03 March 2010

Micro-Financing the Innovation Ecosystem

College/polytechnic applied research offers complementary R&D capacity to the Canadian innovation system. Funding programs such as the NSERC College and Community Innovation Program and the Colleges Ontario Network for Industry Innovation (CONII) are part of a public+private partnership funding model (P3RD) that support the innovation ecosystem.

We see our role as not only supporting SME innovation capacity, but also in preparing industry partners to move along the innovation chain. An ancillary effect of our applied R&D efforts is the graduation of our SME partners into more developed funding programs such as the Ontario Centres of Excellence.

A majority of our work involves Proof of Principle projects with short time horizons that cost $10-$20K. A member of the GBC Research Innovation Advisory Board  put it succinctly: We engage in micro-financing of applied R&D for Canadian SMEs.

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