We are back...after 5 years

This is a greetings post because we are back publishing news about investments in innovation and technology in the Brazil, private and public. I have seen many people still interested in this subject and your views and clicks made me want to continue this blog. Stay tuned...

Scientific exchange

Innovation projects with Switzerland, France and Japan are now funded and in place to start a new era in the Brazilian technology. Bilateral agreements will help delivering an incredible amount of money into research. Biomass fuel, neglected diseases and effective treatments, scientific development and knowledge transfer are some of the goals of this interesting exchange.

Infrastructure of Brazil is still far away from ideal, floods, energy cuts, inflation. However the near future seems prominent since Internet broadband will finally hit the poor and new government reforms promise less space for corruption.

A new satellite is coming and the green movement is making progress in defending a country without hydroelectric power plants, extremely damaging to the environment and native tribes as well as space consuming.

Broadband and cellphone markets are growing rapidly in Brazil. The mark of multiple cellphones per habitant was reached last year and by 2014 access to the Internet will be cheap and fast.

Computer and tablets will receive tax break and the national plan for broadband Internet is to make it cost around R$30 (about US$15).

Brazil is ready for giant telescopes

This week the Science and Technology Ministry have signed agreement with the European Southern Observatory (ESO), directed by Tim de Zeeuw, stating that Brazil can now be part of three main projects: Giant Magellan Telescope - GMT; Thirty Meter Telescope –TMT and European Extremely Large Telescope – E-ELT).

Brazil is open about its intentions, to be introduced to the international community and open the opportunity for national companies to be part of construction and infrastructure projects. Finally Brazil is taking seriously the National Plan for Astronomy (PNA).

PACTI investment results published

PACTI stands for Action Plan in Science, Technology and Innovation, for National Development, integrates all shares of the Growth Acceleration Program (CAP). R$6.6 billion invested in three years proved to have made the difference:
- The amount of companies using the Internet for generating business grew about 80%
- 14 states now have their own regional laws for innovative incentives of industry and commerce
- Benefits paid to science students and researchers is now R$2.8 billion per year, almost 3 times greater than it was in 2001

The detailed report in Portuguese.

Government invests in private IT training

CNPq, ..., is an organ of the federal government and they are responsible for the new Brazilian initiative of placing 3.5 million reais into personnel training for the private sector. Companies and individuals can subscribe to the project (see official edital). Simple IT knowledge such as Microsoft Word, Windows and even typing are still necessary since millions of Brazilians have never owned a computer and just now that they are having an opportunity to have a generation of informatics abitues, like the middle and higher-classes did in the 80's.

Russia's new uranium bank

With the intention of stopping countries from developing their own Uranium enrichment infrastructure Russia has created a nuclear fuel bank. In this bank they will deposit Uranium ready to be used in nuclear reactors, which are different from the Uranium used in atomic bombs. They are trying to stop developing country from creating their own enrichment facilities that could, ultimately, be used to treat the mineral for atomic weapons and by doing that they will guarantee secure energy fuel distribution.

News Update:

-- 07 Dec 2010 --

Apparently the fuel market won't be affected by this initiative, mining that Brazil, Argentina and South Africa will still be allowed to export enriched uranium. I don't think this is going to last long though and is funny to see "free" countries taking freedom out of others. (Institute for defence studies and analysis).

-- 06 Dec 2010 --

Three days ago in Vienna the IAEA board approved the construction of the UN's fuel bank, making that two: one managed by Russia and the other by the IAEA (sponsored by Warren Buffett).

My opinion:
After documents published in WikiLeaks.org and many other stories of corruption and disgraceful abuse from Russian authorities, I don't think any country other than the old URSS partners will use fuel provided by this bank. The problem of unconditional reliance on a single country for providing energy is an old issue and diplomacy has come a long way far from this type of initiative that doesn't add in terms security and doesn't improve life on Earth.

The USA wants to create a similar bank for Iran and Syria with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) which has gone into "dirty-sheets" after revelations of "close relationship" with the US even though it is meant to be an impartial international organ.

Plus, countries like Brazil, India and Pakistan have their own enrichment facilities and although the last two have developed atomic bombs to trough on each other, they all comply with the IAEA and UN regulations. Politics and weapons are going the wrong direction again!

Lowest deforestation rate since 1988

15 Ministries em representaves of 9 Brazilian states are discussing the Macrozoning Ecological-Economic Amazon (MacroZEE), a Federal project that is helping to save the Amazon.
The deforestation rate in 2009/2010 indicates a decrease of 13.6% over the previous period. It is the lowest rate measured by INPE since 1988 and the plan to keep a sustainable development for the communities over this vast area of rain forest is still very much alive.

High-Tech Geology

With the intension of spread the culture of innovation through the mining and geology sector in Brazil, historically conservative, the secretary of Technological Development and Innovation of the Ministry of Science and Technology (MCT), Ronaldo Mota, presents this Thursday (2nd December 2010) governmental programs and actions available that support this initiative. This is a very import part of the country's structure and advances in technology are required to make it more competitive and help productivity.

Thorium instead of Uranium?

Brazilian nuclear scientists are considering investing in research for substituting enriched Uranium in its power plants in Angra. The Center for Mineral Technology (CETEM / MCT) held on December 9 the Mini Forum Iberoeka Torio for scientists and business men from Brazil and Latin America. The use of thorium for energy isn't new even for the young Brazilian nuclear energy program (see reference IAEA) but it is still very hard to evaluate the amount if the mineral available for extraction.

