The results of the joint project of the Government of Kazakhstan and the World Bank "Fostering Productive Innovation" for 2018 were summed up in Astana.

The Fostering Productive Innovation Project is implemented within the framework of the Agreement of the Government of Kazakhstan and the World Bank dated March 1, 2016, and is designed until 2020. The project includes five components. The main objective of the project is to create infrastructure and support high-quality, nationally relevant research for the country, as well as the effective use of global knowledge and practices to consolidate commercialization cycle, which will help to increase the innovative potential of our country.

Component "Innovation Base for Knowledge" provides grants for senior scientist and junior researcher groups.

As explained by Murat Sartbayev, Director of the Project Management Unit, 901 applications were received for this grant program. At the moment, 40 projects are under implementation, one project has been successfully completed.

"We demand from projects to create production and launch the first sales.  Seventeen projects out of 41 reached the first sales, the sales amount is over 200 million tenge. To date, nine license agreements have been signed, two of them have already received the first income in the amount of about 5 and 15 million tenge", - said Mr. Sartbayev.

According to him, today 18 applications have applied for a national patent, 4 for Eurasian patent, and an international PCT application has been applied.

The component "Innovation consortia" of the Fostering Productive Innovation Project works in two directions: Productive Sector Consortia and Inclusive Innovation Consortia. On productive sector consortia, three projects have been selected and implemented since 2017. At the same time, the average amount of co-financing from the business side was 48%. In 2018 three more projects were selected. The average amount of co-financing from business was 38%.

Implementation of inclusive innovation program began in October 2018.

"Inclusive innovations are any innovations that help to improve the quality of life of population and have a stable commercial potential. These innovations can be implemented in different areas, such as health, agriculture, education, etc. The call for applications ended on December 14, about 95 applications were received. Received applications are now being reviewed. In 2019 the International Commission will select the winners of this program," senior Manager of Component 2 Darkhan Seitkazin.

Also in 2017, within competitive selection, 10 technology commercialization offices (TCO) at universities were selected and received grants for training scientists and TCO staff in English, basics of commercialization, training in academic writing and search for international grants abroad.