The 'Time Problem' in Research and Industry Collaborations.

In research, we need time. The culture and system around it for funding is anchored on this. Grants are open for applications once or twice a year and take a long time to process. Programs like CRCs take a long time to agree IP sharing regimes with collaborators. Teams think in longer timelines and optimise funding to spread the project over as long a period as possible.

In industry, we have no time. We need to start today. And when we have started, we need to get to an outcome as soon as possible. Whilst a research collaboration brings a depth of possible value creation that would not be possible for industry to achieve on their own, putting it on a critical path introduces too much risk.

From Industry's perspective, this means that research collaborations are often avoided or only focused on lower priority projects.

If we fix the time problem, I think we can open the gates.

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I'm a Partner at Main Sequence, a VC purpose-built to create global companies from scientific ideas with the inventors who imagine them. I build-out-loud here: https://philmorle.substack.com