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The world’s most innovative countries
The Economist ^ | 10/11/2025

Posted on 10/11/2025 5:43:20 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

THE GERMANS are an inventive bunch. They came up with the printing press, the car and the X-ray machine, not to mention MP3s and gummy bears. The country remains a big contributor to technological progress, filing more than 16,700 international patent applications in 2024. But, according to a new global ranking of 139 economies published by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), Germany is no longer among the ten most innovative countries in the world. China has displaced it.

WIPO uses 78 indicators to assemble its Global Innovation Index. They cover inputs (such as spending on research and development) and outputs (such as patents and high-tech exports). The index also tries to capture the strength of a country’s institutions, the sophistication of its markets and its progress in adopting technology, not just inventing it. Most of the data was collected in 2024, before President Donald Trump started his assault on science in America.

China, of course, has a vast population and a far bigger economy than Germany has ($18.9trn compared with Germany’s $4.7trn). It can train more engineers, spend more on research and maintain more universities. It would be no surprise if it outranked Germany in a league table based on absolute measures. But the explanation for China’s success is not so simple. Many of WIPO’s indicators control for the size of a country’s economy and population. Spending on research and development, for example, is expressed not in raw dollar terms but as a percentage of GDP. The number of researchers is calculated per million members of the population.

The top-ranked country this year, as it was last year, is tiny Switzerland. Sweden comes second and America third. China’s entry into the top ten is all the more remarkable given its status as a middle-income economy. Countries with a similar GDP per person would be expected to rank in the 50s or 60s (see chart 1). Other countries that have outperformed their income levels include India, South Korea, Vietnam and Britain. China also seems to be getting a satisfying amount of bang for its innovation buck. Its scores for outputs (patents, trademarks, exports and the like) are better than expected given its level of inputs (education, research spending and so on). This defies the conventional view that Chinese innovation is force-fed, reliant on huge amounts of money and manpower. The country was once described as a “fat tech dragon” that ingested vast amounts of resources while producing meagre creative sparks. The dragon now seems to be in better shape.

In its report WIPO notes a tentative recovery from the global innovation lull it identified last year. The number of patent filings and scientific publications across the world is growing again. Venture-capital investment also rose by 7.7% in 2024. But much of this spending was concentrated in America and funnelled to one sector: artificial intelligence. Although the value of deals is growing, the number fell for the third year in a row. Venture-capital investment, which had been spreading across more countries and industries, seems to be narrowing again, the report notes. That is a pity.

The technological frontier is broad. There are many avenues of inquiry to explore. Human ingenuity can manifest itself in many ways, from movable type to chewable treats


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Computers/Internet; Health/Medicine; Science
KEYWORDS: innovation

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1 posted on 10/11/2025 5:43:20 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

How does switzerland get to be the number one innovator? Does anyone recall that last time that switzerland was credited for a big invention.

or do they major in the minors.


2 posted on 10/11/2025 5:47:09 PM PDT by ckilmer
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To: SeekAndFind

Blowing up their energy pipeline with Russia, Nordstream, just about sealed the height of their stupidity….the EU is collapsing….and the world’s Wealth is moving from the West to the East.


3 posted on 10/11/2025 5:47:16 PM PDT by delta7
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To: SeekAndFind

britian, germany, netherlands and france are all in decline in the last three years. makes sense. illegals and the war in ukraine are draining their resources off to other things.


4 posted on 10/11/2025 5:48:33 PM PDT by ckilmer
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To: delta7

China’s economy is about to have a very hard landing. Demographically, they are on a precipice. Your delusional statements would be hilarious if I thought you actually believed them.

Not sure how much you get paid for spreading this crap on FR, but I gotta believe this site is so tiny, it must be a side job for your bot farm.


5 posted on 10/11/2025 5:49:21 PM PDT by Vermont Lt
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To: SeekAndFind
Nonsense. Israel is not on the list. The antisemitic world hates Israel for a number of reasons. They are envious because Jews are smart, and God chose to reveal Himself through the Jews. Don't believe in God? Explain the Jews as one noted philosopher once said.
6 posted on 10/11/2025 5:51:06 PM PDT by Fungi
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To: SeekAndFind

Israel is there and I stand corrected.


7 posted on 10/11/2025 5:53:09 PM PDT by Fungi
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To: Fungi

RE: Nonsense. Israel is not on the list.

Israel is ranked number 14. It’s amazing considering the total number of Jews in the world are less than the population of the state of New York ( OK, granted, New York has a lot of Jews, but still ).

Say what you will of Israel, but when it comes to STEM, they punch way above their weight.


8 posted on 10/11/2025 5:56:35 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

Germans also invented poison gas, chemical weapons, and frightened enough physicists around the globe with their discoveries in the 1930s to encourage an American nuclear or atomic bomb research program. Also they invented some poisonous ideas like Socialism, international or otherwise.


9 posted on 10/11/2025 6:27:07 PM PDT by Freedom4US
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To: Vermont Lt
China's economy is about to have a very hard landing.

Isn't that the same thing you always say about every adversary that we have? Do I need to go back and quote you? Wishful thinking and reality often collide don't they. We can hope that all of our adversaries will have bad things happen to their economies... whether this is likely is questionable in most cases.

