In Portugal and Spain, the proportion of innovative companies, and the degree to which these collaborate with other companies and organisations, is below the EU-27 average

In 2019, the percentage of total public spending assigned to R&D was 0.82% in Portugal and  1.24% in Spain, both below the EU-27 average.

Despite growth in the last 10 years, the relative position of Portugal and Spain, with regard to patent applications, is a long way behind that of countries that are leaders in innovation.

Does Portugal attract more talent than Spain? In 2020, the attraction of international talent was situated above the European average (18.7%) in the case of Portugal (29.1%) and below the average (17.2%) in the case of Spain

Portugal and Spain are situated above the European average in percentage of women researchers in all sectors considered, although the lowest participation corresponds to the business sector and the highest, to the governmental sector.

Spain stands at the head of the countries of the EU-27 in the global computation of digital society indicators (connectivity, Internet use, etc). Portugal, however, is situated at the tail end.