South Korea and Taiwan storm up R&D league

South Korea and Taiwan have emerged as two of the world’s technology development powerhouses according to the government’s latest analysis of R&D investment by UK companies and their competitors around the world.

The aggressive research-led strategy of the two south-east Asian nations was one of the key themes of the DTI’s 15th annual R&D Scoreboard, which ranks the world’s 1,000 biggest companies by R&D investment, as well as the top 750 in the UK.

Encouragingly, the study revealed that since 2001 many more UK companies have become ‘R&D vigorous’ — classed as those spending more than four per cent of sales on research-related activities.

But Dr Mike Tubbs of the DTI’s Innovation Group said the significant growth in R&D in South Korea and Taiwan, which between them now contribute 33 companies to the global 1,000, was the surprise package of this year’s analysis.

South Korea is now the eighth highest nation on the scoreboard, with overall R&D as a country up by 40 per cent. This was helped by the likes of Hyundai, which more than doubled its R&D investment to £976m, and Samsung (£2.5bn, up 37 per cent).