Student Notices

The Research and Development Impact (RDI) Fund has announced its fourth Call for Proposals which opens in Semester I of the 2018-2019 academic year.

This call will be the Fund’s first call for applicants for the Innovation Proof of Concept (I-POC) Grants.

Eligible persons include: Full-time academic staff at UWI St. Augustine shall serve as Lead Researchers/Project Team Leaders for proposals submitted to the RDI Fund.  Part-time Lecturers, Assistant Lecturers, Instructors, Demonstrators, Research Assistants, post-doctoral researchers, and PhD students may serve as team members.

Visit the RDI Fund website: https://sta.uwi.edu/rdifund/ for more. The deadline for submissions is October 19. 

About I-POC Grants

The I‐POC Grants are intended to provide monetary support and commercialization resources/services to facilitate the demonstration of the technical and/or economic feasibility of an idea. This idea should be subject to an invention disclosure, legal agreement and/or some form of intellectual property (IP) protection which stipulates that the intellectual property (IP) in question is owned or co‐owned by The UWI. However, ideas which do not meet this requirement can still be considered.

The RDI Fund’s Innovation Proof of Concept (I-POC) Grants are intended to foster the transformation of UWI discoveries and innovations into commercial products, processes and services and scalable development interventions for the benefit of the society. Focusing on research ideas with an already identified commercial and/or social application, I-POC grants aim to protect, develop and scale indigenous innovation, inclusive of social innovation as well as innovation in the creative industries.

Activities which can be supported by I‐POC grants include:

• Product development, optimization and testing
• Commercial feasibility studies for ideas with commercialization potential in the creative industries
• Development of technology transfer solutions for industry partners, particularly SMEs
• Validating proof of concept for a social innovation or development intervention which is scalable and replicable
• Creating an app to aid a socio‐economic intervention or creative experience
• Enhancing product design and user experience
• Research on understanding user behavior
• Research to address an industry‐specific barrier which impairs the ability to license or attract private investment
• Risk mitigation studies to improve technology attractiveness to potential licensees

About the RDI Fund

The purpose of the RDI Fund is to promote impacting research that addresses pressing challenges faced by our society and in so doing, contribute to the advancement of national and regional development. Additionally, by promoting multidisciplinarity and regionality as two of The UWI’s core advantages in the research arena, the RDI Fund seeks to build on The UWI’s reputation for outstanding scholarly work in key development areas and its recognition as the leading institution on Caribbean issues.

For more information, please contact Lois St. Brice at Lois.St.Brice@sta.uwi.edu.