It was announced today that the Government of Ireland is providing funding of €26.75m for the Enterprise Ireland Technology Gateway Network over the five year period from 2018-2022.
Today’s €26.75m funding announcement was made at a showcase event in Dublin attended by over 100 industry representatives where the establishment of a new Food and Beverage Technology Cluster (Irish Food Tech) within the network was also announced.
Since its formation in 2013, the Technology Gateway Network has completed over 2,750 innovative projects with over 1,250 Irish based companies. Projects range from polymers to pharmaceuticals, photonics to mobile services and mechatronics, right through to biotechnology and industrial design.
Typical projects focus on the development of a new product or service or the optimization of a process, across all sectors of the economy and based in every county. The network consists of 15 individual Gateways hosted by an Institute of Technology, spread across the country providing industry with access to over 300 highly skilled and industrially focused researchers, together with specialist equipment and facilities.
Announcing the funding, Minister of State for Training, Skills, Innovation, Research and Development, John Halligan said, "The Technology Gateway Network programme aims to bring Irish companies together with the researchers in the Institutes of Technology to provide near-to-market innovation and solutions in a range of areas, both regionally and nationally. Today I’m also delighted to announce the establishment of a new food and beverage technology focused cluster within the Gateway Network called Irish Food Tech."
He added, "As with the other two sectoral clusters in the network, Applied IoT and EMD Ireland, the aim of Irish Food Tech is to optimise the power of the Network and connect industry with researchers in a wide selection of areas that include bioprocessing, food for health, process control and packaging."
Source: www.businessworld.ie
