The 2011 EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard (Draft) has been published within the context of the Industrial Research Monitoring and Analysis (IRMA) activities that are jointly carried out by the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) - Institute for Prospective Technological Studies (IPTS) and the Directorate General for Research and Innovation, Directorate C. IRMA activities aim to improve the understanding of industrial R&D and Innovation in the EU and to identify medium and long-term policy implications.

Comments and inputs can be sent by email to: JRC-IPTS-IRI@ec.europa.eu
More information on Industrial Research and Innovation (IRMA) is available at: http://iri.jrc.ec.europa.eu/
and http://ec.europa.eu/invest-in-research/index_en.htm

Summary

The 2011 "EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard" (hereafter the Scoreboard) contains economic and financial data of the world's top 1400 companies ranked by their investments in research and development (R&D).
Each of these companies invested more than about €30 million in R&D in 2010, and 400 were headquartered in the EU and 1000 elsewhere. The data are drawn from the latest available companies' accounts, i.e. the fiscal year 20101. While last year's Scoreboard companies' figures reflected the big impact of the crisis that started in 2008, this year’s figures show considerable signs of recovery although companies still have to deal with a challenging economic environment. The willingness of many of the top R&D investing firms to increase R&D investment underline the role R&D plays to maintain or enhance competitiveness. (...)