Brazil

1
Brazil

• Country Report
• MIS480 OU Fall 2004
• Jawan Brooks
• Gene Lopinski
• Igor Pertrovski
• Nick Zeigler
• Karen Zezula

2
Agenda

• GENERAL INFORMATION
• Physical Area Jawan Brooks
• Demographics Jawan Brooks
• Socio-Cultural Atmosphere Gene Lopinski
• Economy Igor Petrovski
• Business climate of country and region Igor
  Petrovski
• TECHNOLOGY
• IT Possibilities in Brazil Nick Zeigler
• IT industry strengths and weaknesses Nick Zeigler
• IT industry Producer Characteristics Gene
  Lopinski
• IT industry Consumer Characteristics Gene
  Lopinski
• E-Commerce Igor Petrovski
• Sample of IT industries Jawan Brooks
• Websites Karen Zezula
• REGIONAL COMPARISON
• French Guiana Nick Zeigler

3
GENERAL INFORMATION
4
Physical Picture
5
Basic Demographics

• Brazil is populous along the coast, less in the
  interior. The inhabitants are very diverse with
  many races and cultures represented.
• Population
• 177.062.044 (2003).
• Ethnic groups
• White (includes Portuguese, German, Italian,
  Spanish, Polish) 55
• Mixed white and black 38
• Black 6
• Other (includes Japanese, Arab, Amerindian) 1
• Religions
• Roman Catholic (nominal) 80
• Languages
• Portuguese (official), Spanish, English, French
• Exchange rate 
• Reals per US dollar - 1.954
• Labor force
• 79 million
• By occupation  services 53.2, agriculture
  23.1, industry 23.7 Unemployment rate  7.1
• Industries
• textiles, shoes, chemicals, cement, lumber, iron
  ore, tin, steel, aircraft, motor vehicles and
  parts, other machinery and equipment

6
Socio Cultural Picture

• Brazilians like to create relationships
• Brazilians, being extremely cordial
• Business and social circumstances you may hear
  this word - jeitinho (pronounced jay-chi-nyo)
• In Brazil, basic business networking is based on
  the family
• Sense of Camaraderie
• Dressing up for Business

7
Economic Picture

• Brazil is advanced in agricultural, mining,
  manufacturing, and the service sectors.
• The beginning of September Brazils government
  reported that the nations GDP grew 5.7 beating
  all median forecasts of 4.5.

8
Economic Picture

• The three pillars of the economic program
• Floating exchange rate
• Inflation-targeting regime
• Tight fiscal policy

• A floating exchange rate is when a nation's
  government is NOT trying to manipulate currency
  prices to achieve some change in the exports or
  imports

The central bank is responsible for achieving a
publicly announced target for the inflation rate
Tight Use of the federal government's powers of
spending and taxation to stabilize the business
cycle
9
Business Climate of Country and Region

• Economy in South America
• Brazil's economy is greater then all other South
  American countries and is expanding its foothold
  in the world markets
• Human Resources
• Brazilian has high quality managers and a
  excellent local labor force that contributes to
  the success of companies operating there.
• Nokia had such confidences in the quality and
  production of the Brazilian workforce that they
  adding more than 1,000 workers to its Manaus cell
  phone assembly facility.

10
Business Climate of Country and Region

• Drawbacks
• One of the main problems in Brazil is high duties
  and taxes. In 2002 import duties averaged over
  11.
• Freight hijacking organizations are known for
  their success in getting goods to market quickly.
  Hijackers, along with smugglers and
  counterfeiters supply Brazil's Black market which
  is equivalent to 40 to 50 of the country's
  gross national income.

11
TECHNOLOGY
12
IT Possibilities in Brazil

• Possible industries for investment
• Outsourced Technical Support Services
• Corporate Help Desk
• Customer Service/Support
• Example Volkswagen Call Center
• Outsourced Manufacturing
• Lower labor costs (but not lowest)
• Labor skill level higher than less-developed
  nations
• Example Nokia Assembly plant
• Not a viable target market for imports
• High import tariffs
• 20 of imports can take up to 30 days to clear
  customs

13
IT Industry Strengths and Weaknesses

• Strengths
• Brazils telecom infrastructure used to be
  considered a barrier to growth. The aging
  telecom infrastructure was privatized in 1998.
  This lead to an influx of telecom-related
  investment, and Brazil now has a modern
  infrastructure.
• Educated, skilled workforce
• Central location in South America
• Many sea ports
• Weaknesses
• Business laws not supportive of e-commerce
• Inadequate legal protection for e-commerce
  transactions
• Language Barrier

