Through its INNOVATION GRANTS (up to S$250,000) and EXPLORER GRANTS (up to $50,000 for students), the SMART Innovation Centre enables faculty and students to pursue exciting new avenues of market-driven research and participate in programs that will help accelerate their innovations toward commercialization. This program is opened to SMART researchers and also to faculty at all Institutes of Higher Learning in Singapore (eg. NUS, NTU, SIM, SMU, SUTD, Polytechnics, etc).

Modeled after the successful Deshpande Center at MIT, the Innovation Centre has created a fertile environment for faculty to accelerate their innovations from the laboratory to the marketplace.  In addition to grant funds, the Centre connects faculty innovators, investors, entrepreneurs and the Singapore and international business community.  Through its Catalyst Program, the Centre provides business advice, market input and IP strategy to define a go-to-market strategy for each funded project.  The Centre, in a cross-campus collaboration, forms qualified pre-selected teams of researchers and business students (called "i-Teams") to assist each project in plotting its business direction.  Our goal is to nurture innovative scientists and engineers and accelerate emerging innovation to commercialisation through licensing or start-up company formation.

I encourage you to explore our website for further details of our grant programs and our Catalyst, i-Teams and entrepreneurial education and networking initiatives. 

Please feel free to contact me at howard.califano@smart.mit.edu if you have any questions.

Sincerely,
Howard Califano
Director, Innovation Centre