The taskforce were already familiar with SE's clusters strategy and the evidence that clusters can drive economic development. However, over the last two years SE has given greater priority to the potential for supporting clusters in the Scottish economy and there are now four pilots in Oil and Gas, Food, Semi-conductors and Biotechnology nearing completion. These are designed to test how the 'community' in each of these clusters could undertake a series of related actions to substantially grow the clusters over the years ahead. The taskforce was aware that Scotland has been in the vanguard of promoting clustering as a very practical tool to strengthen and deepen our major industries. The basic theory is that clustering offers a method whereby companies can form highly beneficial relationships with other businesses, their suppliers, and the wider community, particularly research and education.
Strong clusters promote innovation and enhance the performance of individual companies.
Indeed, success may arise from how the cluster as a whole performs rather than how individual companies perform. Such companies, of course, further strengthen the cluster. The taskforce also accepted that growing clusters exert a strong locational 'pull'. For example, over the past decade, a significant percentage of manufacturing inward invest-ment in Scotland has been in IT related industries. The existence of the IT cluster in Scotland is one of the major reasons why such com-panies now locate in Scotland.