"My plan is to turn Uruguay into the Sweden of America. To create a platform to recruit talent, not only locally but from all over Latin America, to come and think of ideas and produce prototypes that change the world", says the co-founder and executive director of Communications of the interactive communication solutions company The Electric Factory, Juan Ciapessoni, in an interview published in the book Vencer paradigmas (Overcoming paradigms) by communicator Alexis Jano Ros.
Ciapessoni believes that within 10 years there could be campuses where companies could move their development centers to carry out "exploratory and beta testing exercises". Ciapessoni's idea is shared by several government and civil society actors, companies and technology experts, who agree in believing that a change in the local productive matrix is possible, and that Uruguay has everything to position itself as a center for research and development of prototypes.
In an interview with Café & Negocios, Ciapessoni, also co-founder of Sinergia Tech -his first step to achieve this goal-, mentioned that in the 50's Uruguay was positioned as the Switzerland of America, as a logistic pole and a Europeanized and immigrant culture, that's why he plays with the term Sweden-Switzerland. Ciapessoni explained that he uses the comparison with Sweden, although he could have used another Scandinavian country, due to the degree of development of interactive industries in those countries, "among the most advanced in the world".
"Because of the technological issue in which I have been involved for many years, I realized that Uruguay, being a neutral country, because of its time zone, its scale, its technological infrastructure, is a place that can be a hotbed of prototypes and testing, where young people choose to test their ventures," he explained.
It can also be a testing ground for the rest of the world. "Nicholas Negroponte proved it with One Laptop Per Child (the program that inspired the Ceibal Plan) when a computer was given to every child".
"The aim is to attract 500,000 nomadic people to Uruguay to develop," Ciapessoni said.
Sinergia Tech and its recently launched business accelerator, according to Ciapessoni, is a way to "sell" Uruguay, not as a grain or meat exporter, but as a testing center. "If companies want to see the future of how people are going to move, they can test in Uruguay. I think that's the road to development," he said.
In turn, Ciapessoni's partner in the innovation center, Maximiliano Pérez, said that Uruguay offers facilities for entrepreneurs to validate their products and test them in a limited but representative market at regional level. "There are several initiatives at the business level, from civil society institutions and the government that go in that direction," he said. He considers that Uruguay "is a test tube in real time. The economic and financial stability is good and different from other countries in the region".
JOINT EFFORTS
In addition to Ciapessoni, other actors involved in the technology sector are proposing initiatives to attract foreign companies and entrepreneurs to come to work in Uruguay. One of them is the CEO of Collokia, Pablo Brenner, who for the last six months has been working on an initiative together with actors from the industrial sector, the Uruguayan Chamber of Information Technology (Cuti) and the government.
"The idea is to go abroad, talk to companies and understand what they need. We are working on finding out what are the limitations that prevent people from coming (to Uruguay). Some are real and others are perceptions that entrepreneurs in the region have," Brenner said. To that end, an artificial intelligence expert from Silicon Valley, Nate Soares, visited Uruguay two weeks ago and said it's necessary to communicate in detail the processes for obtaining residency and the steps needed to open a company.
Brenner stressed that the constraint to innovation in the world is neither technology nor money, but regulations. "Everyone is talking about autonomous cars. The technology is already quite developed and there is money, what is missing is to regulate aspects such as insurance," he said as an example.
The National Agency for Research and Innovation (ANII) is also making efforts in this regard in conjunction with other agencies related to innovation and competitiveness, such as Uruguay XXI and Cuti -under the Secretariat of Productive Transformation-, trying to unify actions. The president of ANII, Fernando Brum, explained that what they call a fast track for the establishment of technology companies in Uruguay, which simplifies several procedures, has been available since last year.
"We have an opportunity and we are raising it in the Secretariat, in terms of being more aggressive in positioning Uruguay and try to get these companies to come," said Brum.
One proposal put forward by Brenner that Brum agrees with is to have special regulatory areas for certain industries to test in Uruguay. "We could think of a city that would allow the use of self-driving cars. There are cities in the U.S. that have that strategy, that give permits to attract companies. It's not something new, but it could work," he said.
For her part, Isabella Antonaccio, ICT sector coordinator of the Global Services program of Uruguay XXI, mentioned that the focus of the program is to make the sector more competitive and promote the attraction of foreign companies. "We are competitive when companies are looking for higher value-added services," she summarized.
Positive and negative
Fiber optic coverage in homes, economic and political stability, transparency in regulations and good technological infrastructure are some of the Uruguayan characteristics highlighted by the experts consulted to attract foreign companies to set up their development centers.
Cuti's vice president for Global Markets, Leonardo Loureiro, said that the chamber participated in the missions of President Vázquez to China and Germany, in order to attract companies from those countries, and said that the key is to publicize the advantages that Uruguay already has. "Chile recently took out the tech visa. Uruguay already has it. It is a work visa that can be obtained in a few days to work in technology. These are things that, if promoted correctly, can turn Uruguay into a technological country," he said.
One of the world's leading programs is the Ceibal Plan, which this year celebrates its first decade and has positioned Uruguay as a benchmark country in technology linked to education.
Its president, Miguel Brechner, said that through Ceibal some foreign companies are testing their programs, and that this can continue with other areas. "We have good engineers, software specialists, good connectivity, good rules of the game. The technology industry is based on that, and we handle it well," he explained. Like Brum, Brechner understands that the change of the productive matrix is possible and that we have to start it "as soon as possible; prepare people for the world that is coming".
Gonzalo Frasca, head of design at WeWantToKnow and professor of videogames at ORT University, highlighted the success of Plan Ceibal: "In terms of education and technology, Uruguay is much better prepared than other countries".
Regarding product testing, he considered that it can be done and in different industries, especially in software. However, costs could limit the arrival of companies. "Uruguay is an expensive country, it is not so attractive compared to other countries when physical inputs are needed," he added.
The Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining (MIEM) is working through the Sectorial Commission of Electronics and Robotics in the development of knowledge related to these areas. The undersecretary of the portfolio, Guillermo Moncecchi, explained that one of the tasks of the ministry, as a way to lower costs, is to promote regulations at the level of the Executive Branch in order to reduce the tax burden for the importation of components for electronics companies.
"This seems to us that it can help the development of the industry. We want to do with electronics something similar to what happened with ICT. Uruguay exports ICTs to the world, and we believe there is room in electronics to do the same," said Moncecchi. He added that this "is fundamental to transform the productive matrix and the Uruguayan industry".
Necessary cultural movement
Ciapessoni also bets on thinking about tax benefits, not only in businesses related to technology, but in search of ways to entertain those who settle in the country. "There has started to be a movement in Uruguay that there are activities to do," he said.
Source: The Observer
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