South Korea's Ministry of Science and ICT said on Friday it will announce new projects under the "Public Research Outcomes Commercialisation and Start-up Support Programme" and the "Industry-Academia-Research Cooperation Revitalisation Support Programme".

The ministry's regional and commercialisation R&D budget for this year is 487.93 billion won, up 229.342 billion won, or 88.7 percent, from a year earlier.

Of that, funding for commercialisation and start-up support rises 39.857 billion won, or 74.9 percent, from a year earlier to 93.052 billion won. Support for revitalising industry-academia-research cooperation increases 36.705 billion won, or 181.5 percent, to 56.925 billion won. The two programmes will provide a total of 132.9 billion won.

The ministry will strengthen support by participant and by type so more public research outcomes spread to the market quickly. New projects total 88.855 billion won. Six programmes, including Technology Management Commercialisation (TMC), support to promote the spread of outstanding national R&D outcomes and a public research outcomes demonstration pilot project, have been announced in sequence from the 15th through the ministry, the Science and Technology Commercialization Promotion Agency and IRIS.

The ministry will first support capacity-building for various commercialisation players through the TMC programme under the industry-academia-research cooperation support scheme. It will select new projects across the IP Star Scientist support type (50 projects), the TLO innovation type (10 projects), the company builder support type (10 projects) and the comprehensive technology commercialisation specialist company nurturing type (2 projects).

In particular, company builders support efforts to revitalise planned start-ups based on public research outcomes. Comprehensive specialist companies support the full commercialisation cycle, from finding diverse public technologies to start-ups and incubation and follow-on investment, regardless of institutional or technology ownership.

Through the public research outcomes commercialisation and start-up support programme, the ministry will advance support by type to expand public research outcomes. It will select new projects under the "Next-generation promising seed technology fast-track for practical use" (Type 1, 4 projects), "joint innovation R&D support for university labs and start-ups" (2 projects) and "deep science start-up revitalisation support" (Type 1, 4 projects; Type 2, 2 projects; Type 3, 2 projects).

This year, the ministry will diversify support for expanding public research outcomes through new programmes. Support to promote the spread of outstanding national R&D outcomes (6 projects) and the public research outcomes demonstration pilot project (about 34 projects) will select new projects for the first time this year.

Choi Yun-eok (최윤억), director of the Research Outcomes Innovation Policy Division at the ministry, said supporting government R&D results so they do not remain unused and can create social and economic value is an important task for science and technology policy. He said the ministry will do its best to advance support by participant and by type so public research outcomes can become a growth engine for South Korea.