“LONDON, Oct 7 (Reuters) - The World Bank lifted its 2025 growth projection for China to 4.8% and raised its forecast for much of the region, but warned of slowing momentum next year, citing low consumer and business confidence and weak new export orders.

Publishing its biannual economic outlook for East Asia and the Pacific region on Tuesday, the World Bank said it now expected China to grow 4.2% next year, after forecasting in April growth of 4.0% both this year and next.”

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/world-bank-lifts-china-2025-gdp-forecast-48-ahead-slowdown-next-year-2025-10-07/

That is a projected slow down compared to 4.8% growth projected for this year, but the USA's growth rate has been doing much worse than China's and our economic risks are greater, especially if we keep pouring $Hundreds of Billions into never ending sink holes of corruption like Ukraine. Massive deficit spending and letting our country be overrun by illegals who are overwhelming the local economies in many areas is destroying our country at levels never before seen.

10 posted on 10/11/2025 7:27:27 PM PDT by fireman15
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To: Freedom4US

Great points - we should have lists of cultures that have produced horrors - similar to this list.

Thanks Freedom4

Great idea.


11 posted on 10/11/2025 7:46:12 PM PDT by GOPJ (NO 'prizes' from Pulitzer, Nobel or Antifa - reject the filth. <P><I><B><big><center></B>)
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To: ckilmer

A number of companies are headquartered in Switzerland due to its company friendly laws, taxes and banking. So they also have most patents filed. That makes them and Sweden the most innovative. Kind of like Delaware in the USA having so many companies


12 posted on 10/12/2025 1:44:22 AM PDT by Cronos
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To: ckilmer

Home of the globalists, who set the world at war every so often, making money from all sides, but magically managing to remain “neutral” throughout.

That’s pretty inventive, is it not?


13 posted on 10/12/2025 2:03:28 AM PDT by 9YearLurker
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To: ckilmer

I suspect that Switzerland punching above its weight on patents is mostly due to pharma companies. There’s a lot of drug research there. They also innovate quite a bit in the area of food production, cf. Nestle.


14 posted on 10/12/2025 2:21:06 AM PDT by irishjuggler
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To: GOPJ

There was a swath of many inventions and other great advances in music, literature, architecture etc in that area. World War One kinda destroyed all that. Britain, France, Italy were no slouches either. Hungary for a time had some of the finest schools.

Germany was paid royalties or sued for patent infringement on their Mauser rifle bolt design, the US government paid. I think that was actually during the first World War. By the 2nd nobody paid any attention to that sort of thing. At the end of the war all of the technological advancements were confiscated and were considered a form of war reparations by the allies. One notable example, I guess, were wire and magnetic tape recording. Music fidelity and broadcast took a noticeable leap right after the war, acetates and such from the 1930s and 1940s sound very bandwidth limited and tinny, by the 1950s that had changed a great deal.

Many people are aware of the “Paperclip” rocket scientists imported to the US right after. Unfortunately less well known are thousands of propaganda specialists, and chemical warfare guys too. Ostensibly to fight “the cold war”, but in hindsight this helps explain a lot of the otherwise inexplicable turmoil America has been subjected in the last 60 years.


15 posted on 10/12/2025 3:07:10 AM PDT by Freedom4US
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To: Vermont Lt

Aren’t we all on a precipice.

I would guess a command economy can better manage it.

Why do you continually say that China is failing.


16 posted on 10/12/2025 3:16:13 AM PDT by Chickensoup
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To: Cronos

So it is not that the Swiss or Swedish are innovative...they are safe hold repositories for the intellectual and monetary properties of innovation.


17 posted on 10/12/2025 3:21:16 AM PDT by Chickensoup
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To: Chickensoup

Because their economy, which is built on real estate and manufacturing, is suffering greatly. The demographics of the country—based on the one child limit from decades ago—has left a hole in their population which is coming home to roost. They are aging and will have significant declines in population over the next ten to twenty years.

Xi is barely holding on to his job. No…not in the sense of “Putin has cancer” but in a true political sense. That is going to cause major disruption.

China is a mess. And its not getting any better.


18 posted on 10/12/2025 5:19:29 AM PDT by Vermont Lt
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To: Vermont Lt

Up to 20 years from now.

Manufacturing and real estate. Strong sectors thar show softening. Now.

A well educated population. That doesn’t put up with crime and decline.

As I look at the rapidly declining West I really don’t see your issues.


19 posted on 10/12/2025 5:44:54 AM PDT by Chickensoup
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To: Chickensoup
I was hit with the realization of how bad our educational system is here in the US. My goddaughter teaches 5th grade here in North Texas. When I mentioned the novel Animal Farm, she said she’d never heard of it. As I was briefly explaining the plot, she said “it’s probably on the banned list.”

My next gifts to my 15YO grandson will be Animal Farm and the Grapes of Wrath. He doesn’t get any homework assigned, even in high school.

20 posted on 10/12/2025 5:54:29 AM PDT by Night Hides Not (Remember the Alamo! Remember Goliad! Remember Gonzales! Come and Take It! I’m )
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