Non-EIC projects covered by the European framework programmes face several obstacles: based on the Innovation Radar report, 41.9% of the projects see financing as the main bottleneck to innovation exploitation; but only around 5% of the projects have managed to seek funding, showing that projects lack the knowledge and access to funding and require support and mentorship to achieve it.
The INNODEC proposal was created to close the gap between investors and research projects from both sides. On the one hand, by placing investors/partners in contact with research projects that have the highest commercialisation and market potential and on the other hand, to coach projects on raising capital, identifying and refining their business models, and developing sound go-to-market strategies. Such an approach is meant to ensure scalability while simultaneously addressing the large diversity between the projects and the needs. This is achieved by following a data driven selection process for the high potential projects, followed by tailor-made support. Providing suitable support is needed as ownership structures, backgrounds, market focuses, and challenges vary greatly between projects. For example, some researchers prefer to transfer or license their innovations as opposed to starting and running a company. The key to success is to first understand each innovation, innovator, investor and partner. Only then their needs and their potential can be identified, and they can receive the right kind of support at the right stage.
In order to achieve these aims, this Consortium has brought together market leaders in their respective domains to provide the best resources when it comes to:
1) Data-based selection platforms,
2) Go-to-market support and,
3) Corporate and investor networks.
INNODEC project was meant to support ICT innovators that were not yet supported by the EIC. This would be done by providing coaching and bringing their innovations to market.
The overall objectives of the project are:
a) For Innovators and Innovations, seeking for, screening, selecting, and guiding the most promising projects to their chosen go-to-market path and supporting them to reach investment maturity and market introduction readiness.
b) For investors, solving the information disparity by expanding the innovation radar with both third-party data and curation, which enables investors to discover, assess and get in touch with truly innovative projects. Such a solution lowers the risk premium, as well as the administrative cost for assessment, thereby attracting new investors and increasing access to finance for truly innovative businesses.
The main objective of the project can be summarized as increasing the number of commercialised technologies originating from EU funded research projects.
