That is, how easy is it in an age of GVCs and high-skilled migration to keep research insights and know-how within innovating countries? Knowledge externalities that extend beyond borders would facilitate potential technological leapfrogging of developing countries and blur out differences in technology. If digital knowledge externalities are, however, confined within borders, the existing advantages of high-income economies in innovation are likely to persist and provide these economies with a lasting comparative advantage in digital-intensive sectors. The server farms that are necessary to support digital technologies depend on storage devices, power supplies, and cooling systems that consume vast amounts of energies. Van Heddeghem et al. (