Global Technological Impact in Cross-Country Comparison

We introduce a conceptual framework of global technological impact that assesses a country’s unilateral impact on another country’s knowledge base and, in turn, derives its bilateral and global impact. To implement this framework empirically, we develop novel measures of technological impact using citation data from International Search Reports (ISR) in the universe of Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) applications over the past two decades. For the leading innovating countries, we document substantial heterogeneity in positions along the spectrum from technological independence to dependence. The US exhibits the highest level of global technological independence, followed by Japan and Korea, while Europe and China are globally dependent. Over time, the US and Korea remain relatively stable, Japan declines after an earlier increase, Europe increases gradually, and China shows the largest increase from a low initial level. Additional analysis based on international trade data shows that China has reached a leading position, highlighting an important difference between innovation and production.

Müller, Elisabeth and Philipp Böing (2024), Global Technological Impact in Cross-Country Comparison, ZEW Discussion Paper No. 24-024, Mannheim.