Empreende is a project conducted by professors, researchers, technical staff and students from the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO), which aims to develop a strategy for entrepreneurship, innovation and the sharing of knowledge at the institution. It seeks to encourage entrepreneurship and foster economic and social development, based on the scientific knowledge generated by outreach activities and research in the fields of knowledge within which the university is most active and is therefore most able to help other social agencies.
Empreende seeks to promote entrepreneurship within the university environment by setting up structures that can be used by the entire UNIRIO community, to provide services and develop projects in collaboration with government, companies, civil society organizations and local communities. The plan is to set up a business incubator based on the coworking format, hold hackathons and competitions for business plans, provide consultancy for the preparation of business cases, as well as support for intellectual property and the financing of innovative projects, among other activities.
This initiative also has the purpose of assisting the activities provided for under the Legal Framework for Science, Technology and Innovation, approved in 2016 and regulated in 2018 through Decree No. 9,283, which states that scientific and technological institutions must have their own specific innovation policies, proposing enhanced flexibility and promoting relations between knowledge generation, technological development, the production sector and society. It is believed that the set of systemic liaison activities foreseen in the development of the project will enable the institution to better serve the purposes of the decree, while respecting the indivisibility of teaching, research and outreach.
The Empreende project came into being following the approval of a proposal by the Carlos Chagas Filho Foundation for Support to Research in the State of Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ), in the Public Announcement E_24/2021 – Support for Integrated Action to Promote Innovation in Science and Technology Institutions – 2021, and began its activities in August 2022.