Brazillian weather super-computer

INPE (National Institute for Space Research) has developed a computer (Tupã is its name) that has been considered to be among the most powerful in the World. With 258 trillion calculations per second, Tupã is now the third most powerful supercomputer dedicated to operational numerical prediction of weather and climate seasonality.

This XT6, from the company Cray, will improve accuracy and help with the Brazilian Model for Global Climate System that should help evaluate the effects of anthropogenic activities (eg, emissions of greenhouse gases, changes in vegetation, urbanization, etc.) on Natural Systems, extremely important for countries in development.

40 billion for Brazilian nuclear energy program

Brazil will try to reignite its nuclear energy program with an investment of R$40 billion (around US$20 billion) over the course of one year. There are today three power-plants in operation and the self sufficiency in enrichment of Uranium will receive a make over with the new program. Liliane Rank completed, in November 2009, the final report of this first phase of development, the "Study of the Supply Chain of the Brazilian Nuclear Program: background and prospects of the sector of nuclear power generation in Brazil" sees future growth in demand.

Will Brazil supply Uranium to Iran? Recently there was a global discussion whether Brazil should provide enriched Uranium to the controversial need for nuclear power of Iran in the Middle-East. There is no sign of advances in this subject since Iran is already enriching it themselves and so I don't think the new Brazilian program considers this issue at this point. I will provide updates on this in the future.

Germany recently in Brazil

Two things have happened recently between Germany and Brazil: The event "The year of Germany in Brazil" organised by the Brazilian Academy of Sciences (ABC) in partnership with Leopoldina - German National Academy of Sciences - and the visit of an IT delegation made to discuss the current scientific exchange and educational differences between these countries.

11 million dollars in search for European partnership

Brazil is investing U$11 million for creating partnerships between research institutions of this country and EU. The objective is to create an infrastructure for research and development of laboratories and to gather human resources for a better effective use of advanced technologies, with efficiency and international competitiveness. People and companies interested should submit the projects until the 8th of February 2011 and the maximum period for the execution of such project is 30 months. Take a look at the CNPq website http://www.cnpq.br/editais/ct/2010/066.htm

Burger King is now Brazilian?

Today, Wednesday the 2nd of September 2010, the Brazilian group 3G Capital based in New York have settled an agreement to purchase 46% of Burger King for U$4 billions. 3G Capital was founded by Marcel Telles, Jorge Paulo Lemann and Carlos Alberto Sicupira, currently major share holders of Imbed, biggest beer factory in the World, also Brazilian.

Green plastic? What is that?

The green plastic could come from Brazil. Green polymers is the focus of this ground-breking research that promisses to put Brazil in the fore front of the ecological development with the partnership between Braskem (privatly owned petrochemical company) and LNBIO (National Laboratory of Biosciences). The objective is to develop an economically competitive and sustainable "plastic" using raw materials from renewable sources after Braskem bought Quattor and part of Sunoco Chemicals, both frmo the U.S., earlier this year.

Rio Info 2010

Rio de Janeiro becomes the Brazilian national IT city with Rio Info 2010, the political event that gathers together 1500 people from hundreds of private companies and representatives of 10 states. For more information please visit www.rioinfo.com.br

Switzerland-Brazil Symposium - Challenges of Cities in the 21st Century Metropolis

The event is part of the agenda of the High Level Mission of Switzerland to Brazil, which takes place 26-30 August to deal with the deepening of bilateral scientific and technological relations issues of higher education in both countries and international cooperation in health.

How science and technology can help with the challenges modern cities face in this century? This is the question researchers, students, scientists, businessmen, representatives of civil society organizations and municipal government, state and federal are trying to answer.

Attended the opening ceremony of the Federal Councillor of Switzerland, Didier Burkhalter, president of the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq), Carlos Aragon, the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, Eduardo Paes, the Swiss Ambassador Wilhelm Meier and chairman IAB / RJ, Sérgio Magalhães.

Brazil and Israel Partnership

Brazil and Israel are in the search for commercial partnership. Small and medium sized companies from both countries have until the 3rd of Novembre to submit their list of requirements for finding a business partner. IF partnership is successful, governments will finance import and export. BNDES, BNB and FINEP are the Brazilian departments to run the financial support; OCS is the Irealy investment department responsible.

$500 million for small business innovation projects

Innovation rate is one of the aspects highly considered for the RS$500 million invested by the Brazilian Government into private sector high-tech research projects.

The Financier of Studies and Projects (Finep) will invest the above sum into projects of up to RS$500,000 budget in 6 main areas: information technology and communication, energy, biotechnology, health, defence and social development. 40% of the total amount must go to micro and small companies and 30% must be invested on the poorest areas: North, Northeast and Midwest.

The focus of this investment is, among other things:

• Development of integrated circuits
• Projects for improvement of optoelectronic devices and microelectromechanical
• Systems, software or hardware, with great impact in the 2014 World Cup and the Olympics in 2016, able to leverage Brazilian companies to work on the foreign market in the areas of public safety, urban mobility and systems for e-gov
• Developing solutions for exploration and development fields in the offshore oil or gas, including basin modelling, seismic imaging and data acquisition and processing
• Innovations in bio products for nitrogen fixation in grasses and legumes
• Development of bio products for use in pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries, which use active ingredients and essences taken from the Brazilian biodiversity, and for rapid diagnosis of infectious, degenerative and genetic diseases
• Integrated solutions for autonomous flight, including takeoff and landing and automatic optical and infrared systems for unmanned air vehicles
• Systems for widespread access to broadband Internet, to meet the digital inclusion public policies in urban and rural areas

(See the official announcement in Portuguese.)