Intellectual property & technology transfer practices of public Brazilian science and technology institutes: multiple case studies

The "Technological Innovation Act", promulgated in Brazil in 2004, represents the main legal framework implemented to promote technological innovation and to delineate a favorable scenario for scientific development in Brazil. It regulates specially the relationship between Scientific and Technological Institutions (STI) - such as universities and public research institutes - and private companies in Brazil. Among other things, the law determines that each STI should compose a Technological Innovation Center (NIT, as its acronym in Portuguese) to act as an interface of the STI and its markets. These centers are equivalent to what is internationally called Technology Transfer Office and have as main responsibility to transfer the knowledge and inventions generated at Public Research Institutes (PRI) to private sector.This paper describes and provides some reflections upon the experience of three NIT, located in the State of São Paulo (Brazil): Innovation Agency of University of Campinas (Inova/ Unicamp); Innovation Agency of Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar) and Embrapa Informatics of Agriculture. The analysis was focused on the following issues: history, legal structure and organizational model, mission and activities, relationships and results.

This paper is part of the Proceedings for the 9th Research Workshop on Institutions and Organizations – RWIO Center for Organization Studies – CORS, which took place on October 13-14th, 2014.