Denmark remains a leading innovative country in European rankings

Denmark is ranked as one of the leading innovative EU countries, only surpassed by Sweden. Denmark also ranked as the second most innovative country in 2015.

Figure 1: EU countries innovation results

The report shows that the most innovative countries perform best in many different areas, which reflects a well-balanced national research and innovation system.

This year's report contains future analysis of EU innovation results for the first time, accounting for the latest trends and projections. There is an overall expectation that the EU innovation index will increase significantly by about 2.5 per cent in the coming two years. Meanwhile globally, the EU continues to be less innovative than South Korea, USA and Japan, but the difference in achieved results compared to the latter two countries has decreased. However, South Korea has been able to improve its results at a much faster rate than the EU during the last eight years. The EU continues to achieve significantly better results than many other countries, including China. China is catching up with the EU, particularly with its growth rate which is five times greater than that of the EU.

• Download the report from the European Commission's website [inaktivt link]