Synergy evaluation in economic clusters

The aim of this work is to specify, accept or reject a priori assumption of a positive synergy in economic cluster development, to propose à quantitative assessment of synergy and à description of the interaction process among enterprises in the cluster. There are presented arguments in support of the assumption that the cluster can be considered as an economic system. The synergy effects are summarized and described as superadditive and subadditive functions of expenses and revenues. The interaction process among enterprises in the cluster is described by a thermodynamic approach to the costs analysis of the economic systems development and an introduced condition for positive synergy realization. As a quantitative measure of synergy effect is used the concept of entropy. The proposed experimental solution demonstrates the application of presented approach, its possible analytical interpretations and predictability potential for positive or negative synergy realization.