Clusters create growth

Norway is made up of small and medium-sized enterprises. We can nevertheless compete well internationally through collaboration in clusters.

This is what Anita Krohn Traaseth, managing director of Innovation Norway says.

She believes that the clusters are of decisive importance to developing the competitiveness of Norwegian trade and industry. 

“International trends, such as a green transition, digitalisation and globalisation trigger the need for transformation through renewal and innovation. Many of the new challenges require access to expertise and resources that are located beyond the enterprises’ existing business areas. The clusters therefore play an important role in establishing new cross-linked collaborations to trigger expert knowledge and innovation projects.” 

Cluster enterprises perform better
Krohn Traaseth sees a clear correlation between clusters and value creation.

“In collaboration with Statistics Norway, we systematically compare value creation in the cluster enterprises with a representative selection of enterprises that are not members of a cluster. The cluster enterprises show significantly better development with regard to growth in the number of employees, revenues and value creation,” she says.

Good relations is a success factor in clustering. The innovation manager thinks that Western Norway has particularly good conditions, since the business community in the petroleum and maritime sectors has broad experience of collaborating in well-functioning supplier networks.

“This also means a lot when the companies need to change. It will be exciting to see if the more traditional Western Norway clusters can use their expertise in new areas and thus accept even more national responsibility,” says Krohn Traaseth.

Fintech has growth potential
The fintech cluster is one of the latest additions to the “Norwegian Innovation Cluster” programme. Seven of the Norwegian industry clusters are located in the Bergen region. 

“When selecting new clusters, we are focused on their growth potential. Capabilities, willingness and driving forces are important with respect to value-creating collaboration. It is conceivable that Bergen has a proximity and also a size that make the conditions for meeting these criteria particularly good.”

What will a fintech cluster mean to Norway and the region in the future?
“I see good opportunities for taking an international position.Norway has a very digital population, and this provides an extra advantage. National collaboration must be developed in enterprising and technologically strong fintech environments, financial institutions that are open to collaboration and have good access to capital. We think Finance Innovation represents this,” says Anita Krohn Traaseth.