John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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288. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the number of companies or persons based in County Waterford who have successfully applied for innovation vouchers in the past three years. [48319/14]

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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The Enterprise Ireland Innovation Voucher Initiative was established in 2007 in order to drive an ongoing innovation cultural shift within small enterprise by promoting and encouraging a transfer of knowledge between Ireland's public knowledge providers and the small business community and creating greater synergies between the two. This scheme provides small companies access to the sources of knowledge, expertise and innovation available in our Universities and Institutes of Technology and in so doing acts as an important driver of knowledge transfer from 3^rdLevel Institutes to industry. The Vouchers, worth €5,000, can be used by small Irish companies to explore a business opportunity or problem and purchase advice and knowledge that is new to the company.

From 1 Jan 2012 to date 179 innovation vouchers have been approved to companies based in County Waterford.