Collaboration spaces in Canadian biotechnology: A search for gatekeepers

The paper studies the network of Canadian biotechnology co-inventors and compares the structure of the links between inventors within, and outside of, the cluster. Two types of proximity between individuals are compared: within cluster co-invention refers to geographical proximity while co-patenting links (network component) represent social proximity between inventors of an epistemic community. We show that the cluster-based subnetworks are more fragmented and less centralized than the network components. The paper then proposes two indicators measuring an inventor's importance as a gatekeeper, i.e. an individual at the cluster's frontier responsible for the inflow of the external knowledge to the cluster.