With ITV, Vale increases investments in scientific projects and in innovation
Valor Econômico
Vale, which in the past three years had already invested R$ 22 million (US$ 12.8 million) in the installation of five centers of professional education and in the grant of 6.7 thousand scholarships, strengthens its bets in the academic area. The Vale Technologic Institute (ITV), created in 2008 by the mining company to coordinate actions of science and technology, announces today in São Paulo the construction of three research centers for long-term scientific production and signs a R$ 120 million (US$ 69.8 million) agreement to encourage the scientific production in the States of São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Pará.
The amount to be invested in new centers has not been defined yet, affirmed the Director of ITV, Luiz Eugenio Mello to Valor. To the agreement with the foundations of support to research, Vale will invest R$ 72 million (US$ 41.9 million) and the rest will be invested by the institutions. This year, the ITV operated with a budget of US$ 25 million and, in 2010, the value provided by mining operations will be US$ 40 million.
The research centers will be installed in regions considered priority by the company and each will have a specific purpose. The first center will be built in Belém do Pará, where the researches will be focused on sustainable development. In Ouro Preto (MG), the company will install a center aimed at researches in the mining area. The third unit shall be installed in São José dos Campos (SP), with a focus on the area of energy innovation, and its main partner will be the technological centre of Vale Soluções em Energia (VSE), headquartered in the same municipality. The units will be built within four years and will require the hiring of 250 researchers.
Internationally, the ITV has partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and with the Swiss Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne. "With these agreements we create a network structure for the transfer of technology that will allow Brazil to export innovation in the future", says Mello. Internally, the mining company, through the ITV, executes today an agreement with the FAPESP (Foundation of Research Support of the State of São Paulo) and the Foundations of Research Support of the State of Pará (Fapespa) and of Minas Gerais (Fapemig) to support projects of scientific and technological research.
From the R$ 120 million (US$ 69.8 million) that will be invested in four years, R$ 72 million (US$ 41.9 million) will be disbursed by Vale, R$ 8 million (US$ 4.7 million), by the Fapespa, R$ 20 million (US$ 11.6 million) by the Fapemig and another R$ 20 million (US$ 11.6 million) by the Fapesp. The agreement foresees the financing of the items of funding, capital and all types of scholarships. The States of São Paulo, Minas Gerais and Pará have been chosen by the ITV because of the nearness of the researches carried out in those States to the long-term interests of the mining company. "Vale does not have units in São Paulo, but the State accounts for nearly 50% of the scientific and technological production of the country. That is why it was given priority", says Mello.