Opportunity
I-Corps
Award Info:
NSF I-Corps Hub recipients will be supported at a level of up to $3,000,000 per year for up to five years. All funds are awarded to the Lead institution; Partner institutions receive funding as subawardees.
Description:
The National Science Foundation (NSF) seeks to further develop and nurture a national innovation ecosystem that guides the output of scientific discoveries closer to the development of technologies, products, processes, and services that benefit society. The goal of the NSF Innovation Corps (I-Corps) program, created in 2011, is to reduce the time and risk associated with translating promising ideas and technologies from the laboratory to the marketplace, to increase the economic competitiveness of the United States, to encourage collaboration between academia and industry, and to train NSF-funded faculty, students, post-docs, and other researchers in innovation and entrepreneurship skills. The I-Corps program utilizes experiential learning of customer and industry discovery, coupled with first-hand investigation of industrial problems and processes, to quickly assess the translational potential of inventions. The I-Corps program is designed to support the commercialization of so-called "deep technologies," i.e., those based on fundamental discoveries in science and engineering. The I-Corps program addresses the skills and knowledge gaps associated with the transformation of promising basic research outcomes into deep technology ventures (DTVs).