Written answers

Thursday, 28 November 2019

Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation

Research Funding

Photo of Robert TroyRobert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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135. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the number of payments issued to date for successful applications made under the disruptive technologies innovation fund by county; the value of payments that have issued to date; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49629/19]

Photo of Heather HumphreysHeather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Disruptive Technologies Innovation Fund (DTIF) is a €500 million fund established under Project Ireland 2040 and forms a key part in the delivery of the Pillar 1 goal of Future Jobs Ireland to embrace innovation and technological change. The DTIF has been established under the responsibility of my Department with Enterprise Ireland providing administrative support. The first call was run in 2018 with successful projects announced in December 2018.

Applications for funding under DTIF Call 2 are currently being assessed by independent international experts. I expect to be able to announce the successful projects in the coming weeks. 

Given the unique nature of the Fund, which in Call 1 alone is supporting 27 consortia comprised of 100 organisations, including SMEs, Research Performing Organisations and multinationals, intensive contract negotiations have been ongoing since the successful projects were announced in December 2018.

To facilitate payments to the constituent organisations, Enterprise Ireland have developed new consortia agreements and a new pre-finance framework was put in place. Letters of offer and consortia agreements have now issued to all of the successful project partners. Payments to those organisations, including those that are eligible for pre-financing, continue to be processed once the formal legal documentation is signed off and returned to Enterprise Ireland. 

For the most part, enterprise partners in DTIF collaborations will receive grant payments retrospectively following submission of validated claims for vouched expenditure. As most projects did not commence until mid-2019 at earliest, the payments to enterprise partners will not begin in significant numbers until early in 2020. The payments that have been made to enterprise partners relate mainly to pre-finance payments to a number of small enterprises.

Research Performing Organisations (i.e. higher education institutions and other public research bodies) can receive a share of their funding upon project commencement. Most of the €20m available for DTIF Call 1 projects will be allocated to these RPOs with 34 such payments having been made to date.  

The current position is that €12.2m of payments have been processed with another €5m of drawdown requests in train.  The €12.2m includes €9.6m to RPOs and €2.6m to enterprise partners. A breakdown of the €9.6m payments to RPOs by county is set out in the attached DTIF Payments table.  

€2.6m of pre-finance payments have been issued to some small companies. It is not proposed to publish details of the pre-finance for small companies by county at this point as there are relatively small numbers involved and this could reveal information that is commercially sensitive to the companies concerned

Detail on payments to all DTIF partner organisations (RPOS and enterprises) will be provided from 2020 once enterprise partners start making their claims for vouched expenditure. Appended also for information is a list of the successful projects in Call 1, which provides the locations for each enterprise partner.

Payments to Research Performing Organisations under DTIF Call 1 as at November 2019

County Payments
Dublin €4.2m
Cork €2.7m
Limerick €1.3m
Galway €0.9m
Waterford €0.3m
Louth €0.2m
Total Payments to RPOs €9.6m

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