The temporal-spatial evolution of China’s urban high-tech complexity

ABSTRACT

In this paper, a new index is constructed to measure the regional distribution of high-tech industries. Based on the product space theory and the fitness method, we creatively construct the urban high-tech complexity index, which reflects the diversity and universality of urban high-tech industries. Using urban data from Chinese industrial enterprise database, we find the difference in China’s urban high-tech complexity between cities shows a downward trend from 1996 to 2013, and the strong positive spatial correlation of this index. These conclusions reflect the diffusion and spillover effects of China’s high-tech industries across regions. Our paper is helpful to understand the innovation drivers at the city level, and promotes the synergy and spillover of high-tech industries.

KEYWORDS:

• Urban high-tech complexity
• product space theory
• high-tech industry
• innovation driven

JEL CLASSIFICATION:

• F061.5

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Data are available from the authors upon request.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the National Social Science Foundation of China (grant no.17BJL108).