The brake from human capital and investment: Italia only 31st in innovation

Italy's distance from the leading countries emerges above all on the Human Capital front, where it ranks 33rd, penalised by the low number of Stem graduates and public spending on education; it also ranks 37th in terms of public investment in education in relation to GDP. There are also critical points as regards financial resources to support innovation, an area in which Italia ranks 30th: private investment in research and development is held back (they are worth 0.79% of GDP, while total investment rises to 1.38%), while venture capital stops at 0.03% of GDP.

The best performances come instead from the effectiveness of the innovative ecosystem and the industrial and scientific solidity of the country, which stands out for the quality of research, patents, manufacturing exports and the presence of strategic infrastructures such as supercomputers, an area in which Italia ranks 7th worldwide.

"These data,' says Valerio De Molli, Managing Partner & Ceo of The European House - Ambrosetti and Teha Group, 'confirm that the most competitive countries in the field of innovation are those that focus on human capital and research and development. Italia unfortunately continues to suffer from a structural delay on these very fronts. Our country allocates 4.07% of GDP to education, compared to 7.3% in Sweden, which leads the world in terms of human capital. Even on the university education front, the gap remains wide: in South Korea around 71% of young people have a university degree, while in Italia we are just over 31%. This translates into a lower availability of advanced skills, which are essential to support innovation and accompany the transformation of the industrial system. At the same time, however, Italia has strategic assets on which to build future growth: the quality of scientific research, the strength of its manufacturing exports, and technological infrastructures of excellence. Creating favourable conditions for the development of talent, innovative companies and private capital will therefore be essential if our country is to be able to compete again with the main global ecosystems. It is on these factors that industrial growth and employment will be played out in the coming years'.

In terms of the effectiveness of the innovation ecosystem, Italia confirms itself among the most solid countries internationally: with a score of 4.53 it is sixth in the world (ahead of Germany, France and China) for effectiveness in transforming research and innovation into concrete economic results. Leading the ranking are Singapore (4.85), Estonia (4.68) and Israel (4.64). The quality of scientific research also stands out: Italia is fifth in terms of the number of publications (around 814,000) and citations (around 4,365), indicators that measure the impact and international relevance of a country's academic production.

Italia also stands out for its trade balance in R&D services, where it ranks 6th worldwide with a balance of USD 3.71 billion, behind the United States (16.55), Canada (8.28), Israel (8.24), India (6.80) and the United Kingdom (5.94).

This parameter is relevant as it highlights a country's global competitiveness in the provision of advanced research services, an area closely linked to leadership in innovation.

Another strong point is computational capacity: Italia ranks 7th in the world in terms of supercomputer computing power thanks to the presence of some of the most advanced infrastructures (High Performance Computing) in the world, a strategic asset for artificial intelligence applications and the analysis of large volumes of data.

Finland leads the ranking with a value of 69.64 of supercomputer computing power per 1,000 inhabitants, followed by Switzerland (50) and the United States (20.47); Italia performs significantly, with a score of 15.08. Italia also performs satisfactorily on the international attractiveness front (Global Attractiveness Index): it is 15th (with a score of 60.30) on the basis of an index measuring its ability to attract investment, talent and innovation through parameters linked to international openness, efficiency and infrastructure endowment. Here the ranking is led by the United States, China and Germany.

In the 'Human Capital' macro-area, Italia ranks 33rd in the world (with a score of 3.35), slightly better than in 2023 but still far behind the leading countries: the ranking is led by Sweden (8.07), Denmark (7.25) and South Korea (7.01). One of the main factors penalising the country is the level of public investment in education. Italia is 37th in terms of public spending on education as a proportion of GDP (with 4.07%) compared to 7.32% in Sweden, 7.29% in Iceland and 6.38% in Finland.

Added to this is the delay on the university education front: only 31.58% of the population aged 25-34 have a university degree, a figure that places Italia 35th in the world, far behind South Korea (70.55%, more than twice as many as our country), Canada (68.86%) and the United Kingdom (60.32%).

The indicators related to technical-scientific skills also show a lag compared to the main international competitors: italia is 21st for the share of graduates in scientific disciplines (23.55% of the total number of graduates), against 35.5% in Germany, 30.95% in South Korea and 30.52% in Austria; it is also 27th for the presence of universities in the world's top 200 with just 6.98% of the universities ranked among the best in the world (far from the podium numbers: 69.23% in the Netherlands; 62.5% in Sweden; 60% in Denmark). Consequently, the performance related to the international attractiveness of the education and research system remains weak: the country is 30th for attractiveness to international students, with an inbound mobility rate of 4.84%, compared to 65% in the United Arab Emirates, 31.63% in Australia and 23.41% in the United Kingdom.

Even in terms of financial resources to support innovation, Italia stops at 30th position (with a score of 1.15, worsening compared to the 1.62 recorded in the 2023 index) in a ranking led by Israel (6.47), South Korea (4.96) and the United States (4.44). The limited level of private and public investment in research and development is the main factor

This delay in investment is also reflected in the development of technology start-ups: Italia is in fact only 34th in terms of the number of technology unicorns, with just 0.05 unicorns per million inhabitants, compared to 2.65 in Singapore, 2.21 in Israel and 2.11 in the United States.

Among the major weaknesses of the Italian innovation ecosystem is also the limited availability of advanced digital skills: Italia is among the least advanced countries in terms of the number of software developers, ranking 42nd with 28.79 developers per 1,000 inhabitants, less than a tenth of Singapore (297.19), and far behind the Netherlands (102.76) and Iceland (98.86).

Finally, its position in high-tech sectors is weak: it is only 35th in the share of high-tech exports and 33rd in the trade balance of high-tech products, with a negative balance between imports and exports, indicating a still significant technological dependence on foreign countries.