Finep quer acelerar a inovação no Brasil

"Transforming Brazil through Innovation" this is the long-term vision of FINEP, a public company that finances everything from basic research to the preparation of the product for the market, as highlighted by Prof. Oswaldo Massambani, superintendent of the São Paulo region of institution, at the opening of the event held on May 8, 2018, in São Paulo, for ABES members.

The executive and researcher also spoke of the importance of dialogue with companies and the synergy between FINEP and ABES, both focused on technological development, on the growth of the national market and on improving Brazilian competitiveness. “Brazil is in a hurry to innovate”, he emphasized.

Francisco Camargo, executive president of ABES, thanked Finep for being available and recalled that software companies in Brazil need to innovate to keep up with digital transformation, technological disruption and new business models in the ICT sector, such as SaaS (software as service).

With 50 years of existence, FINEP has improved its management to keep up with the demands of a conjuncture that changes rapidly. In addition to launching new lines of financing, lowering interest rates and longer grace and amortization periods, the public company opened regional offices to meet the specific needs of different locations in Brazil – all that remains is to inaugurate the unit in the North Region . Partnerships with state development agencies, regional banks and science and technology foundations remain active.

Available resources

For its business innovation support strategy, FINEP currently has R$ 3.5 billion in resources, with only 25% of this total already having projects under analysis, that is, most of the money is not yet committed and awaits the submission of proposals.

Daniel Morita, FINEP's manager in the São Paulo region, explained that there is a myth in the market that the company takes a long time to respond to those interested in financing. “Our average term to confirm or not the financing of the project is 30 days. Today, we accept different types of guarantees, including receivables. Along with the analysis of the merits of the proposal, we conducted a financial analysis of the applicant, as rigor in granting loans is important, as we provide public money”, he clarified.

The executive highlighted that FINEP has different lines of action, with funding focused on: critical innovation (which meet national priorities of strategic interest); pioneering innovation (development of new products or processes in Brazil); innovation for competitiveness (improving products, processes or services that improve a company's performance against the competition); technological diffusion (for the acquisition of equipment, services and processes aimed at the modernization of a company); innovation for education (to improve education in higher education institutions), among others.

One of the novelties among the innovation promotion lines is FINEP CONECTA, launched in November 2017, which aims to offer better support conditions to companies that invest in research projects in partnership with science and technology institutes (ICTs) and universities, which makes it possible to bring the productive sector closer to the scientific community and finance part of the costing needs. of Academy.

Also in this first semester, the company plans to launch a credit line for innovation in the games sector, which is being developed in partnership with the National Film Agency (Ancine), considering that Brazil is among the 5 main markets for electronic games, but it can still grow a lot in the world ranking of developers.

Access the presentation here held by Finep and get to know all the financing lines.