Intercity Innovation Collaboration and Catch‐Up of Laggard Cities

ABSTRACT Does intercity innovation collaboration contribute to the catch‐up of laggard cities? We study this question in China and show that intercity innovation collaboration helps laggard cities catch up with frontier cities. Core technological capability improvement is an important underlying mechanism. However, the role of intercity innovation collaboration in catching up varies according to the partner chosen. Collaboration with frontier cities is more important for laggard cities to close the gap with the frontier than collaboration with other laggard cities. Furthermore, we show that intercity innovation collaboration widens the gap between laggard cities close to the frontier and those further from the frontier, with important implications for innovation disparities.