The European Innovation Scoreboard 2020

On 22 June 2020, the European Commission released the Innovation Scoreboard (EIS) 2020, which demonstrates Europe’s improving innovation performance.

According to the EIS, on average, the innovation performance of the EU has increased by 8.9% since 2012, with performance having increased the most in Lithuania, Malta, Latvia, Portugal and Greece.

Sweden continues to be the EU Innovation Leader, followed by Finland, Denmark and the Netherlands. This year Luxembourg (previously a Strong Innovator) joins the group of Innovation Leaders, while Portugal (previously a Moderate Innovator) joins the group of Strong Innovators.

At a global level, it is the second year that the EU surpasses the United States. The EU also continues to have a performance lead over China, Brazil, Russia, South Africa, and India. Since 2012, the EU’s performance gap with South Korea, Australia and Japan has increased, while the EU’s performance lead over the United States, China, Brazil, Russia and South Africa has decreased.

Background

The EIS functions as an assessment of the performance of research and innovation in EU countries and identifies “performance leaders” in specific areas of innovation. It covers the EU Member States as well as Iceland, Israel, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine and the United Kingdom.
The EIS contains 4 “performance groups:”

• Innovation Leaders – Denmark, Finland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Sweden perform significantly above the EU average;
• Strong Innovators – The innovation performance of Austria, Belgium, Estonia, France, Germany, Ireland, and Portugal is above or close to the EU average;
• Moderate Innovators – Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain show an innovation performance below the EU average;
• Modest Innovators – The innovation performance of Bulgaria and Romania is below 50% of the EU average.

The innovation performance is measured based on 27 performance indicators, within 10 innovation dimensions and in 4 main categories.

• Framework conditions capture the main drivers of innovation performance and cover three innovation dimensions: human resources, attractive research systems, and innovation-friendly environment.
• Investments include public and private investment in research and innovation, distinguishing between external finance and support, and own-resource investments.
• Innovation activities capture the innovation efforts at the company level, covering three dimensions: innovators, linkages, and intellectual assets.
• Impacts illustrate how innovation translates into benefits for the economy as a whole: employment impacts and sales effects.

 
Source: ec.europa.eu
 
Click here to view the full Q&A document published by the EC on 23 June 2020.
Visit this page for more information on the EIS.