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The purpose of this article is to investigate the engineering of creative urban regions through knowledge‐based urban development. In recent years city administrators realised the importance of engineering and orchestrating knowledge city formation through visioning and planning for economic, socio‐cultural and physical development. For that purpose a new development paradigm of “knowledge‐based urban development” is formed, and quickly finds implementation ground in many parts of the globe.

The paper reviews the literature and examines global best practice experiences in order to determine how cities are engineering their creative urban regions so as to establish a base for knowledge city formation.

The paper sheds light on the different development approaches for creative urban regions, and concludes with recommendations for urban administrations planning for knowledge‐based development of creative urban regions.

The paper provides invaluable insights and discussion on the vital role of planning for knowledge‐based urban development of creative urban regions.

Entrepreneurship, in many low-resilient economies, plays a critical role in overcoming external shocks. Thus, it is crucial in such situation that entrepreneurial firms can survive and even grow so that the whole economy can benefit from a higher level of resilience. The purpose of this study is to understand how entrepreneurial orientation (EO) brings about firms' performance through the moderating role of CEOs' self-transcendence values in the context of a low-resilient sanctioned economy.

This is a quantitative research that employs hierarchical regression analysis of a sample of 114 Iranian entrepreneurial firms composed of 62 knowledge-based and 52 creative firms.

The analysis revealed that in the low-resilient sanctioned economy, Iran, EO-performance link is moderated by the level of CEOs' self-transcendence value, that is, higher level of CEO self-transcendence leads to stronger impact of EO on performance. This moderation is not different in creative sector vs. knowledge-based sector of the economy.

This paper addresses a major gap in the traditional EO-performance relationship which is related to the role of CEO values. Also, the context of Iran's low level of economic resilience adds more novelty to this study, emphasizing on the role of CEO personal values of self-transcendence in times of crisis. The results could also be generalized in many economies now facing the COVID-19 pandemic crisis during which CEOs' self-transcendence values are vitally important in overcoming the difficulties of doing business in such situation.

During the last decade, intellectual capital (IC) has been widely considered as a critical tool to deliver successful business in an intensive knowledge environment. The main goal of this paper is therefore to develop and prioritize human capital indicators as an important component of IC in knowledge-based industries.

Based on an extensive literature review, a valid and reliable questionnaire was designed. In order to gather data, it was sent out to 108 participants from academia and universities who were well qualified in pharmaceutical practice. Besides statistical analysis, the authors also used fuzzy TOPSIS technique as a MADM model in order to extract prioritization of indicators.

The analysis indicates that there is little difference between academic and university respondents. Furthermore, the fuzzy TOPSIS results show that participants have high concerns especially about knowledge and skills of managers and employees.

The findings offer valuable insights in evaluating the state of human capital state as a key component of IC in knowledge- based industry.

There is an immediate need that the policy makers and corporate managers wake up to the need and start to measure and disclose the intangible assets of firms. Intellectual capital measurement is also of primary interest for top executives of pharmaceutical firms in Iran.

This is an initial and pioneering study to develop a valid tool to evaluate IC in the Iranian pharmaceutical industry. The present study provides a new aspect of performance measurement for research-based industries in emerging economies and would be a good topic for further research.

As it becomes increasingly evident that skills shortage in many areas of business and commerce is likely to grow, it is clear that knowledge‐based systems can go some way towards replacing human resources. The use of these systems also increases the productivity and effectiveness of already experienced personnel and also brings with it consistent standards of performance and reliability. A better balance is also achievable between the tasks done by employees and those performed by machines.

This paper aims to assess the contribution of competitiveness factors in how small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) would access competitive advantage (CA) by focussing on industry structure and devise a conceptual model thereof.

The enterprises from three industries consisting of knowledge-based, single-use medical device producers and construction stone cutting each with different structures were assessed. The method is qualitative and quantitative where grounded theory and exploratory factor analysis (EFA) are applied. The initial survey involves 36 deep semi-structured interviews with some of the top managers of each of the three selected industries and a questionnaire distributed among 158 individuals with 46 structured questions.

