The WIPO Global Innovation Index 2026 was announced on September 29, 2026, at the headquarters of the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva, Switzerland. Based on approximately 80 indicators, the index measures countries' ability to generate ideas and turn them into knowledge, technology, and economic value.
Türkiye's rankings over the past six years were as follows:
- 202141. place
- 202237. place · our best ranking ever
- 202339. place
- 202437. place
- 202543. place
- 202645. place
WIPO cautions against straightforward comparisons across years because methods and data coverage can change. Reducing the table to “Türkiye fell eight places in two years” could therefore be misleading. Still, Türkiye's fall from 37th in 2024 to 45th in 2026 deserves attention.
Another point that catches my attention is that we rank 51st in innovation inputs and 39th in outputs. We produce better results relative to our inputs, but we are not strengthening the structure that sustains those results to the same extent.
Türkiye ranks 28th in creative outputs, 38th in business sophistication, and 41st in human capital and research. Trademarks and industrial design are areas of strength. In knowledge and technology outputs, however, we fall to 49th. This distribution raises questions about the difficulties we face in turning ideas into knowledge, knowledge into technology, and technology into economic value.
AI can help with these processes. But when everyone has access to the same tools, a few licenses or a short training session on using them will not change how an organization works. Results also depend on the capabilities employees have and how they use them with AI. That is why I believe AI-Native change should begin with human capabilities.
Technology investments can become disconnected from business needs if we do not know which skills the organization has, which need development, and where they will be used. AI may speed up output, but quality and reliability do not follow automatically. Employees still need to be able to frame problems, make decisions, and question results.
Producing better innovation outputs relative to our inputs is an advantage for Türkiye. For this ability to extend beyond a few successful companies or projects, it needs a broader base across organizations, family businesses, universities, and individual development. As we increase AI use, we can also examine the quality of the results it produces.
To track this within an organization, we can measure how many ideas turn into knowledge, technology, and revenue, alongside how many are generated. A capability inventory drawn from real business cases can help us examine problem framing, decision-making, and the ability to question outputs alongside AI use. We can also define which human capability each use case is expected to develop. If that expectation is unclear, it may make more sense to focus on capability development in that area first.
Türkiye's rise in the innovation rankings depends on many economic, institutional, and structural factors. Alongside technology investments, the capabilities of people who connect technology with the right needs and evaluate its output are part of that process.
Ask yourself
- At which stages in our organization do we see capability gaps that make it difficult to turn innovation inputs into results?
- Which human capabilities do our AI investments develop, and which thinking skills do they bypass?
- Which decisions in our processes for turning ideas into knowledge and knowledge into value should remain a matter of human judgment?
