Swedish owned enterprise groups conducted R&D worldwide for SEK 76 billion in 2015. This was an increase of nearly SEK 2 billion compared to 2013, at the 2015 price level. The expenditure for R&D in Sweden was SEK 39 billion, a decrease compared to 2013.

The Swedish-owned international enterprise groups carried out R&D for SEK 37 billion abroad, primarily in Europe, Asia and North America. The R&D expenditures in North America increased compared to 2013 but in other parts of the world, the R&D expenditure was about at the same level as in 2013.

R&D in foreign (formerly Swedish) enterprise groups

In 2015 the surveyed foreign-owned enterprise groups’ expenditures were nearly SEK 32 billion in Sweden. The number of R&D person years carried out in the foreign-owned enterprise groups’ amounted to 16 000 in 2015.

R&D in Sweden

The business enterprise sector had the largest R&D expenditure, SEK 95 billion, corresponding to 70 percent of Sweden’s total R&D expenditure in 2015. The higher education sector had the second largest R&D expenditure, amounting to SEK 37 billion, or 27 percent of total R&D expenditure in 2015. The share of R&D expenditure in the government sector was 3 percent, while R&D in the private non-profit sector accounted for less than one percent of Swedish R&D expenditure. Foreign-owned companies carried out about 42 percent of R&D-activities in the Swedish business sector in 2015, an increase compared to 2013. The largest proportions of foreign-owned companies' R&D expenditure in Sweden came from firms, where the parent companies of the group, were located in the UK, Germany, the United States and Netherlands.