Portugal has to reach the top 10 of the European Union, says Costa
The prime minister said, this Friday, that competition on a global scale for raw materials or technologies will be brutal in the long term and that Portugal has a unique opportunity to reach the “top 10” of the European Union.
António Costa assumed this position at the end of a session entitled “Web Summit – The following day”, at Clube Ferroviário, in Lisbon, which was also attended by the Minister of State and Economy, Pedro Siza Vieira, as well as the former titleholder this folder Manuel Caldeira Cabral.
In his brief speech, the executive leader considers that the country is facing the challenge of knowing “how to give a new one” to the technological level and defended that the path goes through training more integrated staff, retaining talent, and attracting externally of talents, by companies with greater added value and by a greater connection between companies and knowledge-producing entities.
Afterwards, he commented on an intervention made minutes before by a young woman linked to technology companies, who said that in Spain there is a conviction that Portugal is more advanced in terms of implementing the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR).
“We don’t just have to be more advanced than Spain. We even have to be more advanced than the other Member States of the European Union. The PRR is very interesting, but it will inject something similar to the Marshall Plan simultaneously in all the countries of the Union European, “he pointed out.
In other words, according to António Costa, “the competition will be brutal, because it will be a competition for everything: for raw materials for construction materials, for microchips, for semiconductors and for talent”.
“Therefore, we have to be ahead so that we can reach the goal. Our ambition must be to use this extraordinary opportunity that we now have to manage not only to converge with the European average, but also to start reaching the countries that are in the top 10 of the European Union,” he wrote.
At this point, the prime minister argues that Portugal has the resources to do so, due to its high rate of graduates in engineering, “the third in the European Union, with only Austria and Germany at its head”.
“We have an addition to technical and scientific training, our art of living, which has always been very useful to us”, he added.
António Costa later maintained that the technological ecosystem in Portugal “has been a very vibrant trait”, but warned that it is essential that it “continue to grow”.
“This is an absolute priority for the country”, before referring to the fact that Portugal already has “seven unicorns”, technological companies with capital in excess of one billion US dollars.
“These seven unicorns convey a message of confidence to all other startups. Most startups will never be unicorns. But the example that these unicorns allow is a huge motivating factor for those who are already entrepreneurs, for those who are still studying or for whoever is out there,” he added.