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Innovation

Brazilian IT firms are investing less in R&D

Research is increasingly ignored as it doesn't deliver short-term results, says study.
Written by Angelica Mari, Contributing Writer

The number of IT companies in Brazil that do not invest in research and development (R&D) is on the rise, according to research.

Some 22.4 percent of technology companies in the country did not invest in R&D in 2014 - a 3 percent rise in relation to the prior year, according to the sector census carried out by the Association of Brazilian Information Technology Companies (Assespro).

The reason for the underinvestment in research is the fact that products with less than three years of development, do not represent a significant chunk of IT companies' revenues, the Assespro

study adds.

"R&D doesn't offer short-term benefits, so it ends up being forgotten by businesses. This is worrying because it shows that companies are not investing in an area that might well help them overcome the economic crisis," Assespro president Jeovani Salomão told portal Convergência Digital.

Out of the companies that do invest in R&D in Brazil, 12.9 percent of companies allocate between 4-8 percent of their revenue, while 9,7 percent invest more than 15 percent of their revenue and 4,4 percent couldn't specify details about the R&D investment at their organizations.

Most companies tend to invest their R&D resources in data processing systems, process control platforms, as well as software development and management, as well as web-based systems, according to the Assespro report.

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