"Innovation" funding: bridging the gap between discovery and application

By Shauna Katz, GO-DARRI Public/Private Partnership

Image source: Sergey Nivens - stock.adobe.com

Have you made a breakthrough discovery that has the potential to be translated into a tangible solution, but you don’t know how to push your innovation forward? If so, you are not alone. Indeed, in a recent survey conducted by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the EC, a reccurent obstacle to maximizing the impact of research projects is to obtain further funding following the end of an initial funding period. Funding to support innovation development such as proof-of-concept (PoC) or public-private partnerships (PPP) grants could be an answer to overcoming this obstacle. There are several opportunies for these types of fundings at the national (BPI France, ANR Projet de Recherche Collaborative-Entreprise, ANR LabCom etc.) and the European (ERC proof-of-concept, European Innovation Council, Innovative Health Initiative etc.) levels. Unfortunately, these funding mechanisms are associated with their own set of difficulties. Notably, they are often hard to identify and lack transparency in terms of requirements and expectations. Also, they are often shrouded in « business/market » lingo, for example, what is a « convining go-to market strategy and pathway » or « KPIs for measuring the achievement of business validation and development objectives »?  

The Grants Office (GO) and Direction of Research Application and Industriel Relations (DARRI) have joined forces to create a dedicated structure to provide end-to-end support to help you establish projects and successfully respond to these funding calls. Specifically, we can: 

• Help identify calls that match with your project and needs  

• Check eligibility and requirements  

• Support consortium establishment, including identifying and contacting potential private partners  

• Provide assistance and advice for structuring the project and establishing a coherent intellectual property/business/market strategy  

• Grant writing support 

If you are interested in receiving more information, discussing or benefiting from this support please contact shauna.katz@pasteur.fr.