THE CAMBRIDGE PHENOMENON: IS IT SILICON FEN?

The “Cambridge Phenomenon” was a term coined by the firm of Segal, Quince and Wicksteed (SQW) in 1986 to describe the mushrooming of more than 300 high-technology firms in the Cambridge area, after the Cambridge Science Park received its first occupant in 1976. This number has increased steadily through the 1990s and more than tripled in 1999. By the end of 1999, the number of high-tech establishments had grown to 959 in all, employing more than 31,000 people. In terms of its economic impact on the region, the Cambridge area accounted for 60% of all high-tech establishments and more than 70% of all high-tech employment in Cambridgeshire County.

Cambridge has also developed an array of institutions, university-industry links, and local technology venture capital that has favored and sought to nurture entrepreneurship in science-based industries. In these institutional developments, Cambridge is unique of all the other information technology (IT) clusters that followed in the wake of Silicon Valley's success. No other European region has shown the same scale of entrepreneurial activity in science-based sectors as Cambridge or can boast the emergence of similar institutions without any state intervention. Furthermore, the University of Cambridge has been a key player in these institutional developments. These qualitative features of the growth of Cambridge have prompted several comparisons with Silicon Valley.