Innovation: German companies are most innovative in the EU [ranking]
Eurostat just released statistics about innovation in European companies. Specifically, it looked at the percentage of enterprises that innovated between 2008 and 2010.
Be aware that “innovation activity” is defined very broadly in the survey: means product and process innovation as well as organisational and marketing innovation.
Top five innovative countries in Europe
The top five countries in the ranking are Germany, Luxemburg, Iceland, Belgium and Portugal. I’m a bit surprised by the poor showing of the UK (only 44,2 percent of the surveyed enterprises innovated in 2008 – 2010).
1 | Germany | 79.3 |
2 | Luxembourg | 68.1 |
3 | Iceland | 63.8 |
4 | Belgium | 60.9 |
5 | Portugal | 60.3 |
6 | Sweden | 59.6 |
7 | Ireland | 59.5 |
8 | Estonia | 56.8 |
9 | Netherlands | 56.7 |
10 | Austria | 56.5 |
11 | Italy | 56.3 |
12 | Finland | 56.2 |
13 | Denmark | 54.7 |
14 | France | 53.5 |
15 | Czech Republic | 51.7 |
16 | Serbia | 51.7 |
17 | Turkey | 51.4 |
18 | Slovenia | 49.4 |
19 | Cyprus | 46.2 |
20 | United Kingdom | 44.2 |
21 | Norway | 43.5 |
22 | Croatia | 42.4 |
23 | Malta | 41.5 |
24 | Spain | 41.4 |
25 | Slovakia | 35.6 |
26 | Lithuania | 34.5 |
27 | Hungary | 31.1 |
28 | Romania | 30.8 |
29 | Latvia | 29.9 |
30 | Poland | 28.1 |
31 | Bulgaria | 27.1 |
32 | Greece | : |
Top five countries innovating with Chinese or Indian partners
Another interesting graphic is who is cooperating internationally, and with whom. Finland is the country that innovates in partnerships with China and India most:
1 | Finland | 8.9 |
2 | Sweden | 6.8 |
3 | Luxembourg | 6.0 |
4 | Slovenia | 6.0 |
5 | Cyprus | 5.5 |
It appears that German companies prefer to do their innovation by themselves: the country only comes in in the 23rd spot if you look at the percentage of companies partnering up with others.
This is consistent with the findings of Whiteboard contributor dr. Hermann Simon, who did extensive research into the ‘hidden champion’s, extremely innovative German market leaders (I urge you to read his great articles to get a better understanding).
Top ten countries innovating with US partners:
Mostly smaller countries, it appears:
1 | Slovenia | 44.7 |
2 | Cyprus | 62.3 |
3 | Belgium | 42.3 |
4 | Luxembourg | 32.2 |
5 | Ireland | 28.5 |
6 | France | 36.1 |
7 | Norway | 30.6 |
8 | Austria | 51.0 |
9 | Latvia | 29.1 |
10 | Slovakia | 34.7 |
Top ten countries that cooperate on innovation
Again, enterprises in smaller countries appear to be more likely to cooperate on innovation with institutions or enterprises from other countries:
1 | Cyprus | 62.3 |
2 | Austria | 51.0 |
3 | Slovenia | 44.7 |
4 | Lithuania | 43.3 |
5 | Hungary | 43.2 |
6 | Belgium | 42.3 |
7 | Estonia | 42.1 |
8 | Finland | 39.8 |
9 | Denmark | 39.7 |
10 | Sweden | 38.8 |
All in all, only 27 % of the enterprises in Europe partner up with either universities, public research institutes or other enterprises to innovate. Almost three quarters prefer to tackle their innovation in house.
I’m also a bit surprised by the fact that Italian companies seem reluctant to work together to innovate (only 12 %). The Italian legal system has specific incentives for even small firms to form so called “grids” to innovate and internationalize, as contributor Zuzanna Brocka wrote here recently.
Do you see more here? Let us know!
via EUROPA via @babgi /Photo: Wolfgang Staudt, Flickr
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