The Growth Of Smes In The Cluster Study

According to the experience of many developed and developing countries in recent years, small and medium-sized firms are playing a more and more important role in economy development which might be compared with large enterprises'. Many nations begin to take much of the fact to accelerate the growth of small and medium-firms. Although small and medium-firms have the advantage of agility, they are also faced with the disadvantage of small scale, weak strength and deficient resources. Industrial cluster has been a hot subject of many researchers since 1980s. Many healthy and fast-growing small and medium-firms are located in certain cluster. So it's necessary to study the growth of small and medium-firms in cluster.The article has reviewed the theory of cluster and firm growth, analyzed how clusters' advantages help firms acquire resources and improve their abilities, and established an overall frame of small and medium-firms' growth in cluster according to the resource based review. On the grounds of Penrose's theory of firm growth, we utilize the logic of "resources—capabilities—firm growth" to analyze the growth mechanism of small and medium-firms in cluster. Firstly, since the cluster network expands the way how firms acquire resources, we analyze separately the new ways for firms in cluster to acquire human resources, material resources, financial resources and organizational resources. We also discuss the effect of cluster advantages in helping firms integrate and utilize these external resources. Secondly, we analyze separately the mechanism of how clusters' advantages help firms improve their abilities in technique, finance, production and marketing. Thirdly, we discuss the importance of the ruling factor—entrepreneur in firm growth. Finally, we propose the theoretical framework of firm growth in industrial clusters dependent on clusters' advantages. And the paper concludes by some enlightening to help small- and medium-firms' growth in industrial clusters choose right strategy to grow steadily.Our research mainly uses normative and qualitative method. The concluding model...