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Innovation Ranking

North Data publishes the most innovative companies and research institutions in Germany every year. The number of registered patents, the number and volume of research projects and also trademark registrations are used to calculate the ranking. All of these key figures are indicators of the innovative strength of large and established companies, which includes the ability to manage research projects, to obtain funding for them, to secure a market position through patents and finally to establish new products on the market, which can be seen in the trademark registrations.

Below we present the winners of the year and the top 50 in the table for the two categories of business and research. Finally, we explain the calculation basis and offer the raw data for free download.

All countries
Germany
France
United Kingdom

Winners

Winners Commercial
2025
Rolls-Royce plc Nicoventures Trading Ltd. Jaguar Land Rover Ltd.
Winners Research
2025
King's College London UNIVERSITY University of Southampton Oxford University Innovation Ltd.

Top 50

Rank Company Patent
applications 		Funded
projects 		Funding
Amount (EUR) 		Trademark
applications 		Score
1
Rolls-Royce plc 235 7 44,990,880 1 78.94
2
Nicoventures Trading Ltd. 149 0 0 87 32.82
3
Jaguar Land Rover Ltd. 58 5 7,650,249 203 28.99
4
Unilever Global IP Ltd. 146 0 0 2 28.06
5
Imagination Technologies Ltd. 109 0 0 1 20.92
6
Airbus Operations Ltd. 91 2 1,779,750 0 19.72
7
NPL Management Ltd. 2 27 468,022 0 15.70
8
Imperial Tobacco Ltd. 66 0 0 50 15.10
9
British Telecommunications plc 58 3 243,995 3 13.08
10
BAE Systems plc 64 1 0 1 12.86
11
Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult Ltd. 1 7 8,963,269 0 10.06
12
Centre for Process Innovation Ltd. 0 14 2,590,780 1 9.55
13
Johnson Matthey plc 29 5 1,292,911 3 9.34
14
GKN Aerospace Services Ltd. 1 3 9,475,770 0 8.18
15
Sony Interactive Entertainment Europe Ltd. 34 0 0 30 7.99
16
Astrazeneca UK Ltd. 0 12 1,445,872 2 7.73
17
Intelligent Energy Ltd. 4 2 8,204,766 1 7.40
18
ARM Ltd. 31 1 0 14 7.18
19
Edwards Ltd. 33 1 354,818 0 7.11
20
Dyson Technology Ltd. 18 0 0 73 7.04
21
Micromass UK Ltd. 35 0 0 4 6.90
22
Genome Research Ltd. 4 8 1,834,292 0 6.43
23
Imperial Tobacco Group Ltd. 25 0 0 24 5.97
24
Coopervision International Ltd. 29 0 0 5 5.80
25
J.C. Bamford Excavators Ltd. 25 0 0 13 5.43
26
Ocado Innovation Ltd. 28 0 0 1 5.41
27
Convatec Ltd. 26 0 0 1 5.03
28
Renishaw plc 23 1 0 0 4.96
29
Bentley Motors Ltd. 1 0 0 96 4.92
30
Mclaren Automotive Ltd. 23 0 0 3 4.55
31
Evolito Ltd. 4 1 4,307,999 0 4.19
32
Quantum Motion Technologies Ltd. 3 3 2,508,908 0 3.91
33
T.J.Smith and Nephew Ltd. 17 0 0 4 3.45
34
Innospec Ltd. 15 0 0 11 3.41
35
Kohler Mira Ltd. 16 0 0 7 3.41
36
Siemens Mobility Ltd. 10 2 110,881 2 3.20
37
Perkins Engines Company Ltd. 15 0 0 1 2.92
38
Optos plc 14 0 0 4 2.88
39
Pilkington Group Ltd. 13 0 0 7 2.83
40
Nomad Foods Europe Ltd. 2 0 0 49 2.80
41
Johnson Matthey Davy Technologies Ltd. 9 1 407,212 0 2.55
42
Alloyed Ltd. 0 3 1,201,014 1 2.52
43
Haleon UK IP Ltd. 2 0 0 43 2.50
44
Subsea 7 Ltd. 12 0 0 4 2.49
45
Assa Abloy Ltd. 8 0 0 18 2.42
46
Ipsen Biopharm Ltd. 5 0 0 29 2.39
47
Qinetiq Ltd. 6 2 0 0 2.26
48
Apoha Ltd. 3 2 777,437 0 2.20
49
FOX International Group Ltd. 3 0 0 30 2.05
50
Mbda UK Ltd. 9 0 0 6 2.02
Rank Organisation Patent
applications 		Funded
projects 		Funding
Amount (EUR) 		Trademark
applications 		Score
1
King's College London UNIVERSITY 17 91 83,876,902 0 64.51
2
