From hub-airport to hub-office: New focal points of multiscalar knowledge generation. The case of Amsterdam-Schiphol and Frankfurt Rhine-Main

Accessibility is the prerequisite of today's globalised, knowledge-driven, and networked economies. Moreover, accessibility and good transportation linkages are the key to and a focus for sustained real estate developments. Where accessibility is the highest and agglomeration advantages can unfold their positive cumulative causation, the likelihood increases that people meet other people: interacting, exchanging information, learning from each others successes and failures, and eventually generating new knowledge through personal interactions. Not long ago, Amsterdam and Frankfurt airports were considered purely infrastructural facilities. This situation is changing, and increasingly both airports resemble urban entities. Within this transformation of the airports, the knowledge economy has proved to be a major driver. Findings show that knowledge-intensive companies make strategic use of the location and the hub competence of the airport by installing a highly accessible 'hub office' within their internal office hierarchy.