Universities have broadly similar functions in the innovation systems of most industrial and industrializing countries; however the relevance of their role alters substantially. In Brazil, universities are the most important knowledge producers. Departing from the evidence that they do not form a homogeneous group (which is corroborated using the T-Theil index of inequality), a possible classification is then suggested: 'leader universities', 'threshold universities' and 'unveiling

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... ' which are in turn divided into two different subclasses: 'catching-up universities' and 'embryonic universities'. This paper demonstrates that even though the largest allocation on financial resources goes to 'hard sciences', there is a large allocation of human resources within humanities, applied social sciences and linguistics, arts and literature (soft sciences). This distortion in the distribution of researchers with a relative high concentration in humanities and applied social science may directly affect the countries innovation capacity. Brazil may not be producing the quantity of pertinent human resources expected to compete in the world's technological advanced markets.