Brussels, 22/01/2009 (Agence Europe) - The 8th European Innovation Scoreboard shows the EU making substantial progress in its innovation performance preceding the financial crisis. The relative innovation gap with the US and Japan was reduced, in particular amid strong progress by many new member states, particularly Cyprus, Romania and Bulgaria. While, across the EU, particular progress was made in human resources and availability of finance for innovation, investment by businesses are still relatively weak especially if compared to the US and Japan.
Virtually all European countries have improved their performance although the rate of progress varies: with innovation performance well above the EU average, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland, Germany, Denmark and the UK are innovation leaders and of these countries, Switzerland and Germany are improving their performance fastest; with performances above the EU average, Austria, Ireland, Luxembourg, Belgium, France and the Netherlands are innovation followers - Ireland's performance has been increasing fastest within this group, followed by Austria; with innovation performance below the EU average, Cyprus, Iceland, Estonia, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Norway, Spain, Portugal, Greece and Italy are the moderate innovators, Cyprus being top in this group of countries; and with innovation performance well below the EU average, Malta, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Lithuania, Croatia, Romania, Latvia, Bulgaria and Turkey are the catching-up countries. Analysis of EU-level data shows that there have been substantial improvements both in absolute terms (compared with 2002), and relative to the US and Japan. A comparison with a broader range of countries also shows that the EU has fared relatively well with respect to emerging economies. There has been a particular progress in human resources for innovation (graduates, tertiary education); broadband access and availability of venture capital. However, weaknesses persist in business investment where the EU is behind the US and Japan on R&D and IT expenditure. Furthermore, expenditure by EU companies on such innovative activities (e.g. training, design, marketing, new equipment) has declined. The Commission says, then, that persistent business under-investment in innovation needs to be tackled including through renewed public support to innovative companies such as the Lead Markets Initiative. The report is available at http://www.proinno-europe.eu/metrics (E.H./transl.rt)