Entering its eighth year of existence, INOV, without any doubt, has established itself as a reference entity in the business we carried out and activities we left behind. And we are recognised as such not only for the achievements per se (ultimately embodied in the budget figures) but also for indications collected "on the ground" and, more formally, for the high score we gained in most assessments used by the AdI (Portuguese Innovation Agency) in the last decade to analyse the performance of technological infrastructures. Of course, all the time we have to struggle for better outcome, there is always room for improvement: one or other innovation instrument still remains outside the scope of our attention or is not used in its full potential (for example, entrepreneurship and internationalisation of solutions). However, in general, we were able to correctly interpret what is expected from us and to implement it in practice.

We have a clear perception that the emphasis on the remote monitoring solutions enables us to meet a wide range of current and future needs, recognised and perceived by different entities acting in today's economy. Because the solutions to which I refer such as MONICAP for the marine monitoring, XTraN for the terrestrial fleet management (transferred to TECMIC), CICLOPE for video surveillance of large areas, SAFEGROUND for airport vehicle management, etc., integrate those internal values of INOV that constitute the basis of our knowledge and scientific & technological developments. That is, the units for remote operation are connected with electronics (including sensors, power supply units, signal processing, and so on), they need design and product engineering, they communicate remotely over telecommunications networks (fixed and/or mobile, terrestrial or space), feed the information systems (e.g., geographic information systems) providing visualisation, and store data in the structured systems of database management, eventually acting in the Web environment.

Based on the above mentioned key technological aspects, we solidified our expertise in remote monitoring systems and created additional and innovative solutions that allow to supervise and/or to control remotely diverse objects (such as ships, containers, cars, people, cameras, etc.) as well as to monitor various parameters (such as water level, air/water temperature, wind properties and so on) and, moreover, provide business management solutions that extend the information system coverage down to the tiniest structural elements.

Clearly, we are aware that the medicine or, say, renewable-energy technological solutions have strong growth potentials; but once again, our assertion here is always connected with implementation of our key technology capabilities, bearing in mind that some of them are almost unique in the national level.

Our strategic objectives lies in creating new economical opportunities for utilisation of various activities developed in INOV, holding our strong cooperation with the University. It is this global objective-challenge scope that embraces such directions as:

As to the particular challenges of the internationalisation and entrepreneurship, I would like to note that both depend on the investment of one of the noblest and the most essential innovation ingredients: the innovators. Indeed, one cannot expect significant internationalisation of activity or entrepreneurship without strong efforts (and even sacrifices) from the part of the employees. We must believe in the potential of our results, and I think we have good examples of what can be such a challenge and the institutional benefits that "our sweet home" INOV can harvest. I count on all our staff in putting forward these ideas, which occupy a lot our minds but not yet yield the desired results.

The basic values that INOV relies upon in its activity clearly demonstrate the important role that the R&D institutes play in innovation in Portugal. They are: education and training of employees; commitment to innovation, trust, agility, humility, efficiency, competence and networking. It is with these ingredients that we work with SMEs, large companies, multinationals, government agencies (central and local) playing various roles according to the current situation, from technology divulgation/dissemination (which can be a simple advice or an in-depth surveillance) to project partnership, servicing, technology brokering, providing technical and technological support, etc. The ability to assume all these roles, based on technical and scientific values protected as an intellectual property, gives us the features that are both necessary and sufficient for launching innovation activity with an economic player of virtually any type.