Abstract
Spatial Characteristics of IPO Firms
Track: Business GIS
Author(s): Avijit Sarkar, Satish Thosar
Two competing hypotheses about decision variables driving a firm’s location decision have been tested. First a centrifugal argument anchored in the globalization phenomenon, implying that with lowered costs of communication, firms’ location decisions are driven by costs of labor, commercially zoned real estate, taxes, etc., a view represented by Thomas Friedman’s bestseller: The World is Flat. The second, a centripetal argument, maintains firms tend to cluster in areas offering intangible benefits including social and networking opportunities, access to centers of research and innovation, etc. as advanced by Richard Florida in his recent book: Who’s Your City?
Testing these competing hypotheses, by examining the spatial characteristics of US-based firms that issued initial public offerings (IPOs), lends initial support for the centripetal hypothesis. Tapestry segment analysis for four San Francisco-area counties demonstrates that location decisions for many IPO firms are guided by deeper and more nuanced considerations than just factor input costs.
Avijit Sarkar
University of Redlands - School of Business
1200 E. Colton Avenue
Redlands , California 92373
United States
Phone: 909-748-8783
E-mail: avijit_sarkar@redlands.edu
Satish Thosar
University of Redlands School of Business
PO Box 3080
Redlands , California 92373
United States
Phone: 909-748-8787
E-mail: satish_thosar@redlands.edu