Iceland ranks twentieth in the WIPO Innovation Index 2023
Iceland holds the twentieth place in the list of the most innovative economies in the world according to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Global Innovation Index 2023 (GII). Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Singapore occupy the top five places this year. The other Nordic countries and the Baltic countries all rise in the list from last year, and Sweden, Finland, and Denmark are among the top ten countries on the list.
Consisting of roughly 80 indicators, grouped into innovation inputs and outputs, the GII aims to capture the multi-dimensional facets of innovation. Iceland is in 12th place on the list of 39 European economies, like last year, and scores higher than is to be expected based on the country’s, GDP. The conditions for innovation are considered to have improved over the years in Iceland, but on the other hand, the output of innovation is somewhat lower than before.
In general, Iceland scores above average in the areas of institutions (9th), infrastructure (10th), business sophistication (15th), and creative outputs (20th).
Iceland tops the list for electricity output, GWh/mn pop. (rank 1), National feature films/mn pop. 15-69 (rank 1) and Generic top-level domains (TLDs)/th pop. 15-69 (rank 1).
However, Iceland scores low in the areas of: Human capital and research (rank 24), knowledge and technology outputs (25), and market sophistication (rank 32). Among the individual factors in which Iceland scores low are domestic market scale bn PPP$ (128th place), FDI net inflows, (128th place), GDP/unit of energy use (125th place), Industrial designs by origin/bn PPP$ GDP (97th place), domestic industry diversification (91st place) and the percentage of graduates in science and engineering (87th place).
Detailed information about Iceland's position on the list can be found here.
- Scientific publications, research and development (R&D), the number of venture capital (VC) deals (but not their value) and patents continued to increase to higher-than-ever levels. However, growth rates were lower than the exceptional increases seen in 2021.
- In 2022, spending by corporations representing the largest investors in R&D reached USD 1.1 trillion in 2022 – a historic high. They increased their R&D spend by around 7.4 percent in 2022, down from 15 percent growth in 2021.
- Mirroring the recent surge of artificial intelligence, the ICT hardware sectors saw graphic card and chipmakers in the lead with the most notable R&D growth in 2022. Other sectors that cut back R&D spending during the pandemic, such as automobiles and travel and leisure, invested strongly again in 2022.
- According to preliminary data, global government R&D budgets are estimated to have increased in real terms in 2022. Significant increases took place in Japan and the Republic of Korea, and smaller ones in Germany, making up for cuts in other economies.
- Reflecting a deteriorating climate for risk finance, the total value of VC investments declined sharply by close to 40 percent in 2022, albeit from unusually high levels in 2021. Africa was the only region not to see a decline in 2022.
- The VC outlook for 2023 and 2024 is uncertain, with high-interest rates likely to continue to impact the financing of innovation.
- Indicators in the fields of information technology, health and energy continue to show progress – the Digital Age and Deep Science innovation waves PDF, GII 2022 At a glance outlined in GII 2022 are well underway.
- Overall, technology adoption is developing positively even though penetration for some technologies, such as electric vehicles and cancer treatment, remains low.
About the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)is one of the organizations of the United Nations. Iceland has been a member of it since 1986. WIPO is the global forum for intellectual property policy, services, information and cooperation. A specialized agency of the United Nations, WIPO assists its 193 member states in developing a balanced international IP legal framework to meet society's evolving needs. It provides business services for obtaining IP rights in multiple countries and resolving disputes. It delivers capacity-building programs to help developing countries benefit from using IP. And it provides free access to unique knowledge banks of IP information.