Enterprise Ireland
Annual Report and Accounts 2006
Annual Report and Accounts 2006
The successful Irish exporters of the future will be those investing in the ongoing development of world-class products, inventive client-focused solutions and leading-edge services. Enterprise Ireland enhances our clients' capability to create such products and services by encouraging and supporting long-term commercially focused commitments to research and innovation.
Enterprise Ireland is concerned with every aspect of adding to the technical competence of industry in Ireland, whether this is supporting the development of in-company research capability or bringing new technologies into companies. We also assist the transfer of intellectual property and knowledge from the third-level sector to existing industry or new start-ups in Ireland, stimulate and develop interaction between industry and the research infrastructure, and provide access to opportunities in international collaborative research. Enterprise Ireland therefore continued to strongly drive forward the research and innovation agenda in 2006.
During the year 601 client companies invested over €100,000 in meaningful R&D projects, and 40 clients began significant R&D projects requiring an investment of over €2 million. This commitment by clients to focus strongly on R&D represents significant progress towards our three-year strategic targets of 596 companies carrying out meaningful research, and 42 performing significant R&D. In all, Enterprise Ireland approved 194 in-company R&D projects, involving €52.9 million of funding.
The initiatives and programmes we implemented to encourage companies to undertake or increase their R&D activities in 2006 included awareness-raising workshops and mentoring, training in R&D management, innovation partnerships between industry and third-level researchers, and the sharing of investment risk through co-funding. We also provided specialist consultancy to help companies engage in and successfully manage a more structured R&D programme.
R&D Advocates: Our R&D Advocates programme is a highly proactive programme involving R&D consultants making direct approaches to companies to engage them in practical R&D for the first time. It engages a wide spread of companies, including some whose contact with Enterprise Ireland may have been dormant. As a result, 35 client companies are seeking further support for R&D projects.
TechSearch: Enterprise Ireland's TechSearch service is designed to help companies acquire new technologies and products from international sources through licensing or joint venture agreements. Throughout the year this initiative assisted 160 clients, which resulted in 35 licence agreements representing an investment of over €2 million. The sales potential from the licences is some €15 million over the next three years. A technology partnership agreement signed with the National Research Council of Canada, will enable Irish companies to find partner SMEs as a gateway to the North American market. TechSearch also launched an online, interactive version of the service which provides case studies, licensing toolkits and expert guides.
Partnerships for innovation: Our Innovation Partnerships initiative, which is part of Enterprise Ireland's strategy to enhance clients' capacity to engage in innovative R&D, enables Irish industry and third-level institutions to work together in developing cutting-edge products, product enhancements and new services. This initiative provides financial support to encourage the combining of the third-level sector's intellectual base, facilities and skills with the commercial know-how of industry. In 2006, we provided funding to 63 innovation partnership projects.
