A NOVEL mentoring and business development scheme has been announced for students, with participants being hand-selected from the annual BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition.
The goal is to give students the business knowledge they need to turn innovative ideas from their young scientist projects into commercial opportunities.
The BT Business of Science and Technology Programme was launched at the Science Gallery at Trinity College yesterday by the Tánaiste Mary Coughlan.
It will see a group of 40 student participants from the exhibition linking up with senior staff from companies including BT, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Bombardier, Bord Gáis Éireann, UCD, TCD, IP Innovations, Engineers Ireland and Bank of Ireland.
The student selection will take place soon after the exhibition ends in January and the successful students will then participate in mentoring sessions to take place at the Science Gallery in March.
These will include an intensive three-day series of workshops on subjects such as protecting intellectual property, global marketing, international business and strategy development.
The Tánaiste described it as a “fantastic project” that would help encourage the research “commercialisation we want to see”. It was “hugely” important that researchers began to commercialise their work, Ms Coughlan said after the launch.
The Government had invested heavily in research and there was great potential in seeing products coming from this work.
“We have challenges in our funding, therefore for me as Minister . . . my focus is on the commercialisation of that science,” she said.
The programme was a practical solution that would link business and education, said Chris Clark, chief executive officer with BT Ireland. It would “demystify business” for the participants and perhaps encourage at least some of them to continue with research or develop businesses.
Mentors from participating companies and universities have already been named. The 40 students will be assessed and then divided into eight groups of five, with the mentors then taking over and working with the students.
All participating students will receive a certificate; however, the top six performers will win summer placements in higher education institutions.
The launch included a description of Restored Hearing Ltd, a company recently set up by 2009 Young Scientist runners-up Rhona Togher and Eimear O’Carroll. They developed a method to cure temporary tinnitus, a hearing disorder.
Eimear O’Carroll described seeking financial support from the Sligo county development board, even as she completed her Leaving Cert last June. She was in no doubt, however, where the genesis of the company lay. “None of this could have happened without the BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition.”
