TEHRAN – Iran will soon inaugurate its fifth innovation center in Turkey aiming to find new markets for domestically-made high-tech products.

The inauguration will be concurrent with the second meeting of Iran and Turkey on commerce and technology which will be held in the city of Istanbul from February 27-March 2, ISNA reported on Tuesday.

Iran has already established innovation centers in Russia, Syria, China, and Kenya.

In December 2021, Marzieh Shaverdi, the manager of the Innovation and Prosperity Fund, said Iran will launch production lines of knowledge-based products in seven countries, namely Turkey, Armenia, Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Syria, Iraq, and Kenya.

The export support package for knowledge-based companies includes empowering, networking, and financing, IRNA quoted Shaverdi as saying.

Export empowerment includes training and consulting, providing export standards and licenses, and intellectual property, she explained.

The Vice Presidency for Science and Technology will provide special support to facilitate export for knowledge-based companies with quality products over the next 6 months.

Due to the necessity of Iran's presence in the global technology markets and the high capability of knowledge-based and creative companies, the Vice Presidency for Science and Technology stepped into the field to pave the way for the presence in the global market, Mehdi Ghalehnoei, an official with the Vice Presidency, said in October 2021.

To this end, it has developed and implemented programs, policies, and support packages related to the development of export, planning to attract foreign investment, eliciting the participation of Iranians abroad, and connecting domestic capabilities to the global market are among the actions taken in this regard.

Exporting technological products of Iranian knowledge-based companies is one of the important and key programs of the Vice Presidency for Science and Technology, and in this regard, three houses of innovation and technology were inaugurated in Kenya, China and Syria.

And countries like Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan are set to host innovation houses in the near future.

Ghalehnoei said in February 2021 that, knowledge-based companies gained about $800 million in revenue from export in the past Iranian calendar year (March 2020-March 2021), and this year it seems to reach up to $2 billion.

“Africa, neighboring countries, Southeast Asia and Eurasia are our export target priorities, and we hope to create Iranian innovation and technology in all these areas,” he added.

The Innovation and Prosperity Fund affiliated with the Vice Presidency of Science and Technology has earmarked a sum of 170 trillion rials (nearly $700 million) to support knowledge-based companies over the past 4 years.

The Vice Presidency for Science and Technology has paved the way for research and production of technological products by supporting 7,000 projects over the past 8 years.

There are currently 6,263 knowledge-based companies operating in the country, offering advanced products and services in various fields of technology to domestic and foreign markets, and some of them have entered international markets, Siavash Maleki, deputy head of the Fund stated.

The fields of aircraft maintenance, steel, pharmaceuticals, and medical equipment, oil, and gas are among the sectors that researchers in technology companies have engaged in, leading to import reduction.

MG