Advanced economies consistently emerge as early adopters. Historically, these economies embraced new technologies 20-80 years in advance of the global average. However, this historical advantage has diminished over time. Virtually all newer technologies demonstrate converging adoption lags between advanced and developing economies. The gap in intensity of use was first widening, now it is narrowing Beyond adoption time lag, the report examines how intensively technologies spread within countries after initial introduction. Studying the intensity of technology use across countries reveals a fascinating historical reversal: from the 1gth through much of the 20th century, the gap in the intensity of use between advanced and developing economies generally widened, with newer technologies showing larger differences in how intensively they were used, as illustrated Notes: The intensity of use calculates relative to advanced economies (normalized to zero). Negative values indicate below-average intensity among non-advanced economies adopters. Sample includes 139 countries, of which 17 are Source: Fink, C. et al. (2026). How Do New Technologies diffuse? WIPO Economic Research Working Paper Series No. 91. Geneva: WIPO.