TEHRAN – Knowledge-based companies in Iran sold products worth 1,200 trillion rials (about $28 billion at the official rate of 42,000 rials) in the previous Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19), while the figure is projected to rise to 1,500 billion rials (about $35 billion) in the current year, said Sourena Sattari, Vice President for Science and Technology.

“Currently, some five thousand knowledge-based companies are active in the country and the number is rapidly increasing so that they will be one of the main pillars of the national economy,” he added, IRNA reported on Tuesday.

According to official reports, 250 Iranian knowledge-based companies exported around $400 million of products in the past Iranian calendar year, Mehr quoted Masoud Hafezi, an official with the Vice Presidency for Science and Technology as saying.

Medicine and medical equipment, polymer and chemical products, and industrial machinery were the items exported by the companies mainly to Central Asia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Persian Gulf littoral states, Hafezi explained.

The Vice Presidency for Science and Technology has reported that 35 domestic knowledge-based companies have been recently listed on the country’s stock market and the number is expected to increase in the future.

According to the report, the value of the shares of the mentioned companies is estimated at 1.5 quadrillion rials (over $35.7 billion).
The figure stood at 280 trillion rials (about $6.66 billion) in the previous Iranian calendar year (ended on March 19) which shows a significant growth in this field, so the vice presidency is trying to bring five to 10 new knowledge-based companies into the capital market this year.

The Vice Presidency for Science and Technology is following up on several programs to help to fund knowledge-based companies by utilizing capacities of the capital market.

Industry, Mining, and Trade Minister Reza Rahmani has said that supporting knowledge-based companies is the ministry’s priority in the current year.

Despite the coronavirus pandemic, the country’s major production units, especially in the field of basic goods and healthcare products, were completely active and this could be an opportunity to increase the country’s non-oil exports when the outbreak is over, Rahmani noted.

MG