Position of five new urban centers in Shanghai from the perspective of corporate networks

Under the background of Shanghai's strategy to step up efforts to develop the five new urban centers in the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration, the construction of new urban centers has entered the stage of building comprehensive node cites (CNCs). Nevertheless, it is not clear whether the five new urban centers are suburban satellite cities or CNCs. Based on the headquarter-branch linkages of whole industrial enterprises in 2001, 2010 and 2018, this study built a directed-weighted urban network at the county scale to depict the change of spatial structure of the urban network in the Shanghai Metropolitan Area (SMA). Then, this study examined the network position of the five new urban centers in SMA by using social network analysis. Furthermore, this study introduced spatial econometric models to uncover the relevant influencing factors. The research findings reveal that: First, the original core-periphery structure, with the Shanghai central city (SCC) as the core, gradually evolved into a flat structure, in which administrative constraint is evident. Second, the five new urban centers have not shown centrality characteristics of node cities but exhibit a certain degree of independence, and there is still a great gap from becoming CNC. Third, the impact of innovation capacity, environmental quality, and transportation infrastructure on the centrality of new urban centers is significantly enhanced. Urban population, policy preference, and public services have a sustained positive impact on the centrality of new urban centers. From the perspective of corporate networks, this study provides policy recommendations for the development of five new urban centers as CNCs in SMA.