Innovation
Innovation is one of Copel’s values in its strategic reference. Corporate strategic guidelines state the need to encourage innovation as a lever for growth, increased customer satisfaction and loyalty, and improved processes.
Considering the theme of innovation as a key factor for sustained growth, viability and increased well-being and development of society, innovation at Copel is no longer a matter solely for the areas of research and development but has become a pursuit for the entire Company. Copel clearly sees the importance of innovation to remain active and strong in the markets where it operates.
To reflect this organizational culture, Copel maintains in its structure, in addition to the areas responsible for Aneel’s regulated R&D, an Innovation Department, within the scope of the Business Development Directorate, and an Investment and Innovation Committee, composed of 3 members of the CAD, putting the topic of innovation under debate at the highest decision-making levels. Furthermore, the Investment Policy also considered guidelines for investments in innovation, with the aim of accelerating initiatives of interest to the Group. The Investment Thesis and the Innovation Investment Thesis were also established. In this way, the Company begins to allocate a reserve of resources for investment in business and innovation projects, in addition to the resources traditionally already allocated to Aneel’s regulated R&D program.
Copel has learned a lot over the years, developing innovation through the Aneel R&D program and is ready to make more efforts towards initiatives that aim to promote innovative solutions and businesses that go beyond the initial phases of the innovation chain in search of results with greater added value. With this focus, the Copel Volt Open Innovation Program was launched, an initiative that sought scalable solutions on the market for the Company’s challenges.
Copel took a step forward in the Open Innovation movement by launching its first Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) fund. With an initial investment of R$150 million, Copel Ventures I is focused on boosting national and international startups in the Seed and Series-A stages, aiming to develop solutions in services and products linked to the electricity sector, in particular that contribute to the energy transition.
This is an exclusive fund, wholly owned by Copel, with Vox Capital as manager. Copel Ventures I’s focus covers five main areas: renewable and clean energy; Energy as a Service; smart cities and electromobility; asset and facilities management; and innovative internal processes. One of the central points of this initiative is the contribution to the energy transition, seeking to invest in solutions that not only boost innovation in the electricity sector, but also promote a positive impact on society and the environment.
Urban mobility and smart cities continue to be innovation topics to which Copel pays special attention. Both contribute to the reduction of carbon emissions and access to electricity, in convergence with the Sustainable Development Goals prioritized by the electricity sector and the Company. Copel is renewing its fleet of light vehicles and testing electromobility solutions within Copel Volt, advancing the theme of electric mobility in the company, an initiative that began in 2018 with the implementation of the largest electroway in the country, with 12 charging stations along 730 kilometers of the BR-277 highway, connecting the extreme east to the extreme west of the state.
Contributing to positioning Paraná as a hub for energy production from green hydrogen, the Paraná Sanitation Company (Sanepar) and Copel signed a partnership to carry out the Renewable Hydrogen project from the dry reforming of biogas from sewage treatment household as energy for electromobility.
Aiming to modernize the management and distribution of electrical energy in Paraná, the Smart Electricity Network program was launched in 2020. Smart meters communicate directly with Copel’s Integrated Distribution Operation Center, facilitating control of the entire energy chain, from the substation to the final consumer. With this, consumption reading can be done remotely, giving citizens the autonomy to monitor this index in real time, via application.
Copel Geração e Transmissão
In operation since 2000, the Research, Development and Innovation Program (R&D+I) of Copel Geração e Transmissão (Copel GeT) was responsible for the development of projects that brought direct and indirect benefits to the company. In recent years, Copel GeT has advanced in actions aimed at innovation with initiatives that encourage the sharing of ideas, knowledge and dissemination of good practices – always seeking to encourage creativity and innovative behavior to improve existing processes or create solutions, products and services for this subsidiary.
Inov+ GeT allows any Copel GeT employee to register an innovation proposal at any time and present it to a Management Committee. Using its own methodology, it promotes the development of both projects and intrapreneurs.
It also has ETGET, a biannual event that aims to share and discuss Copel GeT’s technical work.
