Bulder is Norway's most innovative company
Norwegian consumers want seamless, digital and sustainable solutions that make everyday life easier. Bulder beats all other companies in the Norwegian Innovation Index 2025.**
The Innovation Index – insights from a decade of research
Since 2016, DIG and NHH have measured how customers of Norwegian companies perceive those companies’ capacity for innovation. That perceived capacity is revealed by asking customers directly. It often determines whether customers stay loyal or take their business elsewhere.
While other innovation metrics focus on patents, research funding and technology investment, the Norwegian Innovation Index (NII) starts with the customer. In partnership with Open Innovation Lab of Norway, the index is now being taken several steps further. The ambition is to make NII the world’s leading standard for measuring innovation capability from the customer’s perspective. This matters especially for companies serving consumer markets, such as grocery retail, banking, insurance, telecom and energy. In these industries, trust and perceived value are decisive drivers of growth and profitability.
Two complementary partners
DIG and NHH contribute research expertise, academic credibility and methodological rigour. Open Innovation Lab of Norway (OIL), for its part, brings close ties to the business community and a global network with a presence in 116 countries. Together, these strengths make NII stronger in both academic and practical terms.
“Norway needs better insight into how innovation is actually created. It is not only about technology, but about people, collaboration, culture and the ability to turn knowledge into value. The customer experience is at the heart of it all,” says Professor Emeritus Tor W. Andreassen.
He has led the development of NII and will continue as academic lead for the work through Open Innovation Lab of Norway.
“When research and practice work more closely together, we gain a stronger foundation for measuring innovation over time and for comparing Norway with other countries,” says Professor Bram Timmermans, Director of DIG.
A global standard
The Norwegian Innovation Index has already proven to be a strong export in its own right, with the methodology now adopted in 10 other countries and ambitions to reach many more. During 2026, the goal is to expand to 30 countries, and to 100 countries over the following 18 months.
Following an official visit to Japan, Norway’s Minister of Digitalisation, Karianne Tung, congratulated the DIG/NHH and OIL partnership and emphasised that linking strong research environments and knowledge-based insight with business and value creation is essential if Norway is to achieve its ambition of becoming the world’s most advanced and best digitalised country.
Read more about the cooperation (in Norwegian) at innomag.no