Innovation and Internationalization of IT Companies - Comparative Case Studies in Brazil and Portugal

This paper uses a case study methodology to examine the process of innovation of internationalized Information Technologies (IT) companies in Brazil and Portugal. It was directly applied an interview to four IT companies, two from Brazil (Navita and Stefanini) and two from Portugal (Altitude Software and Ydreams). The study has two main objectives, firstly analyze the innovation management for internationalization of IT companies according with the theoretical model of innovation presented by Tidd et al (2005), secondly compare the process of innovation management of IT companies between an emergent economy (Brazil) and a small developed economy (Portugal). The study allowed some findings about similarities of IT companies in Portugal and Brazil, such as, the importance of the links with universities, the higher qualification of the founders, the innovative and international profile of the entrepreneurs that promotes the establishment of networking and partnership in global markets. The results also suggest that some internationalization strategies are mainly dependent from the internationalization process of their clients. This study also reveals some differences related to the dimension of domestic market and the degree of economic development of studied countries. Finally, we believe that within the existing literature, the original contribution of the paper lies on its comparison of innovation management of IT companies in two countries in different stages of development and with different dimensions of domestic market.