Advanced manufacturing cluster is the advanced form of deepening industrial division of labor and agglomeration development, and is the main symbol of high quality development of manufacturing industry. In recent years, our country accelerated the implementation of the development of advanced manufacturing industry clusters special action, the selection of “horse race”, the national cluster development has become an important strength leading to the development of regional manufacturing industry of high quality, improve industrial competitiveness.

Building world-class advanced manufacturing clusters has become a powerful means for major countries to achieve rapid economic growth, cultivate new economic advantages and enhance international competitiveness. The 14th Five-Year Plan and the 2035 Vision Target outline call for fostering advanced manufacturing clusters and promoting innovative development in several industries, such as integrated circuits and aerospace. Facing the intricate international situation and the need to construct the dual-cycle development pattern, it is of great significance to build advanced manufacturing clusters for our country’s high-quality economic development.
First, basic connotation

Advanced manufacturing cluster refers to the complex network structure and industrial organization form formed by a large number of geographically adjacent enterprises and institutions through mutual cooperation and communication in the field of advanced technology, process and manufacturing industry on the basis of the general characteristics of industrial clusters. It is the advanced form of deepening industrial division of labor and agglomeration development, and the main symbol of high-quality development of manufacturing industry. It has the following characteristics.

Strong comprehensive strength: It has formed a larger industrial scale and market share around the leading industries, and has a large number of first-class leading enterprises in the industry and specialized small and medium-sized enterprises. It is in the forefront in the aspects of industry standards, brand building and enterprise management.

Advanced innovation system: An innovation ecosystem composed of core enterprises and research institutes should be established to form a sound technology innovation system around advanced manufacturing, quality standards, management, operation and maintenance technologies, effectively promote cluster knowledge learning and technology spillover, and lead the direction of technological change.

Efficient industrial network: it can effectively realize economies of scale and scope. Under the adsorption effect of leading enterprises, a vertical division of labor system can be formed, which is led by chain master enterprises and closely coordinated with upstream and downstream specialized small and medium enterprises, making the industrial chain and supply chain more flexible and resilient.

Open development mode: development space and urban functional space are highly coupled, cluster evolution and regional urbanization interact and coexist, with diverse, open and inclusive cluster culture. By tapping the cross-domain development potential of clusters, technology locking and path dependence can be prevented.

Innovative governance mechanism: taking the whole cluster organization network as the governance object, various formal or informal endogenous coordination mechanisms are formed on the basis of mutual trust and interaction among cluster members, with spontaneous governance as the primary and public governance as the secondary to maximize the overall benefits of the cluster.

Second, foreign experience for reference

At present, major developed countries in the world have built a number of advanced manufacturing clusters with their own characteristics, such as Silicon Valley in the United States, Route 128 in Boston, Munich Industrial Belt, Ruhr Region, Stuttgart in Germany, M4 corridor in the United Kingdom, etc., with unique advantages in talent, innovation, internal and external collaboration, new models and new forms of business, integration of industry, university and research.

The United States attaches great importance to cluster construction. In August 2009, it put forward the “American Innovation Strategy”. In 2010, it put forward three regional innovation cluster plans, namely, the energy regional innovation cluster plan, the Work Accelerator cooperation cluster plan and the regional innovation cluster plan, to support the construction of 56 innovation clusters. The US Department of Commerce, the US Small Business Administration and other departments have promoted the development of industrial clusters by establishing industrial cluster development funds, formulating regional innovation cluster plans and industrial cluster mapping plans. In addition, the United States is actively building a multi-sector collaboration mechanism, a dynamic financial environment, and a shared information platform. For example, in terms of collaborative promotion mechanisms, take the Energy Regional Innovation Cluster Initiative as an example. The initiative is led by the US Department of Energy, with the participation of the US Economic Development Administration, the US Small Business Administration, the US National Institute of Standards and Technology, the US Department of Labor, the US Department of Education, and the US National Science Foundation. Various departments work together to promote the development of clusters from different perspectives.

Germany also attaches great importance to cluster development. From the implementation of bioregional plan in 1995 to the leading cluster competition plan in 2007 and towards Cluster plan in 2012, cluster strategy has been promoted as an important part of top-level design. A “trinity” national strategic system has been formed, which is represented by technology revolution represented by high-tech strategy, industrial revolution represented by industry 4.0 and organizational revolution represented by cluster strategy. At the same time, Germany has established a hierarchical governance system, promoted the selection of high-level clusters, and strengthened the networked division of labor and cooperation among clusters. For example, Germany’s cluster policies can be generally divided into four categories. The first category focuses on a single industry. For example, the bioregional plan aims to promote the industrialization of biotechnology. The second type mainly focuses on regional coordination. For example, the eastern cluster management plan is committed to cultivating and expanding the eastern industrial cluster. The third type focuses on innovative development. For example, the innovation competitiveness cluster plan advocates cross-industry and cross-region collaborative innovation development. The fourth type mainly focuses on cluster cooperation, such as the “towards cluster” plan to support inter-regional cooperation.

Iii. Domestic development status

In recent years, the country accelerated the implementation of special action on the development of advanced manufacturing industry clusters, adopted the “horse race” selection method, organized three rounds of advanced manufacturing industry cluster competition, a total of 60 preliminary winning clusters, 25 clusters won in the first two rounds of cluster final, as a key cultivation object. Driven by the cluster competition, 13 provinces and cities, including Jiangsu, Guangdong and Henan, issued policy documents to support the cultivation and development of clusters. Hunan, Zhejiang, Hebei and other places also actively organized the provincial cluster competition, the national cluster competition. By September 2022, nearly 100 individual champion enterprises and thousands of specialized and new small giant enterprises have gathered in 25 key advanced manufacturing clusters. Nearly 50% of the national manufacturing innovation center, cross-industry and cross-field industrial Internet platform, industrial Internet identity analysis secondary nodes in the key cluster layout construction; In the first half of 2022, its output value reached 6.2 trillion yuan, an increase of 6.1% over the same period in 2021. It has become an important force leading and driving the high-quality development of regional manufacturing industry and enhancing industrial competitiveness.

4. Future Development trend

Clustered forms of organization will accelerate change. At present, Chinese advanced manufacturing cluster is dominated by government management or dispatch agency (administrative committee), and the promotion of cluster development has not received enough attention. In order to accelerate the organizational reform of advanced manufacturing clusters and cultivate world-class advanced manufacturing clusters, it is necessary to innovate the cluster governance mechanism which is dominated by spontaneous governance and supplemented by public governance, so as to enhance the new competitive advantages of clusters.

Embeddedness and openness will work together. In the future, the advanced manufacturing cluster will break through the administrative boundary and finish some specific links outside the cluster on the basis of the core links being rooted in the local, constantly pay attention to the improvement of the supporting environment of the whole industry, accelerate the cultivation and shaping of the culture of the regional cluster, and then continue to improve its own core competence while absorbing external high value resources, to shape the competitiveness different from other industrial clusters.

The building of an internal innovation collaboration network will be accelerated. In the future, advanced manufacturing clusters not only need a high concentration of industry, technology, talent, capital and other factors, but also need to maintain the free and efficient operation of information and resources in the network, and each member will form a highly specialized division of labor in the industrial chain, innovation chain and value chain. As a core node to promote multilateral contacts and mutually beneficial cooperation, cluster cooperation institutions will provide a bridge for cooperation and communication among members, lead members to initiate cluster motions and take collective actions, so as to improve collective efficiency.