’ 74; Rao, ‘The Helpers.’ 58. Kenney and von Burg, ‘Institutions.’ 59. Boschma and Fornahl, ‘Cluster evolution,’ 3. 60. WCEMA, Product List – Membership Roster; Saxenian, ‘In Search Of,’ 33. 61. Dun & Bradstreet, Metalworking Directory, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990. 62. The relevant high-tech SIC codes are: 357 (Computer and Office Equipment); 366 (Communications Equipment); 367 (Electronic Components and Accessories); 376 (Guided Missiles and Space Vehicles); 38 (Instruments); and 737 (Computer Programming and Data Processing). 63. Lécuyer, Making Silicon Valley; O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge; Rogers and Larsen, Silicon Valley Fever; Saxenian, Regional Advantage. 64. See O’Sullivan and Unwin, 98–105, for a discussion of both the mean nearest neighbour and quadrat-count tests. 65. O’Mara, Cities of Knowledge, 63–64. 66. Cooper, ‘The Role Of,’ 82. 67. Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier, 267. 68. Hasegawa, Engineering the Future, 81. 69. Longhi, ‘Networks’; Wal, ‘Cluster Emergence’; Boschma, et al., ‘How Do Regions Diversify’; de Socio, ‘Regime Network Restructuring.’ 70. Bresnahan, Gambardella, and Saxenian, ‘“Old Economy” Inputs for “New Economy” Outcomes,’ 835.

Faculty Members

Stephen B. Adams - Department of Management and Marketing, Salisbury University, Salisbury, MD, USA
Dustin Chambers - Department of Economics and Finance, Salisbury University, Salisbury, MD, USA
Michael Schultz - CDM Smith, Inc., Dallas, TX, USA

Themes

Geographic shifts in high-tech industry
Evolution of Silicon Valley
Impact of venture capital and universities on industry location
Spatial change in industry clusters
Role of institutions in economic development

Research Article

A moving target: The geographic evolution of Silicon Valley, 1953–1990

Abstract

Faculty Members

Themes

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