Abstract The aim of this paper is to investigate the implications of the fourth industrial revolution for technological competitiveness, its definition and measurement methods. An empirical part is aimed at identifying comparative advantages of the European Union in digital technologies. Recently new approaches have appeared to measure digital competitiveness, however they use a broad definition of competitiveness that encompasses not only technological factors but also the macroeconomic and institutional environment (IMD, 2017; WEF, 2018). There is still a limited number of studies focused on the technological dimension of competitiveness in digital technologies. This paper fills the gap by developing a conceptual framework based on patent indicators, i.e. Patent Share and Revealed Technological Advantage indices. It allows a consistent analysis of the comparative advantages of the EU member states in digital technologies to be conducted. The results confirm a huge diversity within the EU in terms of digital technologies, their global impact and comparative advantages.

中文翻译：

---

第四次工业革命时期欧盟成员国的技术竞争力

摘要本文旨在研究第四次工业革命对技术竞争力的影响，其定义和衡量方法。实验部分旨在确定欧洲联盟在数字技术方面的比较优势。最近出现了衡量数字竞争力的新方法，但是它们使用了广泛的竞争力定义，不仅包括技术因素，还包括宏观经济和制度环境（IMD，2017; WEF，2018）。仍然有少数研究集中在数字技术竞争力的技术层面。本文通过开发基于专利指标（即专利份额和公开技术优势指数）的概念框架来填补空白。它允许对欧盟成员国在数字技术方面的比较优势进行一致的分析。结果证实了欧盟内部在数字技术，其全球影响和比较优势方面的巨大差异。