National Innovation Strategy: Scorecard (2024 Update)

9. Innovation Active Businesses

9.1 Ecosystem

• Adoption

9.2 Performance Assessment

• Performance Worsening

9.3 Description

• Innovation Active Businesses is a measure of the percentage of Scottish businesses (with 10 or more employees) that meet the OECD definition of being “Innovation Active" over a three-year period.
• A Scottish business is classified as “Innovation Active" if it conducts one of the following activities in the survey period:

1) Introduces a new or improved product (goods or services)

2) Initiates a business processes used to produce or supply goods or services that the business has introduced, regardless of origin; these innovations may be new to business or new to the market

3) Engages in innovation projects not yet completed or abandoned

9.4 Timeseries

• Like trends across the UK, the share of Scottish firms Innovation Active is broadly down since 2012-14, with a part recovery in the share of business Innovation Active in 2018-20, before falling back again.

9.5 Current Performance

• In the latest Scotland results for the UK Innovation Survey (2020-22), 32.4% of Scottish businesses report they are Innovation Active.
• The only other survey period since 2008 to report a lower share of Scottish businesses Innovation Active was 2016-18.

9.6 Previous Year Performance

• During the 2018-20 innovation survey period, 39.0% of Scottish businesses were Innovation Active.
• The share of Scottish firms reporting there were innovation active fell by 6.6 percentage points to the latest survey period: 2020-22.

9.7 UK Regional Benchmark

• Scotland ranks 10^th for share of business Innovation Active.

9.8 International Benchmark

• Comparing to lagged OECD comparable data, Scotland ranks 25^th out of 40 nations.

9.9 About the Data

• Current Dataset: Scottish Government (SG): UK innovation survey 2023 – Results for Scotland (Released 19 June 2024)
• Next Release: June 2026