Global innovation index 2021: France with leaders of innovative countries worldwide

The Global Innovation Index 2021 was published in late September by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and confirmed the position of France as one of the leaders of innovative countries worldwide. France keeps making progress: from 16th position in 2019 and 12th in 2020, the country reached the 11th position this year. 

The Global Innovation Index (GII) is an annual ranking of 132 countries based on their capacity to produce innovation and their success in this field. Published by the World Intellectual Property Organization in cooperation with additional organisations and institutions, this popular ranking is based on 80 criteria assessing the inputs (human resources, infrastructures, research and development), and the outputs (creativity, knowledge and technology).

In 2021, a university network was created to engage in this index “universities of worldwide reputation, members of the teaching staff and graduate students, in the GII research and support the publication of GII results in the university community”. In the case of France, it’s the INSEAD, European Institute of administration of affairs, management school with three campuses in France, Singapore and Abu Dhabi, that is included in this academic network.

Encouraging results

The French Ministry of the Economy welcomed France’s performance, which continues to progress and became the 11^th most innovative country in the world, and considers this to be a “very encouraging result for the future of our economy”. Indeed, “research, innovation and the development of the technologies they open the path to are essential levers for the competitiveness of our companies”.

More specifically, France stands out in particular in terms of creativity and is ranked 7^th (up 7 places compared to 2020). Similarly, thanks to “very good results on intangible assets”, France has moved up 13 places and is now ranked 8^th for industrial design registrations, which illustrates, according to the Ministry of the Economy, “a very strong innovation dynamic within our scientific and industrial fabric”.

Eleven ranks in ten years

France is approaching the very closed circle of the Top 10 of a ranking that remains led (as in 2020) by a handful of countries such as, respectively, Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, the United Kingdom and South Korea.

However, the Global Innovation Index 2021 analyses the “remarkable progress” that France has made in recent years, a progression that continues and that the health crisis has not interrupted. If we refer to previous rankings, we can see that in ten years, France has moved up eleven places, from 22^nd in 2011 to 11^th this year.

Increased attractiveness

As the Ministry of the Economy points out, these encouraging results can be compared with two other types of indicators:

- according to the European Patent Office, France is the 2^nd largest European applicant for patents and the 5th largest worldwide;

- according to the EY attractiveness barometer, which ranks France first in Europe for the number of investment projects, France is particularly attractive to talents in innovative sectors.

All these indicators show that “France’s attractiveness is growing”. According to the French Ministry of the Economy, this progress is “the result of the Government’s commitment to encouraging innovation”, thanks in particular to the Pacte law, which has “brought more flexibility to the terms of collaboration between researchers and companies”, and the Deep Tech plan, which has "provided new funding for the most technological start-ups”. These two commitments are in addition to the France Relance plan, which devotes a budget of 10 billion euros to “financing emerging sectors with a high technological content”, in areas such as cybersecurity, the cloud, quantum technologies, decarbonised hydrogen, digital health and innovative therapies.

To know more: 

- Global Innovation Index ranking

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