Land of Innovation and Technology – Brazil's most Important Startups

Brazil is undergoing an economic and political boom and will continue to do so in the coming years. This offers many opportunities to take advantage of the upswing and changes in the market. With a good idea you will usually meet great demand and little competition. Technological progress offers many new niches and segments for innovation and thus potential for new startups. The most innovative and important startups in Brazil are taking advantage of this potential and have a good chance of establishing themselves on the market in the long term. Therefore, Brazil offers a lot of innovation and inspiration for travelers who want to be economically inspired during their Brazil vacation.

Despite the economic boom, it is also a challenge to establish a startup in Brazil. Due to the difficult bureaucratic situation and high taxes in Brazil, it takes a lot of time, patience, and money to start a business. Financing is also difficult. All small and medium enterprises in Brazil suffer from the high cost of capital and difficult access to credit. Therefore, most Brazilian startups finance themselves from their own resources. In addition, it is difficult to get money from investors in Brazil.

To ensure that the startup scene continues to grow despite low investor funding, the Brazilian government has now taken on an important role as a supporter. A few years ago, for example, it launched “Start-Up Brasil”, a funding program that enables tech startups to receive money from their third year of business. Over a one-year period, up to 200,000 reais, equivalent to 40,000 US Dollar, are available per company for research and development. “Seed“, another funding program of the state of Minas Gerais, is aimed at young entrepreneurs with a startup idea. Other important state funding programs are “Conexão Startup Indústria“ and “PIPE“ from the research foundation Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (Fapesp).

There was a strong increase and a high percentage of startups in many industries. First and foremost, the share of new professional services is the highest at 16.2 percent. Examples of startups include goEPIC and Intelup. Intelup was created to improve industry competitiveness by managing inefficiencies in real time. This software platform, based on Industry 4.0 technologies (systems integration, IoT, cloud computing, and Big Data), enables the automation of data analytics and tasks that lead to operational excellence by uncovering inefficiencies in real time and getting everyone involved in the production process to act proactively.

This information technology also features a high number of new companies accounting for 11 percent of the total. Examples include Fhinck and Pris Software. Fhinck is a startup company that provides a virtual assistant for information processing and presentation for companies to make intelligent decisions for the company based on the information. In this way, a lot of information can be collected at the same time and processed by the system into coherent information bundles that give a better overview of the different processes in the company and enable better decisions.

As new opportunities for startups regularly arise in the financial market, this sector also accounts for 8.8 percent of new companies. Examples of new and innovative Brazilian startups include BLU365/Kitado, Parcele.me, and Contabilizei. Founded in 2013 in Curitiba, Contabilizei specializes in tax and accounting services for the self-employed and small businesses. Services also include records management for the Brazilian government and financial training to prepare startups for the international market. Securities, stocks, and cryptocurrencies can quickly become unmanageable for smaller businesses and are often subject to different regulations in different states, which is why Contabilizei has quickly gained popularity.

Many startups offer new management systems for different areas of life, whether in finance, bureaucracy, or healthcare. They often take inspiration from companies abroad and transfer ideas to the Brazilian market. Examples include EBANX, which massively facilitates e-commerce in Brazil, or InstaCarro, an online trading platform for used cars modeled on ebay.

The startup scene in Brazil has a lot of potential because many segments are not yet occupied, especially administration and information technology.

São Paulo is by far the most important hub in Brazil. 30 percent of startups come from the metropolis. The surrounding area of the state of São Paulo accounts for another 12 percent of startups. The second most important state with 12 percent is Rio Grande do Sul in the extreme south, followed by Rio de Janeiro with 9 percent of all startups. Other important innovation locations are the states of Minas Gerais with the startup communities San Pedro Valley and Colmeia, Paraná with Red Foot and Capivalley, and Santa Catarina with Start.

Brazil is also attracting increasing international attention for its innovative startups. This potential is also being promoted by the Brazilian government to give companies with good innovations a solid start so they can establish themselves in the market. This also increases the number of business trips to Brazil and thus new business opportunities can be discovered during a trip to Brazil. A win-win situation for all parties involved.

Sources: www.businessinsider.de, www.fhinck.com, www.gtai.de, www.intelup.com.br, www.latina-press.com