The European continent is one of the most widely promoted markets in a global scale. There are approximately 446 million consumers who enjoy the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital between countries, in addition to a single currency.
When investing in Europe, companies have the possibility to sell without customs restrictions, borders, or taxes to all 27 countries of the European community. In addition, the costs associated with doing business are very different between Eurozone countries. A company installed in southern European countries, such as Portugal, will have much lower costs than a company installed in Germany, for example, since the cost of living is much higher in this region.
At the European level, Portugal has stood out as one of the most promising countries. In addition to benefiting from one of the best climates in Europe, natural beauty, safety, and quality of life, Portugal has been elected by several publications as one of the best countries in Europe to emigrate, in addition to the awards granted as the best touristic destination in Europe.
All this context around this small country in the Iberian Peninsula has risen a dynamic and promising business environment. According to the World Bank's doingbusiness.org portal, Portugal is a leader in matters of international trade, with low cost and agility in the import and export of goods and services. In this specific issue, Brazil ranks 108th, Mexico 69th, while Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador occupy 133rd, 188th, 103rd, respectively.
Support to companies and business internationalization - Portugal 2020.
In addition to a safe and stable business environment, Portugal and Europe have several programs to support business activity, which serves to attract investments to Eurozone.
Some of the main resources that economic push incentives to companies come from a partnership agreement between Portugal and the European Union, called Portugal 2020, which brings together the European Structural and Investment Funds in which the principles of economic development policy are defined, social and territorial to improve Portugal scenery.
Portugal 2020 has already helped thousands of companies in their expansion and development projects, through greater access to internationalization mechanisms, training their managers and collaborators, installations, products and services improvement, among other actions.
According to data from IAPMEI, since 2014 more than 8,100 projects have already started with investments around 7 billion euros.
Portugal 2020 has several contextual areas, such as:
Productive innovation;
Small and Medium Enterprises Internationalization;
Small and Medium Enterprises Improvement;
R&D (Research and Development) in companies;
Hiring specialized HR;
Startups Incentives;
Benefits of Portugal 2020 Program
Access to funds is a distinctive factor for companies. Many projects have a non-refundable percentage of the amount invested if the company doesn't achieve certain goals, such as creating new jobs, for example, that, in order terms, could be invested in strategic areas of the company without the need for further government compensation.
Requirements for Portugal 2020 support access:
The access requirements for these resources vary according to the chosen business area. There are supports for entrepreneurs who have good ideas to be explored and also for companies that have not yet started their activities, as well for companies that are less than two years old and large corporations.
The hiring of a specialized professional can means an interesting differentiation for understanding all the steps necessary to achieve the objective. According to the needs of each company, a strategic framework about the project must be made, including the most appropriate support line identification, which will be used as conditions for the presentation of a complete and structured proposal.
Martins Castro, along with its lawyer's team, has consultants from different areas, such as management, marketing, accounting and human resources, responsible for analyzing and qualify business proposals following the requirements of the funding resources, ensuring that all proposal aspects are well-founded in ways to increase its approval.