According to the annual report published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) on Thursday, India has made impressive strides in the global innovation index ranking, debuting in the top 40.
India continues to lead the world in ICT services exports and holds top rankings in other indicators, including venture capital receipt value, finance for startups and scaleups, graduates in science and engineering, labour productivity growth, and domestic industry diversification, according to WIPO. “India is the innovation leader in the lower middle-income group,” the organisation said in the report. Switzerland, the United States, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands are the world’s most-innovative economies.
Emerging economies are constantly performing well, with India and Turkey making their debut appearances in the top 40.
India moved up to position 40 in the Global Innovation Index for 2022, while Turkey is ranked at number 37.
India’s position in the global innovation index has steadily improved. India made its top 50 debuts in 2020 and landed in the top 40 this year.
The paper demonstrates that despite the COVID-19 epidemic, research and development (R&D) and other investments that fuel global inventive activity continued to expand in 2021. However, obstacles are arising in turning innovation investments into effect.
With the assistance of our Corporate Network partners, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the Brazilian National Confederation of Industry (CNI), Ecopetrol (Colombia), and the Turkish Exporters Assembly, WIPO publishes the Global Innovation Index 2022 (GII), which is in its 15th edition this year (TIM).
While innovation investments soared in 2020 and 2021, the outlook for 2022 is clouded not only by global uncertainties but also by continued underperformance in innovation-driven productivity, according to this year’s GII. As we emerge from the pandemic, innovation is at a crossroads, so we need to pay more attention to not just investing in innovation but how it translates into economic and social impact.
The GII publishes an annual ranking of the world’s economies based on their capacity and output for innovation. This year, the United States moved up to the second spot, the Netherlands to the fifth spot, Singapore to the seventh spot, Germany to the eighth spot, and China to the eleventh spot, just outside the top 10.
Prior to the pandemic in 2019, the top worldwide corporate R&D spenders boosted their R&D spending by approximately 10% to over USD 900 billion in 2021. Four industries, including ICT hardware and electrical equipment, software and ICT services, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology, and construction and industrial metals, were principally responsible for this growth.
Investments in worldwide R&D increased by 3.3% in 2020, a slowdown from the exceptionally high growth rate of 6.1% seen in 2019.
For the top R&D expenditure economies, government budget allocations showed a significant rise in 2020. Budgets for government R&D in 2021 presented a more mixed picture, with rising expenditure in Germany and the Republic of Korea and declining investment in the US and Japan, according to the study.
In 2021, venture capital (VC) agreements increased by 46%, reaching heights reminiscent of the late-1990s internet bubble. The fastest-growing venture capital regions are in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. However, the VC view for 2022 is less optimistic; tighter monetary policies and their impact on risk capital would cause venture capital to slow down.
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