Switzerland has scored 139.6 per cent of the EU average in the European Commission's latest European Innovation Scoreboard (EIS). An extended analysis that includes 11 other European countries shows that Switzerland continues to hold its 2022 title as the most innovative country in Europe in 2023, with top scores in education-related indicators, scientific publications and environment-related indicators, according to the Innovation Scoreboard's country profile of Switzerland. Denmark, Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands remain in the top five. The 2023 EIS report is the third edition published using the new measurement framework introduced in 2021.
The EIS divides the EU member states into four performance groups based on the measurement of their performance compared to the EU average. Belgium, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden are innovation leaders with innovation performance significantly above the EU average. Austria, Cyprus, France, Germany, Ireland and Luxembourg are strong innovators with performance above the EU average. As moderate innovators, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain perform below the EU average. Bulgaria, Croatia, Latvia, Poland, Romania and Slovakia are classed as emerging innovators with performance well below the EU average.
Most EU member states have increased their innovation performance by 8.5 percentage points since 2016. Cyprus, Estonia, Greece and the Czech Republic have seen the biggest performance increase, with a rise of 20 percentage points or more.
