The use of national and EC public funds for financing R&D activities: the case of a thermal spray shop

摘要

The current critical situation of the world economy pushes the companies to make themselves adaptable and to change their usual rigid behaviour in order to survive globalization of the market and the current financial crisis. A large quantity of people entering into the market created a sudden economic earthquake: the needs of goods and their way of production have changed with a subsequent unbalancing of supply and demand. The so called low cost countries (LCC) can offer a significant amount of goods at extremely low prices, with a high capability to "copy " the non-protected technologies. As consequence, it could be noted a movement of production from the rich western countries to the low cost countries, already established in several sectors (textiles, automotive, consumption goods, etc.) and in progress for higher technology sectors. The possible way to face this problem for European and US companies is to invest and increase the technological level of their products by means of effective Research and Development. This is even more valid for the SMEs. The help of the public bodies in funding R&D is crucial in order to make R&D costs acceptable for companies. This paper addresses the study of the financial instruments available for companies in order to obtain financial help for research and innovation: advantages and disadvantages are discussed. An industrial case study is shown, related to a thermal spray shop dealing with gas turbine components, where the efficient and effective use of research allows the set up and the development of the company and also contributes to the surrounding market.