Clusters are individuals - VDI/VDE-IT

these clusters since the establishment of the cluster management
organization. Eventually there is of course a size limit
set by the size of the economy as it has an influence on the
number of players in economic sectors in which clusters can
develop. The large sizes of Finish clusters can be explained
by the fact the majority of the benchmarked clusters are
rather coordination bodies of smaller clusters in the same
economic field; in this particular case the funding program
“OSKE – Centre of Expertise Program”, which supports the
cluster management organizations, had a significant effect
on the size of the clusters.
2.2.3 COMPOSITION OF MEMBERSHIP
Figure 5 displays the typical composition of the cluster membership
for each country (only with regard to the clusters
that have participated in the benchmarking project).
With the exemption of Iceland in all countries industry (SME
and Non-SME) is the dominating stakeholder. Swedish clusters
have the lowest share of industry (56 per cent, SME: 45
per cent) and Finnish clusters, which are dominated by SME,
the highest (93 per cent, SME: 88 per cent). The share of industry
in Icelandic clusters is only 38 per cent.
The share of R&D institutions and universities is very much
different between the countries. Iceland and Germany have
the highest share (R&D institutions and universities account
for 24 respectively 13 per cent of all stakeholders), followed
by Denmark (10 per cent), Sweden (10 per cent), Norway (10
per cent), Poland (8 per cent) and Finland (3 per cent). The
composition of the membership can depend on the specific
requirements of the national cluster programs.
GERMANY
SWEDEN NORWAY FINLAND
3%
6%
3%
4%
6%
7%
46%
19%
4%
4% 3% 8%
7%
3%
3%
45%
52%
5%
3%
7%1%
1%
2%1%
2%
1%
5%
7%
4%
7%
18%
6%
4%
11%
12%
80%
DANMARK ICELAND POLAND
7%
3%
5%
5% 5%
16%
4%
6%
2%
3%
6%
10%
4%
2%
14%
60%
11%
11%
22%
6%
5%
4%
49%
4%
10%
14%
12%
SME
Universities
Consultants
Non-SME
Training and education providers
Governmental agencies
R&D institutions
Financials intermediaries
Others
Figure 5: Composition of membership (median value)
20