Irelands companies can tap into University skill sets for solving technical problems that they haven’t got the core competences to deal with themselves. The industry–company alliances are part funded by Enterprise Ireland (EI) in a scheme called the Innovation Partnership Initiative. This initiative is used to part fund programmes of research (part funded by the company and the balance is funded by EI), especially in the area of new products or innovative processes, which are of commercial value to the company.

To be eligible for this funding, the company must be an EI client and must be a manufacturing, processing and internationally tradable service companies. The company must also be operating from a base here in the Republic of Ireland. The third level organisation must also be based in the Republic of Ireland.

The Enterprise Research Centre in the University of Limerick collaborates with a number of companies under the Innovation Partnership Initiative and has been successful in problem solving and developing innovative new products and processes for their clients.
Companies who wish to avail of such support in their new product, process or service innovation should contact Dr. Mark Southern of the Enterprise Research Centre or Dr. Seamus Clifford for further information and should also read the current information available on the Enterprise Ireland website.