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Recent EU’s industrial R&D investment scoreboard-2025 (published annually since 2004), provides data on economic and financial aspects of thousands world’s top R&D investors and the EU-based companies; it accounts for over 90% of global corporate-funded R&D. Such factors as slowing productivity, demographic challenges, rising energy costs and increased global competition are putting pressure on Europe’s long-term prosperity. At the same time, the green and digital transitions demand unprecedented levels of investment and innovation.
Background
EU companies drove strong research and development (R&D) growth in energy, health, aerospace and defence, according to the 2025 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard, highlights European leadership in key industries; it also underscores the intense pressure from global competition, particularly in the information and Communication technologies (ICT).
In 2024, the EU’s leading industrial R&D investors in the electricity and renewable energy sectors increased their R&D investment by 19.8% and capital expenditure by 17.8%, which is a positive step toward achieving the goals of the EU-wide Clean Industrial Deal.
In the health sector, leading firms increased R&D investment by 13 %, which is a significantly higher growth rate than in other parts of the world. Additionally, European aerospace and defence firms are investing 4.8% more to increase Europe’s defence readiness.
These results, published in the present scoreboard, offer key insights into global research and development dynamics. The 2025 edition of ‘The EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard’ monitors and analyses industrial research and development investment trends in the context of the EU’s 3% of GDP R&D investment policy target and the related policy initiatives by the European Competitiveness Compass.
More on the Scoreboard in: Nindl, E., Napolitano, L., Confraria, H., Rentocchini, F., Fako, P. et al., “The 2025 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard”, – Publication Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 2025, https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2760/7802619, JRC144638.
Strengthening European innovation capacity
In order to respond to global competition and reinforce Europe’s innovation ecosystem, the Commission is advancing several initiatives aligned with the EU Competitiveness Compass, including:
= The EU Startup and Scaleup Strategy, to make Europe a top destination for launching and growing global tech companies;
= The European Innovation Act and the 28th Regime, expected in 2026;
= The European Strategy on Research and Technology Infrastructures, improving companies’ access to world-class infrastructures and R&D support;
= The European AI in Science Strategy with the Resource for AI Science in Europe (RAISE), equipping scientists with the resources to adopt AI for their research.
Accelerating these initiatives is essential to help innovative ventures scale up, particularly where Europe must bolster its sovereignty and technological leadership.
As the Commissioner for Startups, Research and Innovation (E. Zaharieva) notes, the EU “Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard-2025” ensures that “new technologies are developed, deployed and scaled across the member states”. She adds, however, that in the EU’s economy “energy is the fastest growing sector in R&D investments”: hence the states and the EU “must strengthen innovation systems and boost startups and SMEs so that they can contribute to competitiveness and prosperity”.
Source and citation from: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_25_3119
Innovative companies: modern account
The issues of corporate innovative patterns do not have a commonly shared concept, as it includes various factors, such as “driving” economic growth, job creation and technological progress. Knowing their number is crucial to inform policies aiming at supporting their emergence and growth to contribute to the prosperity and wellbeing of our economy and society.
Building on its experience collecting, monitoring, analysing and reporting on research and innovation activities, the EU has produced an estimation of innovative firms in Europe: those that dedicate to R&D more than 10% of their total operating costs.
For example, in 2023, the US share of total R&D investment increased from 42.3% to 43% (e.g. the calculations did not include the “Amazon factor”), however, the EU share decreased from
18.7% to 17.8%, while China and Japan remained basically unchanged at 17.1% and 8.3%, and the “rest of the world” – slightly from 13.5% to 13.7%.
The Scoreboard-2023, in the issue commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Scoreboard, covered over 6 600 individual companies and has had data on financial information.
More in: https://iri.jrc.ec.europa.eu/scoreboard/2024-eu-industrial-rd-investment-scoreboard
General reference to: https://iri.jrc.ec.europa.eu/innovative-firms
The EU’s 235,000 innovative SMEs and 6,000 innovative mid-caps, have a combined workforce of about 7 million workers; 75,000 startups employ 500.000 workers while 4,500 innovative small mid-caps, 1,5 million workers.
Innovative SMEs and mid-caps employ 3,5% of EU’s workforce; the growth systems they create and the labour mobility across firms are key for knowledge creation and diffusion in the EU.
Additional source: https://commission.europa.eu/topics/competitiveness/draghi-report_en
The coreboard-2025 key findings
The 2025 Scoreboard analyses the world’s top 2 000 industrial R&D investors, responsible for over 90% of R&D performed by the business sector globally, based on the financial information in the latest published audited accounts of firms.
It also includes: – analyses of the main global trends and benchmarks among the EU’s top R&D investing companies against global competitors; – provides details by sectors and shows a subsample of the EU’s top 800 R&D investing firms; – revealing the R&D’s internationalisation in key green technologies.
The following are the main findings in selected sectors:
= EU strategic strengths: EU companies sharply increased R&D in energy (19.8%), far exceeding growth in the US (6%), Japan (-14.2%) and China (3.8%). In health, EU growth (13%) significantly outpaced the US (7.1%), Japan (9.1%) and China (0.1%). Aerospace and defence also recorded a 4.8% rise.
= Innovation hubs: Most R&D investment by the top 800 EU companies occurs in countries classified as ‘strong innovators’ (Austria, Belgium, Estonia, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg). This highlights the potential of supportive ecosystems to grow R&D-intensive companies.
= Global momentum is slowing down: The world’s top 2,000 companies invested €1,442.6 billion in R&D in 2024 (+6.3%). Growth was strongest in the US (+7.8%) and the rest of the world (+8.1%), followed by Japan (+7.1%). The EU (+2.9%) and China (+3.9%) saw more modest increases.
= Sectorial focus: Four sectors – ICT software, ICT hardware, health and automotive account for over 80% of the total investment. US firms lead in ICT and health; EU firms remain global leaders in automotive.
The European Strategy on Research and Technology Infrastructures, which was adopted earlier this year, will also play a key role in helping companies obtain world-class support for their R&D efforts. The framework conditions for R&D investments will be further improved with the European Research Area Act, European Innovation Act as well as the Advanced Materials Act, all of which are planned for 2026.
Source: https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC144638