China’s R&D spending jumps 11.5 times over past decade

Korea ranked No. 5 in terms of the amount of research and development (R&D) investments by the country’s businesses in 2023, with Samsung Electronics standing as the world’s top R&D investor in the chip industry, a report on the world’s top 2,000 investors showed on Wednesday.

According to the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s (KCCI) analysis of the European Union’s Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard, Korean companies included in the list invested 42.5 billion euros ($44.1 billion) in 2023, trailing behind the United States, China, Germany and Japan.

Compared to that of 2013, the country’s R&D investment grew 2.2 times from 19.3 billion euros, pushing up the rankings two spots from No. 7 to No. 5.

During the same period, however, the number of Korean companies included in the top 2,000 R&D investor list declined from 54 to 40, as 405 Chinese firms made their entry into the list over the past decade.

Among countries, China showed the most noticeable improvement. In 2013, China ranked eighth in total amount of investment with 18.8 billion euros, but jumped to world No. 2 in 2023 with 215.8 billion euros, achieving an 11.5 times growth.

In the chip industry, Samsung Electronics led the pack with 19.9 billion euros of R&D investment in 2023, doubling from that of 2013. During the past decade, Nvidia showed the sharpest growth in R&D investment, surging 8.2 times from 960 million euros to 7.9 billion euros. It was followed by SK hynix with 6.7 times, AMD with 6.1 times and MediaTek with 5.1 times.

In the software and platform industry, Meta showed the sharpest growth at 32.4 times to 33.2 billion euros, followed by Tencent with 15 times and Salesforce with 10.1 times. Among Korean firms, Naver showed a two-fold growth to 1.4 billion euros during the 10-year period.

“As competition among companies for leading technologies intensifies across industries, it is crucial for Korea to enhance tax incentives for advanced R&D facility investments,” a KCCI official said.

“At the same time, the government and the National Assembly need to introduce proactive measures, such as the Semiconductor Special Act pending at the Assembly, so that the country can establish a regulatory environment that encourages companies to actively invest in R&D.”

Nam Hyun-woo, Korea ranks No. 5 in global R&D investment – The Korea Times, 5th February 2025