Technology Scouting Services for Canadian Companies - Intro Call

Do you know that hundreds of new inventions are filed each year in Canadian Universities and are available for Licensing?

Do you know that Government grants are available to companies willing to access those inventions and integrate them in their products? On some of those grants, you can have a 5X leverage for each dollar invested. That can be interesting!

Unfortunately, many companies do not consider those opportunities for their product development and innovation strategy because the process of interacting with research institution is too complex and often leads to fustrations.

Good news: You now have an easy option to access those technologies!

By using my 'technology scouting service' you can easily extend your internal R&D capacity to leverage the whole canadian research network at your advantage and stay focused on maintaining your product differentiation and market leadership while not reiventing the wheel.

For example, if you develop a smart camera system you may need some algorithm for face recognition. You have the choice to build this algorithm yourself or the buy/license it from a third party. 

While using external technology can be the right choice on paper, to make it happen is another thing and I can help you on this side by operating everything that is between your need and the steps required to find, select and transfer the technology into your product and in the right form factor.

Activities involved:

• Technology scouting and assessment
• Projet definition from the lab to your product rodapmap
• Project financing and intellectual property negociation with the research institution

Benefits for your company:

1- Access state-of-the-art and rare-to-find expertise on a specific problem (and all the expensive test equipment required).

2- Increase for IP porfolio: Technology coming from research institution is typically protected by patents so once it works for you, you may have the opportunity to license this technology and increase barriers to competition. 

3- Access to govenment funding: Engineering work executed by such R&D labs is typically heavily funded by government programs so that each dollar you spend will by multiplied by a factor 2 to 5 (and sometimes more).

4- Potential new hire: This is an opportunity to begin a relation with Highly Qualified Personnel (HPQ) such as master and Ph.D. student and hire them once the project is finished.

On the other side, technology found in R&D labs typically have low maturity of TRL3-4 (proof of concept, prototypes) but some can have TRL9 when already in used in a real application (Licensed to another application than yours). 

This process of taking technologies from R&D labs into real product is called Technology Transfer and well explained in this 2 minutes video from AUTM (see below).

Here is the 3 month program I am proposing you:

1- Initial call: to roughly determine your needs and define your objectives. I will also present you my methodology and how I work.

2- SoW: I will build a Statement-of-Work (SoW) document defining your exact needs in terms of technology function (what it does) and technology integration (how it can fit in your product). This document also details your project timeline and estimated budget.

3- Scouting project execution: Over a three month period, I will scan the market for the best technologies available, gather information on their status and maturity (TRL) and build a pipeline of the 3 best options available for you. With multiple options on the table, you can take the best decision for your project: to pursue scouting, the move on with a technology or to stop.

4- Result presentation: After the three month period, I will show you the results of my investigations and propose you options for the next steps. This presentation will be sent to you as a deliverable.

5- Technology transfer: Upon decision to move on with a technology, I will manage the whole process for you (as a second contract): negotiation with R&D lab, maturation process to delivery process, etc. so that you keep focus on your product development.

Pricing for 3 months project (per technology): $7,500

- Initial call: FREE and no-engagement at this point (go or no-go).

- SoW: included

- Scouting project of available technologies in Canada.

- Results presentation call: included

Conditions:

- I suppose you already have a well-defined product definition supporting a well-defined business case (If not I can help you with it).

- Prices in $CAN for Canadian companies and in $US for US companies.

Scouting executed by: Marc Perron, ing., Ph.D. based in Quebec City, Canada.

- 12 years of experience analyzing and commercializing technologies coming from academia research in many different fields of application (lasers, photonics, medical devices, EV charging stations, food industry, etc.) and business models (software licensing, product selling, service offering, etc.).

- I have a well-established international network in the field of electronics (semiconductor, software, sensors, power electronics, etc.), their applications (lasers, motor drives, electric vehicles, charging stations, etc.) and their markets (industrial, medical, automotive, mining, aerospace, etc.).

- My key skill is to be fluent in both technical and business languages. Hence, I can understand deep technical/product vision from inventors and articulate it correctly so that it quickly get traction on the business side (customers, partners, investors).

- Ethics: I am a member of the Ordre des Ingénieurs du Québec and Senior IEEE Member.

Special needs?

I am open to discuss any special needs to help you reach for business objectives.

How to start?

Click on the 'I want this!' button on the right to set up an intro call (indicate $0 as fair price).