Measuring the internationalisation of EU corporate R&D: a novel complementary use of statistical sources

The report summarises the main results of a research activity aimed at testing a novel approach for the measurement of EU business RD on the other hand, data collected from companies' annual reports and accounts (as in the EU Industrial RD ii) to test the robustness of the novel methodology through an analysis applied to four EU countries (Belgium, Finland, Germany and Italy); iii) to provide indications of possible further research and follow up activities. The main results from the project are as follows: - BERD and Scoreboard values, though addressing slightly different concepts, are comparable and can be used in a complementary way. - Data regarding top EU R&D performers (that is, companies included in Scoreboard rankings who are the active part of the R&D internationalisation process) have to be considered from the starting point of such complementary use, instead of as final data at the country level resulting from official statistics. - Using top R&D performers? global values and adding aggregate values from national R&D statistics allows novel insights on the R&D internationalisation process to be given, at least for the four EU countries involved. - Further research could rely on the forthcoming Euro-Group Register under development at EUROSTAT, to obtain a clear view of intra-EU cross-country R&D flows.