Govt to fund inventive ideas

The government has launched a new agency to help turn innovative ideas into profitable business ventures. "South Africa has a comprehensive science base, but what was missing for the last 15 years was the mechanism to take these ideas to commercial value," said Minister of Science and Technology Naledi Pandor.

Speaking after the inauguration of the Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) in Johannesburg on Monday, Pandor said that it is apparent that South African ideas have not been developed into actual commercial value.

The TIA will act as a business unit in securing funding and further loans for innovative ideas. Any South African can make a presentation to the board and be aided from conceptualisation to the point of commercialisation, the agency promises.

But Pandor stressed that only incentives with potential commercial value would be funded.

"It's not just a funding agency, we will make sure that it is a good idea first," said Pandor.

The fund plans to establish regional offices and will incubate ideas from the space/science, energy, biotechnology, pharmaceutical and nanotechnology sectors.

"Our researchers have great ideas, just not the funding," said Dr. Ramphele Mamphele, former managing director of the World Bank and chair of the board of the TIA.

Ismet Amod, chief operation officer of Bioclones, a biotechnology group and owner of 22 global patents, said that the TIA will significantly lower the cost of local ideas.

"At the moment we make use of technology transfers - bringing patents into the country," he said, "We are currently getting the technology cheaper from overseas."

South Africa has been responsible for patents like Prestik, the pool cleaning Kreepy Krauly and early versions of radar.

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