GERMANY topped the 2020 Bloomberg Innovation Index, breaking South Korea’s six-year winning streak, while the United States dropped one notch to ninth place.
Singapore’s rise to 3rd place within the rating brings it back to its position from two years ago.
The annual Bloomberg Innovation Index, now in its eighth yr, examines dozens of criteria using seven metrics, including research and development spending, manufacturing capability and the concentration of high-tech public firms.
The rating make clear economies’ ability to innovate, a key theme of the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, which takes place from January 21-24.
In the Bloomberg index, Germany ranked three in the highest five for value-added manufacturing, high-tech density and patent activity. South Korea lost its crown partly as a result of a relative decline in productivity, falling to twenty ninth place from last yr’s 18th place on this category.
Singapore’s rise to 3rd place overall from sixth last yr was driven by growth in productivity and value-added production, while maintaining the world’s top rating for higher education effectiveness.
Less rosy
The news is less optimistic for leading advanced economies. The United States, which was in first place when the Bloomberg index debuted in 2013, has dropped one position since last yr’s rating, to ninth place. Japan fell to twelfth place, losing three places in comparison with the identical decline within the index last yr.
The world’s second-largest economy, China, rose one place to fifteenth place. It remained in second place within the rating when it comes to patent activity and was in the highest five when it comes to effectiveness on the tertiary level.
The big winners among the many rating economies in 2020 were Slovenia, which rose 10 places to twenty first position due to a 34-level improvement in patent activity. Chile climbed seven places to 51st place, without losing position in any category and making particular progress when it comes to efficiency on the tertiary level.
Alternatively, the most important loser on this yr’s index was New Zealand, which dropped five places to twenty ninth as its value-added manufacturing performance declined.
Four economies were included within the Innovation Index for the primary time: Algeria – which debuted particularly strongly in forty ninth place – and Egypt, Kazakhstan and Macao.
The 2020 rating process began with over 200 economies. Each of them was rated on a scale of 0-100 based on seven equally weighted categories. Countries that didn’t report data in no less than six categories were eliminated, reducing the full list to 105. — BLOOMBERG
