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, which shows a softening in venture capital activity, R&D funding and other investment indicators.
Now in its 17th edition, the GII is the world’s benchmark resource charting global innovation trends to guide policy makers, business leaders and others in unleashing human ingenuity to improve lives and address shared challenges, like climate change. This year, the GII also looks at “social entrepreneurship,” which uses private-sector practices for positive social change.
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.