• Switzerland continues to be ranked as the most innovation-friendly country in the world.
• More than half of the R&D top 20 are European economies and five are Asian.
• China is outperforming many others where IP is concerned but lags behind in other key areas.

Global investment in innovation remained buoyant throughout 2020, despite the setbacks ushered in by the pandemic. High-tech industries in particular maintained their commitment to research and development (R&D) spending, according to the World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) Global Innovation Index (GII).
The top three countries for R&D investment, as ranked in the GII, are Switzerland, Sweden and the US. Switzerland has held the number one spot in the Index since 2011.

Facilitating innovation
Global rankings

 
This year, South Korea has been placed in the top five for the first time.

More than half the top 20 are European countries, but five Asian economies are in the upper rankings – South Korea (5th), Singapore (8th), China (12th), Japan (13th) and Hong Kong (14th). China is the only middle-income economy in the top 30, WIPO says.

China scores highly in the GII for its number of patents, trademarks and industrial designs. However, it lags behind other economies in areas like human capital, enrollment in tertiary education, plus market sophistication and business sophistication.

There are a number of countries that are performing above expectations relative to their economic development. These include India, Kenya, the Republic of Moldova and Viet Nam.
To create the rankings, WIPO assesses economies’ against a number of criteria that influence and facilitate innovation, as well as those that are created as a result of innovation.

These indicators include things like the volume of venture capital deals, the number of scientific papers published, labour and productivity growth, and high-tech exports.