Two new initiatives demonstrate that government moving on commercialization

Ottawa’s Innovation Agenda and the government’s focus on commercialization have stimulated the launching of two promising initiatives within the federal bureaucracy. Both are being positioned to be in line for consideration in the next Budget cycle to take advantage of what’s seen as the best environment for federal S&T in many years.

At the National Research Council (NRC), a variety of functions relating to commercialization are being consolidated into a single unit. Across government, an Interdepartmental Working Group on Commercialization (IWGC) has been struck that will examine five key issues brought forward through consultations with industry over the past year.

New NRC unit

At the NRC, a commercialization unit has been created within the technology and industry support (TIS) division, headed by Dr Michael Raymont, VP TIS and acting president. Essentially an empty shell, it will initially be filled with personnel related to business relations, patenting, licensing for technology transfer and business case competitions held across the NRC’s various institutes. The unit will be headed by newly appointed DG commercialization Susan Moggridge, who joined NRC from the private sector last year as DG development.

“We have to develop strategic directions to determine the extent of programs and the nature of alliances,” says Moggridge, adding that the new unit represents a natural evolution for the agency. “We’ll be developing an overall model that extends beyond the NRC and builds commercialization capacity … There’s no budget yet and we’re still in the planning stages so we’ll see where it goes. We’ll see what the Budget has next year.”

The move comes amidst escalating rumours of a major reorganization of the NRC and represents a logical step following the recent federal Budget. The Budget had little in the way of new money for the NRC but had many positive words of encouragement (see box). Moggridge says the commercialization unit won’t pool all of the NRC’s commercialization activity but will strive to pool best practices.

The NRC is also a key player in the IWGC, which is led by Sara Filbee, director of Industry Canada’s manufacturing industries branch. The idea for the Working Group was spawned by a series of consultations last year with approximately 25 industry sectors. It has isolated five issues that were distilled from those discussions, including commercialization skills development, near market technologies, infrastructure for smaller businesses, government procurement or government as an early adopter and access to information for government programs.

More than 30 departments and agencies are participating in the IWGC, represented by senior officials responsible for commercialization and procurement. Five meetings have been held to date to produce a discussion paper as an initial outcome by late Spring. Plans are in the works to coordinate with other federal S&T groups, such as the ADM Committee for S&T.

“We’ve taken an integrated, holistic approach. Commercialization is where a lot of these issues reside,” says a government official. “There’s no official mandate. This is like a skunk works group that has grown out of need.”

The IWGC is also timing its efforts to coincide with the fall lead-up to the next Budget. “We’re entering another transition period and we need to position ourselves past the election in time for the Speech from the Throne and next Budget,” says the official. “We hope to be ready to help the government with their process.”

Federal laboratories were the recipient of $25 million in commercialization funding over five years in the last Budget (R$, April 6/04). Details are pending.

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