Clusters in global innovation

Good news

The good news, if you are local, is that Silicon Valley cannot be replicated. Not for lack of trying, mind you; lots of countries and regions have poured resources into this idea. Professor Josh Lerner of HBS has an interesting book on this topic - Boulevard of Broken Dreams: Why Public Efforts to Boost Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Have Failed--and What to Do About It.

In the US alone, there are the Silicon Corridor around Route 128 about Boston, Massachusetts, the Silicon Alley of New York City, New York, Silicon Forest of Seattle, Washington, and Silicon Hills of Austin, Texas. All the same, Silicon Valley has the singular noteriety in the public imagination and, more objectively, it consistently pulled in the highest amount of VC funding for new ventures around the world.

Bad news

Lest people get too smug in the San Francisco Bay area, it is also worth noting that anything that has not had an overwhelming geek component, Silicon Valley does not seem to have an inherent advantage.

For example, the recent wave of social buying firms that has gotten the tech world buzzing are not based in Silicon Valley - GroupOn is based in Chicago, Illinois and Gilt's headquarters is in New York City, New York. Even Google's much venerated advertising supported business model came from Overture in the decided "low-tech" Los Angeles, CA according to Mark Suster http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/twitter-101/.

Looking across the Pacific ocean, Silicon Valley has nothing on mobile handset hardware technology compared to Asia. As anyone who has studied it can tell you, Apple's iPhone is indeed an iconic product, but it is not because Apple is a mobile hardware powerhouse.

The real news

Point by point and in isolation, one could make a plausible case that Silicon Valley is not the best place in the world for a given innovation. On the other hand, with the combination of ethnic diversity, employment, overlapping clusters, and other ecosystems, Silicon Valley still offers the most complete package for disruptive innovation.

As long as you remember that technical geeks suck at shopping.