More than a year ago, the Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Commission (SSTC) made the first move in China to rely on a third-party organization, the National Technology Transfer Eastern Center (NTETEC), to pilot a technology transfer-based innovation voucher. So far, Shanghai has issued about 20 million yuan worth of innovation vouchers, cashed in more than 10 million yuan and facilitated more than 100 technology transfer cooperation projects. Under the impetus of the innovation vouchers, the ice-detection technology of the C919, a large domestic aircraft, has entered the transformation stage and is expected to be used for ice-detection in such fields as drones, power transmission cables and bridges and roads.

"The technology innovation voucher is a policy tool with service categories covering the whole chain of technology fruit transfer." Yan Mingfeng, CEO of the National Technology Transfer Eastern Center, said, "We want to carefully embed this tool into all types of innovation entities to enliven Shanghai's science and technology services industry and promote faster access to the market."

Drawing on practices in developed countries, with clear results

Science and technology innovation vouchers are an imported product; since 1997, developed countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium and Canada have successively introduced innovation voucher policies to reduce the R&D costs of small, medium and micro enterprises and stimulate their innovation vitality. Last year, the Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Commission launched an innovation voucher to support technology transfer services and, drawing on the practices of developed country governments, attempted to establish a funding pool with eight categories of services, including technology search, technology assessment and intellectual property analysis, and competitive intelligence analysis. Universities, research and development institutions, enterprises and technology transfer service providers can apply for the vouchers once they have reached an intention to cooperate in a project, and the service providers can exchange the vouchers for cash upon completion of the project.

Listed on the Third Board of the New Taiwan Stock Exchange (TNSE), the company was the first to take the plunge. In March of last year, they signed a contract with a pharmaceutical company listed on the Growth Enterprise Market (GEM) to start a drug discovery and development (R&D) process reengineering project. Because the client's drug development cycle was long, risky and unclear, Entergy developed a standardized process management system for the client. Upon completion of the project, Enterprise Technology redeemed an innovation voucher worth RMB 100,000 to the Eastern Center.

According to statistics, the demand for innovation vouchers covers more than 30 industry sectors, basically covering key state-supported industries such as electronic information, biomedicine, aviation, new energy and new materials; 175 service providers have submitted applications, with 93.3% of them operating in the market and 96 approved; 225 projects have been supported, achieving remarkable results.

Patent for "7-step" operation of domestically produced large aircraft

Like Kidsearch, Shanghai Rongzhi Intellectual Property Agency Ltd. is also benefiting from the Innovation Voucher. Rongzhi is an intellectual property consulting service agency, its original "7-step patent precision operation model" for enterprises to provide intellectual property evaluation and analysis, strategic layout, management consulting, training management, patent operations and other comprehensive services. General manager Yu Xiaojing introduced, "7 steps" is to intellectual property analysis and evaluation as the axis, management consulting, high-value patent mining and layout as the basis, patent operation as the driving force and the formation of an integration program to achieve patent precision operation.

In May of this year, the C919, a large domestic aircraft, successfully made its maiden flight. The Shanghai Aircraft Design and Research Institute (SADRI), which is involved in the development of the C919, chose Rongzhi as the patent operation service for the "icing detector" used to avoid icing on the aircraft shell. It is understood that this component with eight core patents can be used not only for large passenger aircraft, but also for unmanned aerial vehicles, power transmission cables, bridges and other areas of icing detection. After the cooperation was launched, Rong Zhi experts analyzed the technical characteristics of these patents, transformation possibilities and market risks, but also the use of "7 steps" to help Shanghai Academy to realize the layout of high-value patents, and get the support of innovation vouchers.

On May 5, the C919 passenger plane completed its maiden flight and landed at Shanghai Pudong International Airport. Source:Xinhua

Up to now, RongZhi has applied for more than 10 innovation voucher support projects with various innovation entities. In addition to aviation projects, RongWisdom also provides patent analysis and evaluation for products of many well-known cosmetic companies, so that livelihood projects such as daily necessities can also apply for innovation vouchers, continuously tapping into the "blue ocean" of the science and technology service market.

Promote university scientific and technological achievements out of the laboratory

Recently, Kechuang Gang and Shanghai Maritime University have jointly applied for an innovation voucher for the project "Strategic research on the achievements of composite phase change heat storage technology", which is expected to receive 200,000-300,000 yuan in subsidies.

As a platform under the National Technology Transfer Eastern Center, Kechuang Gang has been active in the front line of innovation voucher services, targeting the innovation needs of industries and enterprises in the process of transformation and upgrading, exploring domestic and foreign high-quality scientific and technological achievements and teams, and providing overall technology docking and achievement transformation services.

Last year, the Shanghai Maritime University Institute of cold storage technology for heat recovery device, launched a series of composite phase change storage technology research, and hope to achieve industrialization of the results. According to reports, the compression refrigerator in the refrigeration process, will discharge a lot of heat to the atmosphere, the value can reach 1.1-1.3 times the cooling capacity. And by making full use of the waste heat of the air conditioning system through the heat recovery device, thermal pollution can be reduced and free domestic water can also be provided. After the breakthrough in the lab, the research team at Maritime University chose Kechuan Gang as its partner for industrialization, going through a series of stages such as market validation, product stereotyping, industrialization model selection, and cooperation negotiations.

Tang Xiaolin, chief executive officer of Kechuang Gang, told Jiefang Daily - Shangguan News, "We often hold presentations at various universities and institutes, and see that many teachers have research projects with high market potential on their hands, but it is difficult to put these projects into market operations due to insufficient funding for conversion and lack of understanding of the market." Now, Shanghai has an innovation voucher, a policy that promotes the conversion of results, which can promote the early entry of these scientific and technological achievements into the market.

Photo credit: Visual China Photo Editor: Zhu Li