IRL Co-Investment fund to stimulate private sector

Media Release

05 November 2010

IRL Co-Investment fund to stimulate private sector R&D investment

IRL last night announced it would assist nine New Zealand firms in getting products to market faster and with much lower development costs through the IRL Co-Investment Programme.

The nine successful companies were announced by Research, Science and Technology Minister Wayne Mapp at an event in Wellington. The companies are Klein Medical, Group 3, Nova Mechanical Design, Fonterra, Nutriventures, TracMap, Im-Able, Virtual Measurement Systems and Antipodean Pharmaceuticals.

“I believe the world-leading science and technology solutions IRL will be providing these innovative companies will give them the opportunity to develop products that will be market leaders in New Zealand and offshore,” says IRL Chief Executive Shaun Coffey.

Minister Wayne Mapp says that science and innovation are at the heart of the Government's economic agenda.

“This programme sits well alongside the business assistance measures the Government has introduced.

"IRL's job is to empower industry to drive innovation in manufacturing and services. This initiative shows IRL is doing its job, helping businesses increase their R&D investment," he said.

Under the programme qualifying companies will get the opportunity to develop their ideas into prototypes and proofs of concept utilising IRL’s world-leading science and engineering expertise.

The firms will contribute 50 per cent of the total project funding with IRL matching their contribution dollar for dollar. The total value of the fund, including qualifying the contributions of qualifying firms is $750,000.

Shaun Coffey says he hopes the IRL Co-Investment Programme will enable many new ideas to leap off the drawing board and secure further investment in due course before successfully entering the market.

The funded projects represent a diverse range of New Zealand’s high-tech manufacturing sector ranging from those involving novel nutraceutical processing techniques to drug development, medical devices and complex measurment systems.

The scheme follows on from IRL’s successful $1 million R&D competition – What’s Your Problem New Zealand – that concluded in 2009 and attracted more than 100 entries.

“After running the competition we realised that New Zealand firms were very keen on utilising R&D to create innovative products but they needed some assistance. If this fund achieves its aims we will endeavour to extend it,” says Shaun Coffey.

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