The Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN collectively almost doubled its share of the world's research papers (scientific literature), and increased its patenting activity, a common industry measure of innovation, by more than 40 percent in the last three years. These are just some of the key findings from the 'ASEAN – The Emerging Research and Innovation Hub' report produced by the Intellectual Property & Science (IP & Science) business of Thomson Reuters, which suggests that the ASEAN region is becoming a hub of research and innovation activity.
This research report, the latest in a series focusing on groups of nations, aims to provide an overview and analysis of the ASEAN countries' research focus and impact in research and innovation based on scientific publication and patenting activity as indexed in the Web of Science Core Collection, Derwent World Patents Index® and Derwent Patents Citation Index®.
Some key findings note that the ASEAN group has nearly doubled its share of the world's scientific literature as indexed in the Web of Science, from 1.37% in 2006 to 2.43% in 2015. Compared to a roughly 50% increase globally, the total research output of the ASEAN countries has almost tripled in the past 10 years. Malaysia, Brunei and Vietnam have all sharply increased their output of research papers in the last decade, with each posting gains of at least 300% between 2006 and 2015. Patenting activity from the ASEAN group has increased more than 40% in the last three years. The ASEAN region is making progress in terms of home-grown innovation. Patent filings by domestic organisations as a proportion of total filings has risen from less than 9% in 2005 to nearly 12.5% in 2014, suggesting that the ASEAN nations' investment in their own R&D efforts is beginning to yield benefits. The technology concentration of the ASEAN group, as reflected in patents, is focused more towards the chemical, agricultural and medicinal sectors and less toward semiconductors and telecommunications.
ASEAN is made up of 10 nations that are bound by geographic proximity and are diverse in many ways including their populations, wealth and geography. The regional research output is dominated by research communities in Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand, which have accounted for 85% of the region's research publications followed by a second group comprising Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines.
Over the past 10 years, each of the ASEAN member countries has increased its output faster than the global average, the USA and the European Union.
This survey of publication and patenting activity suggests that science and technology indicators for ASEAN are pointing in the right direction toward the region increasing its research and innovation impact to achieve more sustainable economic growth.
Interested parties may visit http://stateofinnovation.thomsonreuters.com/asean-an-emerging-hub-in-research-and-innovation to download the report.
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