India is 60th most-innovative country globally: GII rankings

India moved up six spots to feature in the top-half of the Global Innovation Index (GII) in 2017. From the 66th position in 2016, India now ranks 60th among 127 countries in the world with top-ranking in Central and South Asia. While Switzerland, Sweden, the Netherlands, the US and the UK lead the 2017 GII rankings, China too moved three places to 22 from 25th last year.

The rankings released by Cornell University, INSEAD and World Intellectual Property Organisation, shows India's rise as an emerging innovation centre in Asia.  Notably, India improved its rankings in five segments such as Institutions (up 4 spots to 92nd), Infrastructure (up 14 spots to 73rd), Business sophistication (up 2 spots to 55th), Knowledge and technology outputs (up 5 spots to 38th), and Creative outputs (up 9 spots 85th). The report also mentioned about the impact of information technology (IT) in unlocking value for the grassroots level in areas such as mobile payments or health.

The report also highlighted the continual improvement of India in terms of investment, tertiary education, quality of its publications and universities, its ICT services exports and innovation clusters. It also pointed at country's potential to improve on indicators such as business environment (121st).

The report said India’s current and imminent development, and its contribution to the region and the global innovation landscape is vital these days with the country consistently outperforming on innovation relative to its GDP per capita. “It is to be hoped that India will continue on this trajectory, with innovation investments leading to more and more dynamic R&D-intensive firms that are active in patenting, high-technology production, and exports. If India then increasingly connects its innovation system to the innovative countries in the East, as well as to standing innovation powerhouses in the West, it will make a true difference in Asia’s regional role in innovation, and to global innovation more generally,” it said.

Every year, the GII surveys some 130 economies using dozens of metrics, from patent filings to education spending, providing decision makers with a high-level look at the innovative activity that increasingly drives economic and social growth.

The overall GII score is the simple average of the Input and Output Sub-Index scores.  The Innovation Input SubIndex is comprised of five input pillars that capture elements of the national economy that enable innovative activities: (1) Institutions, (2) Human capital and research, (3) Infrastructure, (4) Market sophistication, and (5) Business sophistication. The Innovation Output SubIndex, on the other hand, provides information about outputs that are the results of innovative activities within the economy. There are two output pillars: (6) Knowledge and technology outputs and (7) Creative outputs.