A delegation of senior Singapore National Research Foundation (NRF) officials visited Israel to study the Israeli model of cooperation and investment between research institutes and industry and venture capital funds. The delegation was in Israel between 16 and 21 July, and did not return early to Singapore because of the war.
The delegation met Chief Scientist Dr. Eli Opper and Office of the Chief Scientist program directors, and visited the Weizmann Institute of Science and venture capital funds.
Opper said a Singaporean global study of industrial R&D found that the two leaders in patents for commercial use derived from academic research registered each year were Israel and Finland. Singapore therefore decided to focus its study on these two countries. Singapore is analyzing Israel’s model for R&D and decided to send a delegation to Israel in order to view Israel’s academic infrastructure and its R&D collaboration with industry.
The NRF is a Singapore government agency founded in August 2005 as one of two agencies for R&D and entrepreneurship. The NRF finances R&D projects in fields defined as strategic by the Singapore government. Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Dr. Tony Tan heads the NRF. He is scheduled to visit Israel towards the end of the year.
The NRF budget for 2005-10, together with allocations supporting academic research, will be S$12 billion, compared with S$5 billion (US$3 billion) Singapore allocated for civilian R&D in 2000-05. A large part of Singapore’s annual R&D budget is invested in entrepreneurship and innovation designed to maintain the country’s leadership position in technology development in selected fields, including information and telecommunications technology, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and environmental and water technologies and interactive/digital media.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on July 27, 2006
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