Hortolândia is a Brazilian municipality in the interior of the state of São Paulo. It is part of the Metropolitan Region of Campinas and the Mesoregion and Microregion of Campinas. It is located northwest of the state capital, about 110 km away. It is part of the São Paulo macrometropolis, which exceeds 29 million inhabitants and makes up approximately 75 percent of the state's population. The metropolitan regions of Campinas and São Paulo form the first megalopolis in the southern hemisphere. It is bordered by Sumaré, to the north; Monte Mor, to the south and west; and Campinas, to the east. Hortolândia was founded in 1991, splitting from Sumaré, and the privileged location and proximity to major industrial centers in the country caused the municipality to undergo a rapid demographic and industrial development. Hortolândia is considered a technopole and there is currently representation of several companies of highly advanced technological parameter, including IBM. These activities make the city have the 76th largest nominal municipal GDP in Brazil, with BR$12.9 billion in 2017. Hortolândia has several campuses of renowned universities, such as the Federal Institute of São Paulo and the Adventist University Center of São Paulo [pt]. Some of the city's main attractions are important green areas that provide space for sports and resting. There are also the cultural projects and events held by the Municipal Secretariat of Culture, the body responsible for projecting the cultural life of Hortolândia. History Origins In 1798, lands were donated by the Portuguese Crown to José Teixeira Nogueira, an important mill owner in the region. He brought coffee for the first time to where the city of Hortolândia is today, whose work on the farms was based on slavery. After the slaves were freed, lands were donated to them, but stolen by an American doctor. Some areas were even renegotiated, but those that were made available did not favor coffee, so cotton, sugarcane and cattle breeding began to be grown. The place, which served as a stopping point for tropeiro, settlers and slaves, came to be called Jacuba (a Tupi-Guarani word meaning "hot water"), or the Sítio de Jacuba, since these travelers took advantage of the waters of the streams and the shade of the trees to rest and feed themselves. The settlement began to take utterance when the telegraph office was inaugurated in 1896. Later, in 1917, the Jacuba telegraph post became a railroad