The resources shared within a cluster are of two types: firstly, systemic resources accessible to all companies in the cluster, and secondly, resources that are only accessible to companies that can benefit from new, shared data and are able to recognize and evaluate their strategic value. Indeed, a company must be able to exploit opportunities in its environment while at the same time neutralising any threats. Only under these conditions can the resources of the cluster enhance the internal strengths of a company and develop its competitive advantages according to an internal process of value creation.

In order to clarify the competitive advantages inherent to participation in a cluster, the research team identified and classified potentially strategic resources, in the knowledge that the "strategic" nature of a resource is specific to each company. Five categories of resources, closely linked and synergistically reinforcing each other, were assessed by means of interviews with actors in the Serra Gaúcha wine-making cluster in Brazil.

This typology highlighted institutional resources, reflecting organisational, political and technological capacities (public governance structures, research and training organisations, professional organisations); the mobilisation of specialised assets (access for companies to specialised resources specific to the cluster: suppliers, marketing consultants, finance); the constitution of social assets based on trusting relationships and the sharing of values developed within the cluster, thus facilitating formal and informal exchanges within the network (dissemination of knowledge and know-how); natural resources (components in the environment favourable to the development of high-quality wine-making: climate, soil and sustainable water management, attractiveness of the vineyard landscape), and finally, the development of reputational assets (identity developed by the network and disseminated outside the region of origin, such as recognition of the quality of wines and accreditations – RDO, DOC, PGI, etc. – the development of wine tourism, synergistic relationships with actors in gastronomy, culture, the arts and history).

Actors in the cluster described their views on the real or potential contribution of each resource supplied by the cluster to the creation of value, using a 4-point scale ranging from "not important" to "very important".

The results provided a mapping of the strategic resources profile of the cluster. Resources which provide companies with the most sustainable competitive advantages constituted the strengths of the cluster. They included: entrepreneurship (social asset), local facilities easily available to winemakers, the sharing of knowledge and know-how (specialisation of assets), links between professionals and local exchanges (institutional resources), the reputation of the cluster (high-quality wine, importance of the region of origin, terroir) and natural assets (water resources, landscape).

In some ways, resources with a profile of less interest constituted deficiencies of the cluster which need to be addressed: financial services, consulting and marketing activities, access to the sharing of technological knowledge and know-how (specialisation of assets) supplied by the cluster, and sustainable wine-making practices (reputation).

This research project enabled a demonstration, firstly, of the robustness of the proposed typology of resources and its relevance, and secondly, its usefulness as a tool to analyse the performance of a cluster. The typology thus developed could therefore be applied to other wine-making clusters throughout the world (notably in Australia, New Zealand, the USA, Spain, Portugal and Italy) with the objective of defining an international benchmark.