Switzerland is the winner

Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, Singapore and the United Kingdom are the world’s most-innovative economies, while China, Türkiye, India, Viet Nam and the Philippines1 are the fastest 10-year climbers, according to WIPO’s Global Innovation Index (GII) 2024. The 2024 edition identifies a major softening in leading indicators of future innovative activity, including a reversal of the 2020-2022 boom in innovation investments. Amid higher interest rates, venture capital (VC) funding dropped by about 40 percent in 2023 and growth slipped in research and development (R&D) expenditures, while international patent filings and scientific publications fell.

Switzerland is ranked first overall. As in previous years, Switzerland tops the list in the criteria summarised under ‘innovation output’. These include criteria such as knowledge creation, knowledge impact and knowledge diffusion or intangible assets. In terms of ‘innovation input’, Switzerland is ranked second, behind Singapore, but still one place up on last year's ranking. Innovation input includes criteria such as institutional framework conditions, infrastructure or financing options, knowledge workers or collaborations between companies and universities.

Despite its good performance, Switzerland also has some weaknesses, particularly in connection with entrepreneurship. For example, it only ranks 16th in the criterion ‘Entrepreneurship policies and culture’. This result is based on a survey of experts from various fields regarding the conditions for entrepreneurship.

In the area of start-ups in the narrower sense, there is a clear decline from technology transfer to growth. Switzerland comes first in the criterion of university-industry R&D collaboration. In terms of venture capital received, Switzerland still manages to come in at 19th place, and in terms of unicorn valuation, Switzerland comes in at 29th place. One reason for this may be Switzerland's traditional weakness in the ICT sector, which is reflected, for example, in ICT service exports. Here, Switzerland only manages to come in at 47th place. In contrast, Switzerland is better positioned when it comes to tangible products. In the criterion share of high-tech manufacturing, Switzerland ranks second.

Switzerland is the world champion of innovation, according to Roland Berger as well

The WIPO report is not the only analysis to identify Switzerland as the most innovative country. The Innovation Indicator 2024 from Roland Berger and the Federation of German Industries (BDI) comes to the same conclusion. The top positions in the overall ranking of the 2024 Innovation Indicator are once again occupied by smaller nations, as in previous years. Switzerland remains in first place with 71 points, followed by Singapore, which increased its score by three points to reach 68. The positive developments in Singapore and Denmark have brought the top three countries closer together, while the gap between them and the next-ranked countries—Sweden (58 points), Ireland (55), and Finland (52)—has widened significantly.

The analysis focuses on three key aspects: first, assessing the current state of innovation ("Creating Innovations"), second, exploring the technological future of the countries ("Developing Future Fields through Key Technologies"), and third, evaluating the sustainability of economic systems to determine if they operate within planetary boundaries and can be successful in the long term ("Sustainable Economy").

The rankings of the countries in relation to seven future technologies are particularly interesting. Switzerland makes it into the top ten for all technologies, but there are differences. Switzerland performs very well in advanced production technologies (1st place), biotech (2nd place) and digital networks (2). Digital networks comprise technologies that are important for the development of future-proof digital communication networks. These are primarily semiconductors and semiconductor lasers, but also high-performance computers and even quantum computers. There are also software-based application areas such as artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Switzerland is relatively poorly ranked in energy technologies (8) and circular economy (8).

Best country overall

In addition to these two reports focusing on innovation, the Best Countries Ranking by US News & World Report was also recently published. Here, too, Switzerland comes out on top.Switzerland this year came out on top again despite not placing No. 1 in any subranking, though it’s still a consistently strong performer: The nation ranks second in open for business, third in quality of life – where it jumped from No. 6 in 2023 – and is in the top 10 of several other subrankings. the open for business subranking, which analyzes how business-friendly a country is perceived to be, is where Switzerland really shines. It ranks as the least corrupt nation among those in the Best Countries analysis and also places fifth for perceptions of a favorable tax environment – two attributes that inform the subranking.