CFI launches on-line lab and facility listing

The Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) is launching an on-line service this week to assist companies and other organizations in accessing facilities, equipment and expertise funded by the CFI or that currently use CFI-funded infrastructure.

Test runs of the new program — dubbed Navigator — have generated an impressive response, with 150 facilities to be listed on the day of the launch and another 150 currently being validated and translated.

"It's a searchable, on-line directory of facilities, labs and people … Its part of our ongoing activities and accountability framework," says Dr Gilles Patry, CFI's president and CEO. "Research is a collaborative game and all sorts of facilities are being submitted from health to social sciences including labs and databases."

In many cases, institutions are offering partnership and collaboration opportunities with state-of-the-art, specialized equipment which are beyond the financial reach of many smaller businesses to acquire on their own. Companies can seek out the equipment and facilities they need by entering key word searches.

Submissions by universities, colleges and research hospitals to Navigator are voluntary.

While the cost of developing the Navigator is modest (less than $100,000), it helps to leverage the massive investments CFI?has made in research infrastructure and equipment since its creation in 1997. It also helps to realize the partnerships plank of its current strategic roadmap and its more general objective of assisting job creation and economic growth. CFI is relying on institutions to help promote the new service, augmented by presentations to key associations.

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