Sweden well ahead in digital transformation yet has more to do

This article is brought to you in association with OECD. Sweden’s efforts to embrace the shift to digital have been a key driver of economic growth in recent years, yet more needs to be done to get remote areas of the country online, bring digital technology to small firms, upgrade skills and meet security and privacy challenges, according to a new OECD report. OECD Reviews of Digital Transformation: Going Digital in Sweden finds Sweden is among the top OECD countries in deploying digital technology across households and business, with widespread Internet use across the country and narrower digital divides by age, education, income and firm size than most countries. The availability, quality and affordability of high-speed Internet in Sweden is among the best in the OECD. Sweden’s economy has the highest share of value added coming from information and communication (ICT) technologies of OECD countries and is among the top ten exporters of ICT services. Use of digital technologies has helped Swedish firms to integrate into global value chains in manufacturing and move up the value chain to focus on high value-added services like product design and marketing. Sweden is also a leader in the Internet of things. While Sweden is on a solid path to reach its goal of having 98% of households and firms connected to 1 gigabit per second Internet by 2025, it should now focus on enhancing co-ordination among national, regional and local broadband deployment strategies and  expanding networks in sparsely populated areas. The use of digital technologies by people with lower levels of income or education could be further increased. Sweden also lags other countries in opening up government data to citizens. On the business side, while digital tools are widely used in Swedish firms, most are slow to seize opportunities to analyse big data. There is also a limited supply of advanced ICT skills in the Swedish workforce. The report also notes that as an international hub of scientific and technological leadership, Sweden should strengthen its policy priorities and publicly funded programmes for digital innovation. Concerns about digital security are higher among Swedish people than in many other OECD countries. The government should promote a clear vision of digital security risk management as an economic and social responsibility of all and provide stronger policy leadership.

The report is the first in a new series of OECD reviews that will analyse development of the digital economy, review policies and make recommendations to improve performance as part of the Organisation’s Going Digital project.