The Innovation Voucher Scheme

The Innovation Voucher has been introduced to inspire small and medium sized enterprises to utilise the opportunities and potential of making use of the knowledge of knowledge institutions. At the same time, the Innovation Voucher Scheme is expected to enhance the awareness at knowledge institutions of the need for knowledge and thus secure the quality and societal relevance of public research.

The scheme is open for projects within all scientific fields and the
administrative structure of the scheme is designed in a slim manner to reduce bureaucratic measures as much as possible for the project participants. The Council of Technology and Innovation runs the scheme and has decided that state co-funding is channelled directly from the Danish Agency of Science, Technology and Innovation to the research or technological partners of the projects, relieving the SME from the burden of invoicing its project partner.

Description of the voucher scheme

An Innovation Voucher project is a research-business-partnership project designed along one of two different tracks:

• A basic voucher for a research-based business development project with a state co-funding level of 40 percent, but max. DKK 100,000 (approximately EUR 14,000). Main focus in the basic voucher is the successful transfer of knowledge from research to SME, in order to place the SME and its activities in a position ahead of its market.
• An extended voucher with characteristics similar to a larger scale R&D collaboration project with a state co-funding level of 25 percent, but maximum DKK 500,000 (approximately EUR 67,000). Main focus of the extended voucher is finding new solutions to current problems. It is a prerequisite for the extended voucher projects that the participating knowledge institution itself carries out research on the field in question.

The enterprise is the formal applicant and experiences an evaluation process for applications which is relatively fast - 30 days from end of month of applying.

There is one call every year with a first come first served basis and no fixed deadline, for optimal flexibility. This structure enables integration of academic research and practical business. The projects are effective network promoters between research institutions and the private sector. Two very different working environments are matched in the projects, making way for creating a personal network with a potential to spin off future collaboration. The applying SME must be a private sector SME located in Denmark whereas the knowledge institutions may very well be placed abroad. Applications are assessed by the secretariat of the Danish Council for Technology and Innovation.