The Global Innovation Index, published by Cornell University, INSEAD and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), was published this week and SEPAM very kindly sent me a link.
There, ahead of the USA, France and Germany was the UK.
For the first time, China made it into the top 20. “China’s rapid rise reflects a strategic direction set from the top leadership to developing world-class capacity in innovation and to moving the structural basis of the economy to more knowledge-intensive industries that rely on innovation to maintain competitive advantage,” says WIPO’s director general Francis Gurtyl
The least innovative of the 126 countries surveyed were: Bolivia, Nigeria, Guinea, Zambia, Benin, Niger, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Togo and Yemen.
Here are the top 20:
- Switzerland
- Netherlands
- Sweden
- United Kingdom
- Singapore
- United States of America
- Finland
- Denmark
- Germany
- Ireland
- Israel
- Korea, Republic of
- Japan
- Hong Kong
- Luxembourg
- France
- China
- Canada
- Norway
- Australia
Considering the ranking of big countries vs small countries I would guess that this is ranked per capita.
I looked at the link but did not find a statement about this.
It would certainly help explain how it can be that the US ranks so low despite all the VC funded startups in Silicon Valley.
Well given the latest investments seem to have been in electric scooter rental startups which just seems to me like a new spin on Boris bikes, I’m not convinced there is much useful innovation happening in Silicon Valley anymore !
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/11/lime-bird-spin-why-scooter-start-ups-are-suddenly-worth-billions.html
WEll, Mike, this is a WIPO thing, so a lot of the data is patent-related.
Patents play a major role but also other factors are acknowledged:
http://www.wipo.int/export/sites/www/pressroom/en/documents/gii_2018_infographics.pdf
And I agree it is strange Switzerland is at the top of the list. I think it might be due to all the big pharma companies located there, at least located there officially for tax purposes. Or it might be secondary indicators from the PDF above such as infrastructure, institutions and market sophistication.
I agree pharma is the one area Switzerland leads the world (unless overpriced watches are counted) but surely that’s only a small percentage of total patents ?
It mentions education as important, but Switzerland only has one world class university whereas the UK has at least 6, probably more depending how you draw the line as world class.
Switzerland is a great place to holiday and I go once or twice a year, but it’s never seemed that innovative to me, unless you count things like having spare seats on trains and them running on time which I agree would be innovative measures in the UK !
Watches are high profile but not in terms of patenting. Some statistics:
Applicant
Name No
F. HOFFMANN-LA ROCHE AG 4637
NOVARTIS AG 4474
NESTEC S.A. 2540
MICHELIN RECHERCHE ET TECHNIQUE S.A. 2183
SYNGENTA PARTICIPATIONS AG 1595
ROCHE DIAGNOSTICS GMBH 1587
PHILIP MORRIS PRODUCTS S.A. 1334
COMPAGNIE GENERALE DES ETABLISSEMENTS MICHELIN 1330
ABB TECHNOLOGY AG 1202
TETRA LAVAL HOLDINGS & FINANCE S.A. 1195
CIBA SPECIALTY CHEMICALS HOLDING INC. 1097
ALSTOM TECHNOLOGY LTD 1047
ABB SCHWEIZ AG 1019
SOCIETE DE TECHNOLOGIE MICHELIN 1002
NOVARTIS PHARMA GMBH 901
ABB RESEARCH LTD 733
INVENTIO AG 728
SIKA TECHNOLOGY AG 700
HOFFMANN-LA ROCHE INC. 649
BAXTER INTERNATIONAL INC. 562
BAXTER HEALTHCARE S.A. 525
ST-ERICSSON SA 507
GENENTECH, INC. 506
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION 502
SYNTHES GMBH 497
I agree the UK has more world class universities but it seems the UK is not that successful in turning academic research into commercial results. A scientist from Imperial College said the research was under pressure there and not in a good way. The Swiss have a better reputation in that respect.
Seems an odd scoring system. Switzerland come nowhere in the Nobel Prizes league, whereas if you count Brits working in the US and discount the silly prizes we come moreorless top with the US with a much smaller population.
And can mobile app generation really be regarded as creative ? The creative person is the one who thinks up the idea, then has it coded up in a low cost economy like Estonia or Cyprus.
Interesting SEPAM, that explains a lot. Thanks, and thanks for flagging this report up orignally.
For all the efforts from France and Germany, I think the factors that put the UK on the 4th place make it had to persuade startups to move to France or Germany. Also US VCs find the British legal system more familiar than the continental one so the exits will probably result in a greater pay off in the UK.