Bio-clusters have been established in Korea since the late 1990s, with active efforts to foster the national bio-industry beginning in the early 2000s. This study examines the effects of Korean bio-cluster characteristics and open innovation activities on the innovation performance of biopharmaceutical firms to explore future development directions for these clusters. In this study, innovation performance is proxied by firms’ sales revenue (log-transformed) as a financial outcome of innovation activities. The analysis utilized 400 survey responses collected from 2015 to 2021 from the annual "Bio industry Status Survey" conducted by the Korea Biotechnology Industry Organization. Bio-clusters were classified into government-led planned clusters and private sector-led clusters to reflect their distinct characteristics. The results reveal that open innovation activities do not uniformly affect all bio-clusters but show positive effects specifically in government-led clusters. Furthermore, technological cooperation activities positively impact innovation performance in government-led clusters, while non-technological cooperation activities demonstrate positive effects in private sector-led clusters. These findings confirm that the factors related to open innovation activities affecting company performance vary according to bio-cluster characteristics. Although open innovation activities can enhance firm performance within bio-clusters, their effectiveness differs across cluster types, indicating that uniform approaches may not be optimal. Based on these findings, this study proposes differentiated strategies for the future development of domestic bio-clusters and derives practical implications for enhancing business success and competitiveness of firms within these clusters. The research contributes valuable insights supporting the qualitative advancement and competitive strengthening of Korean bio-clusters through evidence-based development strategies tailored to specific cluster characteristics.
Lee et al. (Sun,) studied this question.