A group of 20 Catalan clusters travel to China to explore innovation opportunities and build alliances

A delegation of 20 Catalan clusters has traveled to China to explore the country's innovation ecosystem, form alliances, and seek international collaboration opportunities. This marks the 10th edition of the Strategic Cluster Week, organized by ACCIÓ-Catalonia Trade & Investment, the agency for business competitiveness under the Ministry for Business and Labour, as part of the Catalonia Clusters program.

Participating clusters are some of the members of the Catalonia Clusters Program: Edutech, Innovi, Àmbit, the Barcelona Leather Cluster, the Tech Tourism Cluster, the Digital Cluster, Femac, the Waste Cluster, the Packaging Cluster, Foodservice, the Catalan Water Partnership, Kids Cluster, MAV, CEEC, Indescat, Catalonia.Health, the Audiovisual Cluster, CSIM, and CICAT.

The delegation visited Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Shanghai, where they met with leading Chinese companies such as OPPO, Shenzhen InnoX (a tech incubator), Tencent (a leading global tech company, creator of WeChat), and the e-commerce firm Baozun. The mission included site visits to Hutchison Ports HIT, a major global port operator, and Ficosa, a Catalan automotive components company established in China in the 1990s. 

The delegation also participated in specialized training sessions on China's economy and consumption model, led by experts such as Alicia García Herrero, Chief Economist for Asia-Pacific at Natixis and senior researcher at the BRUEGEL think tank, and Coral Puig, professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Additionally, the Catalan business representatives attended a session on China’s cluster policy delivered by Professor Teng Tangwei, Director of the Institute of Land Development and Regional Economics at East China Normal University.

This 2024 edition marks the tenth year of Strategic Cluster Week, an annual initiative designed to introduce Catalan clusters to international innovation ecosystems and foster knowledge exchange and collaboration. Each year, the program takes Catalan clusters to different countries for inspiration and learning. In previous years, delegations have visited key innovation hubs such as Boston, Silicon Valley, New York, South Korea, Singapore, and Japan.

What is a cluster?

A cluster is a group of companies (SMEs, multinationals, and startups) and related institutions (universities and tech centers) within a specific economic sector that simultaneously compete and collaborate. It serves as a tool to boost the competitiveness of its members through joint transformational projects and the definition of strategic challenges for the sector.

In Catalonia, cluster policy is driven by the Catalan government through the Catalonia Clusters program, which, over the past 30 years, has grown to include 27 clusters grouping together 3,000 companies and institutions, and generating over €80 billion in revenue.

Harvard University published a case study that analyzes the evolution of the cluster policy in Catalonia, promoted since 1992 by ACCIÓ-Catalonia Trade & Investment.

According to Christian Ketels, the Harvard Business School researcher conducting the study, "Catalonia is a global reference in cluster policy. Many regions of the world can learn from how public policies and cluster structures have adapted to economic and global changes over the last thirty years"

The study shows how clusters have had a decisive positive impact on Catalan companies and that Catalonia is one of the most developed regions in Europe in this area.