Singapore loses Asia-Pac's top spot on Global Innovation Index to Korea, still eighth globally

SINGAPORE ranked second in Asia-Pacific in the Global Innovation Index (GII) 2021, losing its top spot to South Korea after holding on to the ranking for seven consecutive years.

However, the city-state maintained its eighth position in global rankings. Korea joined the top five of the GII for the first time after making notable advances in innovation output, in particular global brand value and trademarks by origin.

The GII is published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), a specialised agency of the United Nations. As innovation is a key driver of economic development, the GII aims to provide an innovation ranking and analysis that references around 130 economies.

Switzerland snagged the top spot globally in the index, followed by Sweden, the United States and the United Kingdom. WIPO's report noted that Singapore has been among the top 10 most innovative economies consistently for the past 14 years.

The city-state ranked first for innovation inputs and attained the top position for two new indicators relating to capital raising and financing - "venture capital (VC) investors" and "venture capital recipients".

"(This is) a nod to our whole-of-government efforts to ensure timely finance for innovative companies, and to establish Singapore as a destination of choice for local and global innovative companies, especially those from the high-growth and high-tech sectors," the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS) said in a media statement.

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Notably, strong growth in VC deals in the Asia-Pacific region more than compensated for declines in Northern America, the WIPO report found. Globally, VC deals grew by 5.8 per cent in 2020, exceeding the average growth rate for the past 10 years. First-quarter figures suggest VC activity will be even more vibrant in 2021, said WIPO.

Singapore has consistently held the top position for innovation input for the past decade. It moved up two places to 13th position for innovation output.

The innovation input sub-index captures elements of the national economy that enable innovative activities, while the innovation output sub-index reflects the results from innovative activities in the economy.

Despite the economic shock from the pandemic, government budget allocations for the top R&D spending economies that have already disclosed their budgets continued to grow in 2020. The top global corporate R&D spenders grew overall R&D expenditure by around 10 per cent.

International patent filings via WIPO reached a new all-time high in 2020. An increase of 3.5 per cent was driven by medical technology, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology.

Some middle-income economies, such as Turkey, Vietnam, India and the Philippines, are beginning to pull their weight in global innovation.

“Beyond China, these four particularly large economies together have the potential to change the global innovation landscape for good,” said WIPO.