A Method for Identifying Actors in a Knowledge Based Cluster

The objective of the paper is to develop a method through which we can identify the actors (industrial, institutional and individual) who are active in technology development in the same or similar knowledge fields. The paper is, thus, aimed to make a methodological contribution to the literature, which has emerged on the systemic nature of innovation. The method involves broadening out from a starting point in a specific patent class, which corresponds as closely as possibly to the technological area of interest, to a set of related patent classes by using co-classifications and citations. After close scrutiny of both patent classes and patents, the actors in the new classes, as well as in the original class, are then identified. We try out the method on radio wave antennas for communication technology in Sweden. We find a range of firms and other actors in a whole set of industries, which bear little relation to one another in an input-output sense. Although we cannot ascertain the extent of linkages or relations between these actors, our hypothesis is that they constitute a cluster around radio wave antenna technology in Sweden.