Unclogging India’s innovation pipeline 

Innovation is often measured through rankings, patents and startup success stories. While these are important indicators, they capture only a part of the picture. A truly innovation-led economy is built on a continuous pipeline that connects STEM education, scientific research and industry. When even one part of that pipeline weakens, the country’s ability to translate ideas into real-world impact is constrained.

Going by the numbers, India appears to be on the cusp of being considered as an innovation-driven economy. However, that deserves a closer look.

India produces around 2.6 million STEM graduates each year, including around 1.5 million engineers. Over the past decade, the country has risen from 66th 3 to 38th 4 rank in the Global Innovation Index, while its startups ecosystem has grown to more than 0.2 million DPIIT-recognised startups. These achievements reflect India’s growing ambition to become an innovation-led economy, but they also invite a deeper question: are we strengthening every part of the innovation pipeline that makes such progress sustainable?

These are encouraging signs that India’s innovation ambitions are gathering momentum. Yet, innovation cannot be measured solely by outputs such as rankings or startup numbers. The strength of any innovation ecosystem lies in its ability to consistently generate, nurture and translate scientific knowledge into meaningful economic and societal outcomes.

But statistics often hide a more important story.

The real question is not whether India is producing talent, but whether it is creating the conditions for that talent to become researchers, innovators and problem-solvers. This is where the country’s innovation pipeline begins to narrow. Of the 1.5 million people who graduate with a science degree each year, about half enrol in post-graduate degrees, and slightly less than half (365,000) graduate, according to AISHE. The funnel narrows further: 7,400 candidates are awarded a PhD in sciences each year.

What emerges is a ‘missing middle’- the crucial layer of scientific research that connects education with industrial innovation.

One number presents the culmination of all the data shared above: the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) researchers per million people. That figure is just 255 in India, against a global average of 1,1987. This gap is significant because research capacity ultimately determines how quickly ideas move from laboratories into products, technologies and scalable solutions. Countries that consistently lead in innovation invest not only in talent, but also in creating an environment where researchers can thrive.

India’s rise to 38th rank in the Global Innovation Index is encouraging. India has been climbing up the list by one rank over the last three years. Sustaining this trajectory will require translating scientific research into globally competitive products, technologies and companies, if the country is to join the world’s leading innovation economies. As experts have pointed out, cutting-edge research is happening so fast that the country cannot afford to fall too far behind.

The government’s ambitions on innovation are clearly laid out as part of Viksit Bharat and Atmanirbhar Bharat. In this year’s Union Budget, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) fund of Rs 1 trillion (Rs 1 lakh crore), of which Rs 200 billion (or Rs 20,000 crore) will be allocated in this financial year itself. This includes a Deep Tech fund and financial resources targeted at advanced materials, robotics and artificial intelligence (AI).

These policy measures signal an important shift in how India views research and innovation, not as isolated scientific pursuits, but as strategic drivers of economic growth, technological self-reliance and global competitiveness. Funding is undoubtedly essential, but its real value lies in creating an ecosystem where researchers, startups, academia and industry can work together with shared purpose.

In 2023, the government established the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) through an Act of Parliament. One of its main objectives was to promote industry academia collaboration in R&D.

While India’s investment in R&D (0.64% of GDP) remains below that of many innovationled economies, an equally important challenge is broadening participation beyond government funding. Innovation ecosystems are strongest when public investment is complemented by sustained commitment from industry. Industries are not simply end-users of research; they are partners in shaping research priorities, investing in translational research, accelerating commercialisation and building futureready capabilities.

India must find ways to address this ‘missing middle’, and that must start with STEM education. Building research capacity is not simply about increasing the number of PhD programmes or research institutions. It is about creating an environment where curiosity is encouraged, interdisciplinary collaboration is valued and young researchers see long term opportunities to pursue scientific discovery. A strong innovation ecosystem is built over decades, through consistent investment in people as much as infrastructure.

First, teaching and research must both be strengthened significantly on an accelerated basis, using financing provided for in the Union Budget and the ANRF Fund. Resources from other initiatives and missions sponsored by the government can also play a key role in developing world-class lab infrastructure, shared scientific facilities and faster access to advanced instrumentation. The will exists, and ways must be found.

Second, STEM education and pedagogy must be integrated into skills, built on foundational education, specialised education, opportunities, and innovation. Included in all of this must be ways of translating research outputs into applied science and solutions that meet industrial and technological needs.

Third, drawing from the two steps outlined above, industry-academia collaboration must increase significantly. In healthcare, climate science and energy, and advanced materials sciences, such collaboration can begin with institutions of national importance like the Indian Institute of Technology, the Indian Institute of Science, and specialised institutions. These are already primed to do this; what is needed is rapid expansion of such activity.

For private sector corporate strategy, the goal of R&D is to create new sources of competitive advantage. Nationwide, companies haven’t been doing enough; that can change now. R&D is a layered phenomenon; addressing the layers can help us understand how to go about maximising what companies and the country at large can get out of investing in it. India’s aspiration to become an innovation-led economy cannot be achieved by government or academia alone. It requires industry to move from being a consumer of innovation to becoming a co-creator of it.

Sources 

1https://educationforallinindia.co m/the-stem-pipeline-in-indiafrom-science-classrooms-to-stemdegrees/ 

2 https://www.pib.gov.in/Pressreleaseshare.aspx?PRID=1702450 ®=48&lang=2 3https://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/economics/gii/gii_2013.pd f 4https://www.wipo.int/web-publications/global-innovation-index2025/en/gii-2025-results.html 5https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2214872 ®=3&lang=2 6https://www.education.gov.in/sit es/upload_files/mhrd/files/statistics-new/AISHE%20Book_2021- 22_4.pdf 7https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/fil es/S%26T%20Indicators%20Tables%2C%202019- 20.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com 8https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2150817 ®=48&lang=2 9https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2153547 ®=3&lang=2

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