RTDI Schemes for 2000-2006

Applied Research Enhancement Schemes

Provides funding for the establishment of applied research centres in Institutes of Technology (IT's), aimed at building sufficient scale to allow them to make an impact on industry in their locality through collaborative research.

Innovation Partnerships

This scheme supports joint R&D projects involving companies and colleges, where the bulk of R&D is carried out within a third level institute or a public research organisation. The focus is to increase the competitiveness of companies and to develop the scientific / technological skills base and supporting infrastructure of the participating Third Level Institutions.

The scheme supports both mutually beneficial co-operation and interaction between industry and the Universities / Institutes of Technology (IT's) respectively.

Project proposals can take the form of individual partnerships between a company and a college or clusters of companies and/or colleges working together to a common goal. The programme operates on an open call basis.

Competence Centres

Supports the establishment and maintenance of centres aimed at developing close interactions with companies with the intention of transferring knowledge and skills about technologies of direct relevance to their business.

These centres represent a transformation of existing PAT centres supported by Enterprise Ireland, brought up to date and made more relevant to industry.

Industry Led Network

This scheme provides support for research in areas defined by networks of companies in specific industry sectors. An industry board oversees the work. Enterprise Ireland works to create real collaboration between the companies and the researchers to ensure the transfer of technology.

International Collaboration

In the past this scheme assisted Irish researchers to establish new research collaborations with high quality research groups abroad which could lead to applications for funding from the Framework Programme. Future focus will be on greater collaboration between industry and the research community to create synergies in competing for Framework Programme funding.

Networking Initiatives

A key aspect of the transfer of knowledge from the research system to the productive sector is the maximising of scale in research. This can be done by networking existing research resources.

Two network systems currently receive funding support:

• Tecnet (a group used by all the Institutes of Technology for joint activities) and
• The Technology Transfer Initiative (focussed on facilitating collaboration between the three West Coast Universities).

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