The difficulty of transferring inventions developed in academic contexts to society is well known. The process of transferring a technology to the market is often blocked when this technology is at a development level that is not yet suitable to draw the attention of society due to the disappearance of economic resources distributed by public research.
To fill this gap, Politecnico di Torino, beginning in 2016, was one of the first universities in Italy to implement Proof of Concept (PoC) projects: applied research funding programmes aimed at bringing technologies from the initial development stage to a sufficiently evolved one in order to appreciate the commercial potential thereof, whether you wish to enhance the technology via its application at an industrial level or by setting up a new entrepreneurial initiative.
To meet the different needs that these two enhancement paths present, over the years, two different types of Proof of Concept programmes have been implemented:
- Stage I PoCs: created to fund the first development stages of a technology, are usually distributed in the form of grants. They may comprise, or not, specific education paths for the direction of technology transfer that you wish to undertake (licence vs. entrepreneurial path). The involvement of market actors in the PoC project is considered a plus for selecting the project.
- Stage II PoCs: usually distributed by investment funds and only for supporting the development of new businesses. These provide for the potential setting up of a start-up at the end of the project (in which the investor will participate in exchange for funding), as well as binding the IP involved.