Digital Technology and Value Chain Agglomeration: Evidence from East Asia

Digital technology reshapes the value chain (VC), driving value chain agglomeration (VCA). This study conducted an analysis of East Asia using a data factor flow model. The findings highlight that data researcher flow facilitates VCA while data capital flow restrains it, thus producing a VCA structure with duality. Moreover, the influence of digital technology on VCA is heterogeneous at national and industrial levels. Furthermore, the mechanism analysis employing the cross-term method shows that commodity trade intensity and trade cost have a positive role in data researcher flow on VCA, while regionalization impels the influence of data capital flow on VCA. In this case, the study provides useful insights for breaking the duality of East Asian value chain agglomeration (EAVCA) and offers empirical evidence for emerging economies to strengthen digital-driven development and achieve VC climbing by utilizing EAVCA.