UTAH INVENTION INDEX – MARCH 2025

The Invention Index measures a country’s or state’s innovation output by comparing GDP growth with patent production growth. 

Utah Invention Index March 2025: 1.40% (B- grade)

Utah Invention Index over the last year:

Anything over C grade is positive sentiment; anything under C is negative outlook/sentiment. Using that sentiment, it is possible to observe trends over time, and also compare states/countries. In doing so we can predict which states have the best chance to recover economically from the pandemic (or any other economic incident that may occur).

Utah Invention Index Scores (Sep 2024 – Mar 2025)

Analysis

Comparison with Previous Months:
The March 2025 Invention Index for Utah was 1.40%, a slight decline from February’s 1.60%. This dip follows a two-month rise from December (1.30%) to February. Despite the drop, the March score remains higher than November (1.04%) and December, indicating a relatively stable performance in recent months.

Long-Term Trends:
Across the seven-month period, the scores show moderate fluctuation with no consistent upward or downward trend. The index peaked in October at 1.73% and bottomed in November at 1.04%. Following the low in November, there was a general upward movement through February, before the recent dip in March.

Significant Changes:
October’s score (1.73%) represents the highest point in the observed period, while November’s 1.04% marks a significant drop—almost 40% lower than the previous month. This sharp decrease is the most notable shift in the dataset. Recovery began in December and continued through February, suggesting some resilience after the downturn.

Contextualizing the Data:
March’s score of 1.40% is slightly below the recent peak but remains within a stable range compared to the long-term average. The decline from February could be a temporary fluctuation rather than a reversal of the upward momentum observed from November to February.

Discussion:

In March, the Utah Invention Index scored a positive sentiment which was lower than the previous year’s average but outperformed the downward trend for the year. This is in contrast to the prior 12 months, which experienced an upward trend. As the world continues to recover from the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, it is unclear if there is any backlog of applications awaiting approval or if the department has fully caught up. If approvals are not yet caught up, we may see a decrease in approvals – and a reduced Invention Index – in the coming months/years as the state feels the full economic impact of companies closing and/or being forced to minimize their staffing and therefore minimize their R&D work hours.

Learn more about the Invention Index here.

Are you thinking of patenting any of your bright ideas? Did you know your research work could be eligible for the R&D Tax Credit and you can receive up to 14% back on your expenses? To find out more, please contact a Swanson Reed R&D Specialist today or check out our free online eligibility test.

Who We Are:

Swanson Reed is one of the U.S.’ largest Specialist R&D tax advisory firms. We manage all facets of the R&D tax credit program, from claim preparation and audit compliance to claim disputes.

Swanson Reed regularly hosts free webinars and provides free IRS CE and CPE credits for CPAs.  For more information please visit us at www.swansonreed.com/webinars or contact your usual Swanson Reed representative.