Entrepreneurial renewal in a peripheral region: the case of a winter automotive-testing cluster in Sweden

This research paper generates new insights into renewal processes that may occur in peripheral regions. Key findings are presented from an explorative study on a regionally clustered automotive-testing industry, located in northern Sweden. The findings suggest that despite theoretically unfavourable conditions it is possible to progress regional industry after a peripheral setting's socio-economic relapses. Moreover, this research shows how, notwithstanding the importance of profitable service offerings, an entrepreneurial environment can be encouraged within a peripheral region and subsequent renewal achieved by <italic>advancing local networks</italic>, <italic>improving internationalization</italic> and <italic>enhancing local infrastructures</italic> related to a service-based regional industry. Consequently this research offers us a glimpse into a pioneering service-based renewal case which, in essence, differs from previously reported entrepreneurship scholarship.