The study is conducted in collaboration with Henk Volberda, Professor of Strategy & Innovation and Scientific Director of ACBI. The Innovatie 300 ranking shows which companies Dutch business leaders see as most innovative. It also provides a picture of how the Netherlands performs in international innovation rankings.

Turning potential into impact

Volberda points out that the Netherlands still scores well in international innovation indices, but is slowly losing position. Dutch companies are strong in generating ideas, yet often find it difficult to turn these into successful market innovations. R&D investments in the Netherlands lag behind countries such as Belgium, Germany and Denmark when measured as a share of GDP. He underlines that a large part of innovation success comes from social innovation: how organisations organise work, learning and collaboration. Technology and R&D matter, but leadership, organisational culture and cooperation are essential to turn innovation potential into real impact.

Key trends from the Innovatie 300

• Strong innovation reputation, but gradual decline in international rankings
• Structural underinvestment in R&D compared to neighbouring countries;
• Clear gap between idea generation and implementation or commercialisation;
• Dutch companies are often relatively risk averse, which limits innovation impact;
• Leading firms, such as ASML, show the effect of consistent and high R&D investment.

How the ranking was compiled

The Innovatie 300 is based on a reputational survey among business decision makers in the Netherlands. Participants assess companies they know well from their professional practice and rate them on perceived innovation strength. This peer-to-peer approach focuses on how organisations are viewed by other professionals, not only on hard indicators such as patents or R&D budgets. The methodology was developed jointly by MT/Sprout, project leader Niels van der Weert and the research team of ACBI. Together they translate the survey outcomes into a ranked list of 300 companies, supplemented with breakdowns by sector and category. The Innovatie 300 will be published annually and is expected to become an important indicator for Dutch innovation performance.