14
IT Industry Producer Characteristics

• Brazil is the leading IT market in Latin America
• Long-term outlook IT sales is extremely good --
  economic expected growth 3.5 annually, next few
  years
• Hardware Market should increase due to private
  sectors ongoing modernization of its operations
• Brazilian governments commitment to providing
  Brazilians with electronic government, plus
  expanding computer and Internet use throughout
  the country
• Brazilian government commitment should increase
  sales and opportunities for suppliers of Servers,
  Desktop, Notebook, PDAs and used PCs in the
  future
• Peripheral Firms should benefit
• Scanners, Printers, Disk Drives
• Demand for High-end data storage should be strong

15
IT Industry Producer Characteristics

• Software market has enormous potential
• Brazilian Manufacturing Services need for
  software solutions
• Brazilian Corporate Security concerns result in
  heavy IT spending
• Excellent Market for networking
  equipment-continuing expansion
• International Data Corporation predicts IT
  Services overtake investment in computer
  equipment
• Brazils acute shortage of qualified IT
  personnel-Great need for consultants and system
  integrators
• Corporate execs consider data warehousing and IT
  security part of their budgets

16
IT Industry Consumer Characteristics

• Brazil has most the PCs installed and Largest
  internet population in Latin America
• PC use still confined to the Wealthy
• US market research forecasts Brazilian Internet
  users will triple to 42 million by 2006, Yankee
  Group
• Brazil was the 11th largest computer market in
  1997, could reach 5th in the near future
• Most PC consumers are in Industrial commercial
  and financial establishments
• Small Office/Home Office Market to continue to
  increase
• Growth in Government Market Educational Market

17
E-Commerce

• E-commerce in Brazil has a firm hold in
  information intensive sectors with little
  affection by foreign business
• The growth of e-commerce in Brazil has been rapid
  in the last two years electronic trade grew from
  100 million US dollars to nearly 2 billion
  dollars a year

18
IT Industries

• Variety of IT Industries in which to work
• Computer Analysts
• Programmers
• Systems Administrators
• Web Developers
• Telecommunications
• Education
• Certifications are not mandatory
• Preference given to college education and
  relevant work experience
• Graduate level degrees preferred by employers for
  higher level positions

19
Brazil Websites

• Portugese
• MSN
• Mercado Livre free market
• Sandisk SD 256MB
• 175.00 Reals
• Exchange rate
• US Comparison -- EBay
• General Motors Brazil
• Extra.com
• English
• Braslink
• In translating its 'Got Milk?' slogan into
  Hispanic, the US Milk Board would have been best
  to know that it actually asked people if they
  were breastfeeding. Ford had a similar problem in
  Brazil when the Pinto flopped. The company found
  out that Pinto was Brazilian slang for "tiny male
  genitals". Ford prised all the nameplates off and
  substituted Corcel, which means horse. These, and
  dozens of other blunders, highlight how
  linguistic nuances can change the whole meaning
  of marketing slogans and would have been avoided
  by using native linguists in marketing
  translations

20
REGIONAL COMPARISON
21
French Guiana v. Brazil
French Guiana Brazil
General Geography/Information
Population 191,309 184,101,109
Literacy Rate 83.0 86.4
GDP per Capita 8,300.00 7,600.00
Mean IQ 87 88
Land Area (sq. km) 89,150 8,456,510
Coastline (km) 378 7,491
Climate tropical hot, humid little seasonal temperature variation mostly tropical, but temperate in south
Natural resources bauxite, timber, gold (widely scattered), petroleum, kaolin, fish, niobium, tantalum, clay bauxite, gold, iron ore, manganese, nickel, phosphates, platinum, tin, uranium, petroleum, hydropower, timber
Land use
arable land 0.14 0.14 6.96
permanent crops 0.05 0.05 0.90
other 99.81 (90 forest, 10 other) (2001) 99.81 92.15
Irrigated land (sq. km.) 20 26,560
Natural hazards high frequency of heavy showers and severe thunderstorms flooding recurring droughts in northeast floods and occasional frost in south
Of Note mostly an unsettled wilderness the only non-independent portion of the South American continent largest country in South America shares common boundaries with every South American country except Chile and Ecuador
22
French Guiana v. Brazil
French Guiana Brazil
Technology Infrastructure
Telephones - main lines in use 51,000 38,810,000
Percentage of population 26.66 21.08
Telephones - mobile cellular 138,200 46,373,300
Percentage of population 72.24 25.19
Internet users 3,200 14,300,000
Percentage of population 1.67 7.77
Internet TLD .gf .br