Within the scope of TÜBİTAK 1512 Entrepreneurship Support Program (BiGG), 52 project applications were made to the BİGG 2022 call, which is part of the transformation in the entrepreneurship ecosystem, involving 163 organizations. As a result of the evaluations, it was decided to support 37 project applications.
Sectoral and regional collaborations were prioritized in the new Implementing Organization model updated with TÜBİTAK's "Developing Together and Achieving Together Approach". Within the scope of this model, TÜBİTAK MAM opened its doors to BIGG entrepreneurs with 2 projects. With the BIGG-Bio and BIGG-LABSOUT platforms, it is aimed to develop the entrepreneurship ecosystem by uniting in many areas in line with the priority science and technology goals of our country.
With the BIGG-Bio project we are involved in, it is aimed to develop the entrepreneurship ecosystem in the food-health vertical by combining the competencies with Marmara Teknokent, METU Teknokent and ReDis Innovation, in which we are stakeholders. TÜBİTAK MAM will offer its strong infrastructure and technical expertise in life sciences to the service of entrepreneurs.
In this context, they will be offered the opportunity to benefit from the opportunities of the Food Themed Incubation Center and the Turkey Food Innovation Platform, a first of its kind in Turkey, implemented under the leadership of TÜBİTAK MAM.
The EU-IPA INNOFOOD project will help SMEs operating in the food and beverage sectors to increase their competitiveness in the external and domestic market by improving the quality and safety of their products and developing new value-added food products/processes. Within the scope of INNOFOOD, Turkey Food Innovation Platform (TÜGİP) will be established to encourage R&D and innovation collaborations between SMEs and start-ups. tugip.org.tr) was established. The project aims to transfer scientific and technological knowledge, develop institutional networks and clusters, connect clusters to international networks and improve the R&D and Innovation skills of Turkish enterprises.
With the BIGG-LABSOUT program, Turkey's first BIGG process focused on academic entrepreneurship has started. With METU Teknokent, Sabancı University Nanotechnology Research and Application Center (SUNUM), METU Solar Energy Research and Application Center (GÜNAM) and METU MEMs center, academic entrepreneur candidates will be guided by the strong infrastructure of TÜBİTAK MAM, special entrepreneurship training programs for academicians and technical mentoring support in the process leading to incorporation.
The main goal of the BIGG-LABSOUT program is to train academic entrepreneurs who want to commercialize their ideas/inventions by establishing spin-outs from academics at universities in Turkey with the experience gained so far, and to enable them to go to the market with the right business plan.
The LABSOUT Consortium will utilize all its experience and opportunities for academic entrepreneur candidates, aiming to establish qualified startups with high chances of success. This will increase the number of high value-added academic initiatives, leading to increased capacity, employment and economic growth. By encouraging academic entrepreneurs, the project will also contribute to the national innovation ecosystem by establishing a sustainable and scalable model academic entrepreneurship program at universities.
and will contribute to ensuring an equal distribution of resources, opportunities and expertise to establish startups with the program designed across Turkey.
