The European Innovation Scoreboard 2005 comes with a strengthened methodology and a revised list of 26 indicators (methodology report). It confirms that Sweden , Finland and Switzerland are the European innovation leaders, followed by Germany and Denmark . Most of the new member States are engaged in the catching up process, however following a low rhythm that will not allow for short-term convergence in Europe . In addition, would trends for the 25 Member States remain stable, the gap with the US will not close within the next 50 years.

The EIS 2005 comes with a new analysis of innovation efficiency, capturing how countries are good at transforming their innovation assets into innovation results (Innovation inputs and outputs) . Switzerland , Denmark , Germany , Ireland , Italy or the Netherlands are especially high performers in this respect. One possible explanation of their success is that most of them benefit from an above average innovation demand from their population, as measured by the Innobarometer 2005 (Innobarometer 2005 – Innovation readiness in Europe).

A particular emphasis has also been given to 5 key dimensions of innovation, which are further explored in the EIS (innovation drivers, knowledge creation, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Applications, IPR) (Five key dimensions of innovation) . Some new evidences show that an even performance on all dimensions is a positive driver for a strong overall innovation performance, therefore suggesting to rather investing in areas of marked weaknesses (Strengths and weaknesses).

These detailed statistical analyses are fully available in the EIS 2005 document and accompanying reports. They will directly contribute to the policy discussions aiming at strengthening the European Innovation Area.

All documents can be downlaoded under the scoreboard papers page

EIS country pages

Click on a country to access a list of country files from various EIS reports