This paper analyses the role of inventors concerning innovation of technologic processes. First, the paper presents a typology of inventors taking into consideration professional status, link with R&D systems, entrepreneurial behaviour and so on. After that, the paper summarises a research on inventors who filled patent applications at the Instituto Nacional da Propriedade Industrial, the Brazilian Patents Office, and compares its results with similar researches in other countries. Finally, private and public instruments created in Brazil to aid each kind of inventor are examined.
Individual inventor; entrepreneur; technological innovation; patent; venture capital