TEHRAN –The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has published the Global Innovation Index (GII) report based on which Iran’s innovation capabilities are ranked in seven criteria that include institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure, market sophistication, business sophistication, knowledge and technology output, and creative output.

Iran is ranked 133 in Institutions globally. In this category the country’s global rankings in Operational stability for business, Government effectiveness, Rule of law, Business environment, Entrepreneurship policies and culture were130,120, 118, 128, and 85, respectively.

In Human capital and research criterion, the country is placed 64. It ranked 93, 109, 67, 66, and 96 in Education, Expenditure on education, Government funding/pupil, School life expectancy, and Pupil-teacher ratio, respectively.

Iran’s ranking in Tertiary education, Graduates in science & engineering, Research and development (R&D), and Researchers is 35, 8, 48, and 47, respectively.

The global ranking of the country in Infrastructure is 95. It ranked 5 in Gross capital formation, and 50 in General infrastructure.

In Market sophistication criteria, with a global ranking of 17, Iran is placed 70, 58, and 19 in Finance for startups and scaleups, Domestic industry diversification, Domestic market scale, and Market capitalization. 

In Business sophistication, Iran is ranked 110. It is ranked 86 in Females employed with advanced degrees, 82 in Public Research-Industry co-publications, 121 in University-industry R&D collaboration, 55 in Research talent, and percent in businesses.

Iran has been ranked 49 in knowledge and technology outputs. In Labor productivity growth, Production and export complexity, Software spending, ICT services exports / total trade, it is ranked 68, 72, 3, and 125, respectively.

Within creative output criteria, Iran is ranked 52.  Under this category, the country is placed 23 in Intangible assets,1st in Trademarks by origin, 59 in Entertainment and media market, 93 in Mobile app creation, 74 in Creative goods exports, and 102 in Creative goods and services.

According to the 2024 edition of the Global Innovation Index (GII) report, Iran ranks second among the countries of the Central and Southern Asian region, unchanged compared with the last two years.

India and Kazakhstan ranked first and third, respectively. According to this year’s report, Iran ranks 5th among the 38 lower-middle-income group economies, which has improved compared to the 2023 ranking, 6th.

However, the country’s ranking, among the 133 economies featured in the GII 2024, has dropped from 62 in 2023 to 64th this year.

Switzerland secured the first rank in the GII 2024 report with a score of 67.5 for the 14th consecutive year, closely followed by Sweden and the US at the second and third positions with scores of 64.5 and 62.4, respectively.

As stated in the 2024 edition, over the past four years (2020-2024), the statistical confidence interval for the ranking of Iran in the GII 2024 is between ranks 56 and 80.

Iran performs better in innovation outputs (48th) than in innovation inputs (85th) in 2024.

Iran’s ranking in knowledge and technology output, as well as business sophistication, has improved from 55 and 117 in 2023 to 49 and 110 in 2024, respectively.

Also, the country’s ranking in market sophistication and infrastructure has risen by two positions from 19 and 97 in 2023 to 17 and 95 in 2024.

However, Iran’s ranking in creative output, human research, and capital, as well as institutions has lowered compared to 2023.

GII 2023

According to the 2023 edition of the Global Innovation Index (GII) report, the Islamic Republic of Iran ranked second among the countries of the Central and Southern Asian region.

The report ranked Iran 19th, 43rd, and 55th in “Market sophistication”, “Creative outputs”, and “Knowledge and technology outputs”, respectively.

The GII 2023 used 80 indicators to track global innovation trends in 130-plus economies, guiding policymakers and business leaders in stimulating human ingenuity. The report’s findings were unveiled against a background of slow economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, high interest rates, and geopolitical conflict.

The 2023 edition identified an increasingly uncertain outlook for venture capital (VC) that helps transform human ingenuity into new products and services, with the global value of VC funding marking a significant plunge last year.

According to the GII 2023 rankings, Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Singapore were the top countries.

China, India, Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Iran were the middle-income economies making the most headway in innovation over the last decade.

In knowledge and technology outputs, creative outputs, market sophistication, human capital, and research, and infrastructure, Iran’s performance was above the average of the lower middle-income group.

On the other hand, Iran performed above the regional average (Central and South Asia) in all these indexes, except for the infrastructure.

Under the 6.2.2 index, which was presented in the 2022 report under the title of “New Businesses” and in the new report under the title of “Unicorn Valuation”, Iran’s rank had risen from 90 in 2022 to 48 in 2023.

Iran had no data for 10 out of 80 indicators evaluated and 18 indicators were not up-to-date, which requires inter-institutional coordination with the evaluator institution to include a more accurate and realistic assessment of the country’s state of innovation development.

Iran’s main innovation strengths are Trademark by origin (rank 1) graduates in science and engineering (rank 3),  Market capitalization ( rank 5), gross capital formation (rank 9), industrial designs (11), and intangible assets (13).

MT/MG