R&D investing companies by country/region

The 2021 Scoreboard comprises the 2 500 companies investing the largest sums in R&D in the world in 2020. These companies, based in 39 countries, each invested over €36.5 million in R&D for a total of €908.9 billion, which is approximately 90% of the world's business-funded R&D.

Key figures by country/region

The 2500 companies raised their total R&D by a substantial 6.0% over the previous year, the ninth consecutive year of significant increases.
Worldwide, net sales experienced a significant decrease (-4.6%), probably due to the COVID-19 crisis.
The number of employees by the 2500 companies shows a little increase (+0.9%).

R&D investment

EU

The 401 EU companies invested €184.1bn in R&D, a decrease of -2.2% compared to the previous year.
The four largest R&D investing sectors (ICT producers, Health industries, ICT services and Automobiles & other transport) account for 77% of the total R&D of the 2500 companies.

WORLD

R&D is very much concentrated by country. The top 3, top 5 and top 10 countries account respectively for 66%, 79% and 93% of the total R&D investment.
The four largest R&D investing sectors (ICT producers, Health industries, ICT services and Automobiles & other transport) account for 77% of the total R&D of the 2500 companies.

R&D investment and net sales trends

Over the past 10 years, the R&D share of EU companies over the total R&D decreased slightly.

Volume of R&D investment

Over 10 years, top R&D investors increased R&D investment by 68%, net sales by 15% and employment by 16% . Figures refer to the database of 1527 companies for which data are available for the whole period.

Top 5 sector in terms of R&D

EU companies are leader in R&D investment in the Automobiles & other transport sector. On the other side, EU companies lags significantly behind the US in the ICT industries. US companies strengthened their position as world R&D investing leaders, increasing substantially their global R&D weight in ICT services and Health industries. These long time trends have been strengthened by the COVID-19 crises.

Green Tech

The global share of green inventions* in overall patenting activity is 8%. Among major economies, the EU is second, slightly behind South Korea, in terms of green patents over the total.