Benchmarking urban competitiveness in Europe to attract investment

The current context of the global economy and a shortage of capital is putting cities all over the world under great pressure and increasing competition between them. The competitive position of a city does not remain stable over time: it changes due to both internal and external factors such as the appearance of new technologies, new competitors and changes in the preferences and desires of its target groups. Cities therefore need to understand the strengths and weaknesses that influence not just their own ability to compete but also that of their competitors. This paper seeks to benchmark the competitiveness of European cities as locations for businesses and in terms of their ability to attract investment. Urban competitiveness is a complex, multidimensional issue, so a scale of measurement has been created based on a synthetic index called the Urban Competitiveness Index (UCI), which comprises various sub-indices representing its various dimensions. In the present study we focus on the basic dimension, the efficiency dimension and the innovation dimension. The study covers 159 cities located in 26 European Union countries.