The findings indicate that the micro-competitiveness factors are more contributive in achieving CA than macro factors as follows: in knowledge-based enterprises, customer relationship management (CRM), goods/services features and knowledge management are the most important variables. As to single-use medical device production industry, the sales force, sales promotion, and CRM are the most effective factors. Regarding construction stone-cutting industry, quality of the stone, sales promotion, and advertisement play the same role. The results of the EFA indicate that the three impressive factors, including capabilities of the enterprises, strategies of the enterprises and macro factors, are the extracted factors.

The findings here would assist SMEs’ managers in identifying the most essential factors in accessing CA.

The innovation of this study is that although there exist many studies on SMEs and their CAs, this study seeks the models of CA among SMEs in industries with different structures.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of specific variables, that are strategic orientations, organizational model and prior acquisitions experience, in the management of acquisitions that are not motivated exclusively by financial objectives.

Multiple cases have been developed, selecting frequent acquirers and analysing the dynamics of acquisitions implementation. Within‐case analysis was aimed at describing the acquisition and integration processes experienced by the selected firms, identifying the role of the researched variables in each phase and their impact on the acquisition outcomes. Thereafter, cross‐case analysis was used to look for the presence of similarities across multiple cases. The organizational characteristics under investigation are proposed as hallmarks of the effective acquirer in knowledge‐intensive industries.

Characteristics such as the market orientation, the entrepreneurial orientation, the organizational model, the experience in acquisitions management and the investments in knowledge codification emerged from the cases as critical in managing acquisitions that are mainly motivated by the need of the acquirer to have access to knowledge‐based resources of the target.

The paper gives a contribution to the debate going on in literature about the role of new variables in explaining the acquisitions success or failure and the non‐financial motives for acquisitions. It tries to bring the expertise showed by certain firms in managing acquisitions in knowledge‐based industries to specific and, until now, under‐researched features that characterize them. The main limitation of the study is the generalizability of the developed framework, due to the bounded number and the nature of case studies. All the examined firms operate in the field of IT services and all the considered acquisitions are horizontal.

Even if literature has long emphasized the need to prioritize the multiple aspects of the acquisition process and discussed the role of multiple variables in explaining the variance in acquisitions outcomes, empirical research has not completely identified the antecedents of the acquisitions performance and has traditionally overlooked the non‐financial motives for acquisitions. This study focuses on high‐tech industries, where acquisitions are motivated mainly by motives other than financial, and investigates the role of specific and under‐researched characteristics of the acquirer firms.

This paper aims to present an approach to the knowledge‐based economy that focuses on the developmental synergies between technology (especially information and communication technologies), culture and place (hub) as expressed in the innovative milieu of the inner city.

This paper draws on research in city and urban planning, which emphasizes the importance of quality of a place, location or city and the more intentional emphasis given to development of human and cultural resources, which are conducive to innovation, learning, creativity and change in a knowledge‐based economy.

Singapore is chosen as a case study of analysis for a knowledge‐based economy in transition because of its developmental approach and strategic shift from one focused on technology‐intensive sectors to one focused on high knowledge‐intensive companies and towards a free‐spirited dynamic creative hub in the making. It displays many characteristics typical of a knowledge‐based economy in which people, their ideas and capabilities are the key sources of wealth and opportunities.

The paper observes a missing link in the transition from technology to knowledge to culture hub, which might have implications for Singapore's effort towards establishing itself as a cultural industries metropolis, a renaissance city using culture to re‐position its international image as a global city for the arts.

The originality and value of the paper lie in this analysis, which makes one conclude that, although Singapore's developmental model had created benefits in many ways, it had also negatively constrained its development, particularly in the area of knowledge creation and application to entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity.

