A new paper by Professor Xiaolan Fu and Liu Shi (DPhil student in International Development) at Technology and Management Centre for Development (TMCD) is published as the Economic Research Working Paper No. 69 of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) exploring the direction of innovation in developing countries and its driving forces. Recognising that technical change is not neutral but biased, the paper highlights the importance of direction of innovation for development. It demonstrates the diverse and vibrant landscape of direction of innovation in emerging economies and low-income-countries (LICs), and especially unpacks the driving forces of under-the-radar innovation (URIs) in the latter group applying the open national innovation system (ONIS) framework. The opportunities and challenges faced by developing countries brought about by the unfolding Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) are discussed and policy recommendations are provided. The working paper can be accessed following the link: https://www.wipo.int/publications/en/details.jsp?id=4596&plang=EN

The working paper forms one of the background chapters for the World Intellectual Property Report 2022, “Chapter 1: Setting a course for the direction of innovation” on the perspectives of developing countries, which has been launched on April 7, 2022.