Startup Nations Standards Report: Europe Achieves 55% Level of Compliance with Standards of Excellence

The Startup Nation Standards Report 2023 thoroughly examines initiatives and challenges within Europe’s start-up ecosystem. It aims to map the progress towards fostering an innovative and supportive environment for start-ups, analysing the adoption of eight Startup Nation Standards (SNS) across member states and evaluating their efforts in implementing these standards.

This report guides policymakers, highlighting the collaborative efforts required to elevate Europe’s competitive edge in innovation and entrepreneurship. It assesses the current situation and outlines the path forward, emphasizing the need for adaptive policies and shared best practices.

The report indicates a generally positive assessment of the implementation of the SNS with an average score of 55%.

Among other factors, the report highlights the importance of proper management of intellectual assets for start-ups and their growth. According to the report, a substantial majority of countries – 76% - answered that ownership of intellectual property rights can usually be retained by start-ups/scale-ups. The countries are the following: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, France, Greece, Ireland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.