The creation and distribution of human capital, often termed talent, has been recognised in economic geography as an important factor in the locational decisions of firms (Florida, 2002), and at a more general level as a key driver of economic growth (Romer, 1990). The purpose of this paper is to consider how talent is created and distributed across the cities of the UK and the key factors which are driving this spatial distribution. They also consider what the economic outcomes of these disparities are for cities.

The multivariate models can estimate the dynamic inter-relationships between human capital (talent), innovative capacity, and economic value added. These can be estimated, using talent as an example, in the form: human capital measure_i =α_0i+α_1i innovative capacity +α_2i quality of life + α_3i labour market indicators + α_4i economic indicators + α_5i HEI indicators + β_6i population demographics + β_7i population + υ_i.

The first finding is that talent is unequally distributed across cities, with some having three times more highly educated workers than others. Talent concentration at the city level is associated with entrepreneurial activity, culture, the presence of a university, and to a lesser degree the housing market. This feeds into more knowledge-based industry, which is associated with higher gross value added.

The research is limited in a practical sense by the fact that UK data at this level have only become available quite recently. Thus, it is only possible to capture talent flows and city growth in a relatively small window. But the prospects going forward will allow more detailed analysis at the city level of the relationship between talent flows and local economic growth. And additional insights could be considered relating to the on-going changes in the UK university system.

The question of whether universities are simply producers of talent or play a much broader and deeper role in the socio-economic landscape and outcomes of cities is an open one. This research has identified what the key drivers of city level economic growth and knowledge creation are, and sought to explain why some cities are capable of attracting and harnessing three times more talent than other cities. This has significant implications for the future development of UK cities and for those seeking to address these imbalances.

Universities are a major economic agent in their own right, but they are increasingly being asked to play a wider role in local economic development. The authors’ evidence suggests that universities do play a wider role in the growth and development of cities, but that there are large discrepancies in the subsequent spatial distribution of the talent they create. And this has significant implications for those seeking to address these imbalances and promote a broader and less unequal economic landscape.

The authors explore how cities create economic value via a process whereby talent is attracted and then this stimulates knowledge-based industry activity. The originality relates to several key aspects of the work. First, the authors look at the stock of talent, and then the authors explore how “new” talent from universities is attracted by looking at graduate flows around the cities of the UK, differentiating between top-level graduates and less talented graduates. The authors then allow a wide variety of economic, cultural, and population factors to influence the locational decision of talented people. The results highlight the complexity of this decision.

Recent empirical findings on the relationship between internationalization and firm performance (I–P) suggest a significant role of firm's context. Extending this line of argument, the authors study the effect of internationalization on firm's performance for emerging market firms from knowledge-intensive industries, taking into account the firm's motive of internationalization and host country’s location-based advantages.

The authors link host country-specific advantages (CSAs) with firm-specific advantages (FSAs) to identify three distinct settings of internationalization for emerging economy firms – (1) asset-exploitative internationalization in developing or least developed countries, (2) asset-exploitative internationalization in developed countries and (3) strategic asset-seeking internationalization. The authors test this study’s hypotheses on a sample of 415 Indian firms from knowledge-intensive industries.

The authors find that firm's performance upon internationalization is non-linear in each of the three different settings. The nature of the non-linear relationship depends upon location-based advantages of the host country and the motive of internationalization.

The motive of internationalization and the location-based advantages sought during internationalization are unique for emerging economy firms. Hence, the study extends understanding of the I–P linkage in an emerging economy context.

Research on corporate entrepreneurship (CE) has grown rapidly over the past decade (for reviews, see Dess et al., 2003). This interest in CE stems from rising international competition, requiring companies to learn new skills and develop new competencies (Eisemhardt & Santos, 2003). These competencies enable companies to compete in new market arenas both at home and internationally, creating value for shareholders (McGrath, MacMillan & Venkataraman, 1995). With more and more companies focusing on international expansion, recent research on CE has focused on examining international issues. Though most past research is comparative in nature, some has investigated companies’ international expansion as a forum within which CE activities unfold (Zahra & Garvis, 2000).