The geography of green entrepreneurship: Regional capabilities and the rise of new green technology-based firms

The emergence of New Green Technology-Based Firms (NGTBFs) is geographically uneven and identifying the regional conditions that support their formation remains a key challenge for both scholars and policymakers. This paper examines whether and to what extent Green Relatedness Density shapes the emergence of NGTBFs across EU NUTS-3 regions over the period 2000–2015. Drawing on patent data from the EPO PATSTAT database, we construct a novel panel dataset on NGTBFs and compute Green Relatedness Density to capture the coherence of regional technological structures underpinning green innovation. The results show a significant and consistently positive association between Green Relatedness Density and NGTBFs formation. Estimates also reveal significant spatial spillovers across neighbouring regions, while further analyses show a stronger association in the period following the Great Recession. These findings have direct implications for the design of spatially coordinated green transition strategies across the EU.