Scotland’s latest innovation scorecard presents a divided picture. The 2026 update records improvement in high-growth businesses and later-stage equity investment, while patents granted, smaller risk-capital deals and the share of innovation-active businesses are assessed as worsening. Other measures, including research and development spending, academic income from business and community interactions, and business R&D jobs, are marked as maintaining.
The scorecard is the third annual update to Scotland’s National Innovation Strategy dashboard. It compares Scotland with UK regions and, where comparable information is available, international peers. Its figures should not be read as a single snapshot of one calendar year: the dashboard brings together data released on different schedules. The R&D spending and business R&D jobs measures relate to 2024, patents and equity measures to 2025, academic income to 2024/25, high-growth businesses to 2024, and innovation activity to the three years from 2022 to 2024.
Strengths are uneven across the dashboard
Research and development spending remains in the second quartile in both the UK and international comparisons. Business R&D jobs are also in the second UK quartile and first internationally. Academic income from business and community interactions is in the first UK quartile, although no international comparison is available for that measure.
These positions sit alongside two commercialisation measures marked as improving. High-growth businesses are assessed as improving, but remain in the fourth quartile among UK regions and the third quartile internationally. Later-stage equity investment is also marked as improving and is in the second UK quartile. That combination is a useful reminder that an improving trend does not necessarily mean a leading relative position.
At the less favourable end, patents granted are marked as worsening while remaining in the second quartile in both comparison groups. The scorecard also records worsening performance for risk-capital deals below £10 million, a measure intended to capture smaller equity rounds. Scotland remains in the second UK quartile for that indicator, with no international comparison shown.
Business innovation measure has moved down
The dashboard’s adoption measure gives the clearest recent numerical context. In the 2022 to 2024 period, 29.4 per cent of Scottish businesses covered by the survey were innovation active, down from 32.4 per cent in 2020 to 2022. The UK-wide figure for the latest period was 34.0 per cent. Scotland is placed in the fourth UK quartile and third internationally for this measure, which the 2026 update assesses as worsening.
For this survey, being innovation active is broader than holding a patent or operating a research laboratory. It includes introducing a new or improved product, undertaking new or improved business processes, or carrying out innovation projects that have not yet been completed or have been abandoned. The measure covers businesses with at least 10 employees in the relevant sectors, so it is an indicator of a defined part of the business population rather than a count of every firm in Scotland.
The same caution applies to the scorecard’s investment signals. A separate 2025 market benchmark recorded a record total value of equity investment in Scotland, but it was heavily influenced by one £445 million energy-storage deal. The scorecard’s worsening risk-capital indicator instead concerns deals below £10 million. The two measures cover different parts of the market, so a strong headline total does not by itself settle the picture for early-stage fundraising.
A diagnostic, not a single verdict
The update does not announce a new funding programme or a change in policy. Its value is as a diagnostic across the route from investment and research to commercial growth and the spread of innovation through businesses. The mixed outcome points to areas of relative resilience, including R&D employment and later-stage finance, but also to weaker momentum in smaller funding rounds, patents and business innovation activity.
Future scorecards will need to show whether the improvement labels for commercialisation are sustained and whether the decline in innovation-active businesses can be reversed. Because the indicators use different datasets, populations and reference years, they cannot on their own establish why a measure has moved. They do, however, provide a structured way to track whether Scotland’s research, finance and business-innovation systems are strengthening together rather than in isolation.