University of Southampton 11 95 98,246,981 0 60.81
3
Oxford University Innovation Ltd. 31 0 0 1 47
4
University of Leeds 2 96 82,320,792 1 45.04
5
Imperial College of Science Technology and Medicine 0 87 45,837,265 1 29.59
6
The University of Birmingham 4 43 40,572,724 0 24.91
7
Swansea University 1 30 47,618,180 1 22.68
8
The University of Manchester 9 29 15,689,641 0 22.39
9
United Kingdom Research AND Innovation 3 18 43,106,627 0 20.33
10
University of Warwick 2 39 30,819,271 0 18.41
11
University of Bristol 1 40 33,582,004 0 17.96
12
Queen Mary University of London 7 21 13,217,408 0 17.48
13
London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine 1 29 33,526,765 0 16.22
14
Aston University 1 38 15,288,961 2 16.06
15
University OF Exeter 2 31 25,741,002 0 15.61
16
University of Lancaster 1 12 5,575,413 5 15.03
17
The Queen's University of Belfast 6 14 6,442,207 1 14.86
18
University of Edinburgh 3 20 16,551,939 1 14.53
19
The University of Liverpool 6 18 7,870,464 0 13.93
20
University of York 1 26 22,611,686 0 12.42
21
University of Leicester 5 20 6,243,196 0 12.29
22
Queen Mary University of London 4 18 12,005,772 0 12.28
23
University of Strathclyde 2 17 7,983,522 2 12.00
24
Newcastle University 3 19 11,435,506 0 10.82
25
THE University OF Sheffield 5 10 5,737,550 0 10.57
26
Cranfield University 6 6 2,877,606 0 10.53
27
City St George's, University of London 0 10 2,394,694 4 10.29
28
Cardiff University 1 25 13,888,536 0 9.60
29
University OF Surrey Company Inc. by Roya Charter (England/Wale 4 10 6,042,876 0 9.21
30
The Francis Crick Institute Ltd. 1 16 13,642,825 0 8.12
31
The Open University 0 16 9,217,832 1 7.31
32
Heriot-Watt University 3 11 4,043,316 0 7.31
33
University of Durham 1 15 10,660,648 0 7.05
34
University OF Northumbria AT Newcastle HIGHER EDUCATION CORPORATION 0 6 1,956,955 2 5.54
35
University OF Sussex 2 8 4,477,024 0 5.52
36
University of Lancashire 3 4 1,043,593 0 5.30
37
Oxford Brookes University 3 2 723,774 0 4.89
38
Brunel University London 1 14 4,023,531 0 4.87
39
Bangor University 1 7 4,526,539 0 3.93
40
University OF Plymouth CORPORATION 1 7 4,139,024 0 3.81
41
University OF THE West OF England, Bristol UK UNIVERSITY 2 4 519,078 0 3.69
42
University of Bradford Union 1 8 1,258,967 0 3.09
43
The Pirbright Institute 1 4 2,441,804 0 2.82
44
Royal Holloway and Bedford New College 1 5 1,482,960 0 2.69
45
The University of Huddersfield 1 3 719,595 0 2.14

Calculation basis

The following four performance indicators are taken into account when calculating the score:

Indicator Sources Weight
Patents Epobase 45 %
Number of public fundings Fts Ukri Sat Hor 15 %
Total public funding Fts Ukri Sat Hor 30 %
Trademarks Euipotm Euipods 10 %

The highest value achieved for each key figure in the period under review is set as the maximum point value of 100. The two categories Economy and Research are evaluated separately. The period under review was the year 2025.

The performance indicators used are available together with financial figures as Deep Data Finance/Marketing/Tech via the North Data's Data Services.

An evaluation is required and only carried out if the respective organization is entered in the sources with the correct name and registered office. Subsequent changes are not permitted.

Data

Download
Download the data of the respective category in CSV/Excel format.
Commercial Research

Creative Commons License The innovation ranking data is provided by North Data and may be reused under the terms of the Creative Commons CC-BY license.