Small firms are often viewed as the remedy of regional development and growth, but there is little empirical evidence if the cluster of innovative small firms thrives regional innovation performance. This paper attempts to answer a timely policy question of “How vital is small-firm dominated ecology for regional innovation?” by investigating the mix of firm size within a region. The results find that the effect of the proportion of small firms in a region is nonlinearly associated with the regional innovation activity, proposing that a mix-model of large and SME firms induces more innovation commercialization. The results of this study shed some light for policymakers to assess the “knowledge searching” strategies of firms when choosing locations.

中文翻译：

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小企业主导的生态对区域创新的影响

小企业通常被认为是区域发展和增长的良方，但是很少有经验证据证明创新型小企业集群能否促进区域创新绩效。本文试图回答一个及时的政策问题：“小企业主导的生态对于区域创新有多重要？” 通过调查区域内企业规模的组合。结果发现，一个区域中小企业比例的影响与区域创新活动是非线性相关的，这表明大型和中小型企业的混合模型会引发更多的创新商业化。这项研究的结果为决策者在选择地点时评估公司的“知识搜索”策略提供了一些启示。