Copel Distribuição
Copel DIS promotes InovaDIS, a week dedicated to the culture of innovation and learning of its employees, and open to other Copel Group employees. The objective is to engage and encourage innovation within Copel DIS. Innovation together with a change in culture are the foundations for the distributor to be the most modern in Brazil and, thus, reach new levels of excellence.
With the challenge of promoting innovation in a highly regulated environment, Copel DIS proposes to co-create solutions for the development of innovative solutions.
Another initiative focused on innovation is the +Dis_aí Program, which consists of capturing ideas from any employee, and generating some innovation, by registering their idea on the program channel. In this way, the intrapreneur finds a way to obtain resources to put his idea into practice. +DIS_aí is Copel Distribuição’s main ideation program. Democratic, it encourages Copelian protagonism by allowing everyone to contribute with innovative ideas and proposals for the Company’s processes, regardless of the role performed, work sector, city of employment or specialty.
Accessible 24 hours a day and 7 days a week via computers or mobile devices (tablets and cell phones), even available in the field, the platform allows ideas to be registered the instant they come to the mind of any employee, taking advantage of those moments when inspiration arises or when problems manifest and are experienced.
More than just a platform for registering ideas, +DIS_aí is a complete ideation program that follows all phases of the process, including evaluating the alignment of the idea with strategic objectives, improving the proposal and implementation phase.
Copel knows that being innovative involves those who produce and generate ideas, as well as those who implement them. It is understood that capturing, executing and disseminating projects and suggestions for improvements are sources for a continuous process of developing competitive and innovative differences. Therefore, during all phases of the program there is the opportunity for several collaborators to participate and collaborate, including the proponent himself, with studies, prototyping and pilot projects. The program has been running since 2018 with excellent results.
Open Innovation
Open innovation aims to establish coordinated knowledge flows that go beyond the company’s borders in order to expand and accelerate internal innovative capacity and allowing the expansion of markets for external use of innovations. This system has helped organizations to improve the development of products or services, increasing the efficiency of development and innovation processes, with shorter deadlines, lower costs, or adding new services through partnerships with different entities, such as startups, educational institutions or technological institutes.
By adopting open innovation, the organization’s borders become permeable and allow it to combine resources with external collaborators.
Copel+
Made possible in 2018 by the Aneel R&D program at Copel Distribuição as a first step towards the culture of open innovation at Copel, Copel+ was a project whose general research objective was to evaluate the Organizational Learning provided by participation in an entrepreneurial ecosystem aimed at Open Innovation in the electricity sector. All the research work made the Copel+ project a successful case of interaction between the industry, represented by Copel; the university, represented by the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná (PUC-PR); and PUC-PR’s Hotmilk innovation ecosystem in conjunction with the Federation of Industries of the State of Paraná (Fiep) and the Eduvaldo Lodi Institute (IEL).
Copel Volt
Copel Volt is Copel’s open innovation program started in 2021. The initiative aims to leverage new products and services in the energy area and strengthen Copel’s position within the innovation ecosystem. The main objective is for startups to develop, with financial and technical support from Copel, proofs of concept (PoCs) seeking the most innovative solutions to face the challenges raised by the Company. In 2022, the proofs of concept for the 1st edition were finalized and the 2nd edition was launched in November. In 2023, the 2nd edition of the program was concluded.
CVC
In 2023, Copel launched its first Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) fund. With an initial investment of R$150 million. Called Copel Ventures I, it is focused on boosting national and international startups in the Seed and Series-A stages, aiming to develop solutions in services and products linked to the electricity sector, in particular that contribute to the energy transition. This is an exclusive fund, wholly owned by Copel, with Vox Capital as manager.
Copel Volt
Open innovation is a reality and companies from various sectors have sought competitiveness through this type of innovation. Its main characteristic is to find solutions for organizational processes, new markets, or improvements in existing solutions, relying on startups’ partnerships.
Corporate Venture Capital
Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) is an exclusive fund, wholly owned by Copel, which has Vox Capital as manager and aims to develop solutions in services and products linked to the electricity sector, covering the pillars of decarbonization, decentralization, digitalization and demand disruption. The five main areas for prospecting solutions are: renewable and clean energy; energy as a service; smart cities and electromobility; asset and facilities management; and innovative internal processes.
