R&D in Sweden

The business enterprise sector accounted for 69 percent of the total R&D expenditures in Sweden 2011. The higher education sector represented 27 percent and the government sector R&D accounted for 4 percent of the remaining portion. Business enterprise sector R&D is highly concentrated in a small number of large international enterprise groups.

Swedish owned enterprise groups R&D

Swedish owned enterprise groups conducted R&D worldwide for 76.1 billion kronor in 2011. It was a decrease of nearly 1.5 billion compared to 2009. The enterprise group’s expenditure for R&D in Sweden was 42.2 billion kronor, which was an increase from 2009 and represented 55 percent of the enterprise group’s total R&D expenditure. The studied enterprise groups accounted for 52 percent of the business enterprise sectors R&D ex-penditure in Sweden.

Decrease of R&D in Europe

In 2011, the enterprise groups performed R&D for 33.8 billion crowns abroad and it was subsidiaries in Europe, Asia and North America, which accounted for the majority of ex-penditures. The enterprise group’s R&D expenditure rose in Asia, North America and Oceania, while they declined in the rest of the world, the largest decreases occurred in Europe with 4 billion. Since 2001, the enterprise groups R&D expenditure in Asia has increased sharply from 1.4 billion in 2001 to 10.4 billion kronor in 2011.

Foreign owed enterprises R&D increases

38 per cent of the business sector R&D in Sweden was conducted by foreign-owned companies. The largest proportions of foreign-owned companies R&D came from the United Kingdom, Germany and the Netherlands. Foreign owned enterprises R&D in Sweden in-creased with 5.6 billon.