Press Release: EU companies must boost R&D investment to stay globally competitive

Investment in research and development by companies based in the EU grew by 2.6% in 2013, despite the unfavourable economic environment. However, this growth has slowed in comparison to the previous year's 6.8%. It is also below the 2013 world average (4.9%), and lags behind companies based in the US (5%) and Japan (5.5%).

These results were published on the 4 December 2014 in the European Commission's 2014 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard, which analyses the top 2500 companies worldwide, representing about 90% of the total business R&D expenditure. Data show that EU-based companies (633) invested €162.4 billion in 2013, whereas US-based companies (804) invested €193.7 billion and the 387 Japanese ones €85.6 billion.

European Commission: RAPID: MEMO/14/2347: World trends in R&D private investment. Facts and figures http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEMO-14-2347_en.htm

European Commission: IRI: Scoreboard: Scoreboard 2014 http://iri.jrc.ec.europa.eu/scoreboard14.html

European Commission: IRI: Survey: Survey 2014 http://iri.jrc.ec.europa.eu/survey14.html

European Commission: Horizon 2020 http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/

European Commission: 10 Priorities: Jobs, growth, investment: Investment Plan http://ec.europa.eu/priorities/jobs-growth-investment/plan/index_en.htm

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