Springboard Atlantic Gets $9.6 Million To Continue Commercializing Region’s Innovation
HALIFAX – The federal government is investing another $9.6 million in Springboard Atlantic, an industry engagement and technology commercialization network that includes 19 Atlantic Canadian universities and colleges.
This is in addition to contributions from the member institutions, which totals $5.1 million.
Springboard Atlantic helps match publicly funded research and knowledge with private sector needs, resulting in new products and services ready to serve the market.
The federal government had invested more than $9.2 million into Springboard in 2017 through the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA). This time, the funding is again distributed by ACOA, taken from its Atlantic Innovation Fund (AIF), over three years. That will allow Springboard to maintain its services, and develop and deliver programs that will help bring new products and solutions to market.
“We’ll wrap up our current funding round in March 2020, so we will start with this new funding that we announced in March next year,” said Daryl Genge, president and CEO of Springboard Atlantic. “What that means is that we will have enough revenue to provide financial support for the industry engagement professional that work in the 19 institutions…we can support them directly and their work.”
There are 30 industry liaison officers across the 19 institutions. The bigger ones or the ones with more viable research taking place have more officers.
“Their role is really all about getting in there and understanding what research is happening within their institutions that has good commercial applicability and then working with those researchers to either help them connect with industry partners so that they can do collaborative projects, or they also are out there in the marketplace working with industry who have challenges and are looking for help to solve problems,” Genge explained.
“Springboard is really the network of the 19 institutions so, we have a small central office team but the real work here happens at the universities and colleges. It’s our industry engagement professionals that are really on the ground doing the work,” he added.
The funds will also support six staff at Springboard’s head office in Halifax. In addition, Genge said the money will support Springboard’s work in things like securing intellectual property for the solutions coming out of the research, proving them in the marketplace, and continuing to connect researchers and industry to each other.
“We’ve been doing some interesting projects over the past year…bringing together our universities and our researchers to tackle some industry wide problems here, and with some good success and small pilot projects,” said Genge.
“What that means is we can really expand this model out so I think we’re going to do even bigger innovative things here in the Atlantic region. This investment means that we’ll really be able to drive more new startups here in the region. We’ll be able to bring more really good research out there in the marketplace to help Atlantic Canadian industries be more competitive,” he added.
Springboard is also driving collaboration in key sectors of the region’s economy. Most recently, it does so with Ocean to Plate, a series of consultations to help the lobster sector find solutions to challenges.