Characteristics of High-Technology Industry Migration within Metropolitan Areas—A Case Study of Beijing Metropolitan Area

Industrial migration is a hot topic in economic geography. This study traces the migratory process of key high-tech enterprises in Beijing during 2008–2016, revealing the migratory characteristics and patterns of high-tech enterprises within the metropolitan area by using spatial analysis methods and mathematical statistics. The results show that: (1) Migrating enterprises are mainly mixed-ownership and foreign-funded or privately-owned enterprises. Medium-sized enterprises are more likely to relocate than small and large enterprises, especially in lucrative sectors. (2) The migration of high-tech enterprises is mainly based on proximity migration. More than 77.19% of enterprises tend to move to agglomerations or agglomeration expansion areas such as Jiuxianqiao and the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (BDA) in Daxing District. In addition, 33 enterprises experience varying degrees of scale expansion after relocation. (3) Most high-tech manufacturing enterprises are in the growth stage of their life cycle. They initially relocate between 7 and 16 years after their establishment, which means that there is roughly a 7-year adaptation or development period for firms within a region after their establishment. During the adaptation period, companies do not tend to relocate; afterwards, as they grow, they need to find other spaces in which to do so. For reasons such as familiarity with the environment, enterprises give priority to finding new locations within the agglomeration and the surrounding area. These results deepen the understanding of the temporal and spatial characteristics of the migration of enterprises within the city from the microscopic perspective and provide a scientific basis for the optimization of industrial space in a metropolis.