In 2017, fewer than one fifth of firms with between 20 and 49 workers had adopted at least one advanced technology (such as robotics and artificial intelligence); this share rises to one third among medium-sized firms and is more than half for those with 250 or more workers. The more complex the technologies considered, the wider the gap between small and large firms.
The fragmentation of the productive sector has had a negative effect on firms’ capacity to innovate: expenditure on research and development in the private sector amounted to 0.8 per cent of GDP in 2017, less than half the average in OECD countries. It is low in the public sector too (0.5 against 0.7 per cent).