SKOKAN KAREL, ZOTYKOVÁ LUCIE. 2014. Evaluation of Business Cluster Performance During Its Lifecycle. Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis, 62(6): 1395-1405. Business clusters as geographic groupings of fi rms and other organizations and associated institutions are for more than two decades considered to be the effi cient instrument in regional and industrial policies which enable to increase the innovation and competitiveness of fi rms and other institutions

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... regions. The assessment of their benefi ts and performance is an issue o en discussed in professional literature with various approaches. The composition and structure of clusters develop during their lifecycle from establishment to maturity or decay and diff erent parts of fi rms in cluster contribute to cluster results in a variety of ways. The main aim of paper is to design a methodology for evaluation of business cluster performance during its lifecycle based on cluster analysis and time series analysis of business clusters and to reveal which parts of clusters called sub-clusters exert the decisive impact on business indicators by which the performance may be measured and to predict the future development of cluster and its parts. The methodology is verifi ed on the case of the Czech machinery cluster with the longest life time in the Czech Republic. The results show that development of cluster is signifi cantly aff ected by its structure and by performance of fi rms in sub-clusters.