Thames Valley Technology: TRITEC - Participants

<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" vlink="#CC3399"> <table border="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr> <td width="100%">TRITEC is a major pan-European research and demonstration project, part funded by the European Commission, within the Innovation programme of the Commission's Fifth Framework Research and Technology Development programme.  Find out more about <a href="#Project summary">TRITEC</a>, its <a href="#Objectives">objectives</a>, the <a href="#Description of the work">work programme</a>, and how it will benefit technology <a href="#SMEs">SMEs</a>, <a href="#venture capital">venture capital firms</a> and <a href="#large companies">large companies</a>, through the development and implementation of novel, trilateral alliances between them.  See how you can <a href="#Interested?">work with TVT as a collaborator</a> on TRITEC.<p> </p> <p class="h4"><a name="Project summary">Project summary</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">The project aims to develop and test mechanisms for stimulating trilateral alliances between technology SMEs, large companies and venture capital (VC) firms.  The purpose is to satisfy market needs and opportunities through more widespread and faster exploitation of new technology from (or channelled through) innovative SMEs.  The project seeks to exploit the known benefits of corporate venturing in which large companies may plug gaps in their technology in return for contributing complementary resources, in alliances with SMEs.  However, few large companies are willing or able to provide equity finance and the absence of funds frequently inhibits many potentially valuable alliances.  The key feature of the project is that it will address the need to fund internal SME development, through the introduction of VC, in a novel trilateral arrangement, which benefits all three parties.</p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"> </p> <p class="h4"><a name="Objectives">Objectives</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">The primary objective is to research, develop and demonstrate mechanisms for realising the potential of ideas and capabilities within innovative technology-based SMEs.  The aim is to satisfy market opportunities and needs for technology-based products, processes and services.  The mechanisms will aim to stimulate and unlock the value of trilateral alliances which bring together the ideas, inventiveness and agility of SMEs with the strategic vision and human and physical assets of large companies and the financial resources of VC firms.  Lessons will be drawn from the experiences in five European regions in order to stimulate a number of transnational alliances.  These will allow:</p> <ol> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">large companies to gain access to technology with which to assess and exploit market opportunities, or to evaluate defensive measures, at relatively low cost and risk</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">VC firms to realise high capital gains through reduced risk and high investee growth rates</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">technology-based SMEs to achieve high growth rates, facilitated by large company resources and VC funding.</p> </li> </ol> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"> </p> <p class="h4"><a name="Description of the work">Description of the work</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">The project involves a partnership of five European technology transfer organisations working as 'catalyst' partners to develop and apply a range of tools and techniques for creating trilateral alliances.  Each partner will exploit its existing experience in innovation, technology transfer and technology financing and its strong regional network of active collaborators, made up of:</p> <ol> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">large companies, VC firms and technology SMEs (the potential trilateral alliance partners)</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">technology organisations, eg. universities, incubator units, business support organisations.</p> </li> </ol> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">The partners and collaborators will focus on technology and application areas that are well represented by significant clusters across the participating regions.   Each partner will work with an identified core group of regional collaborators, including many technology SMEs, selected on the basis of their fit with market needs and opportunities, as identified by the corporate collaborators.  Information on all regional activities will be pooled and be accessible by all participants via a secure access Website.  Regional and international advisory groups, compromising a cross section of regional collaborators, will assist the partners in every aspect of the project.<br> <br> The TRITEC partners will facilitate a number of transnational demonstration alliances, designed to plug gaps in regional/national resources, and to exploit more widely those resources which may predominate in a particular region or sub-set of regions.  The project represents a 'learning by doing' exercise with definition, research and demonstration phases over three years.  The results will be widely disseminated via a number of mechanisms, which include presenting two international conferences.</p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"> </p> <p class="h4">Trilateral alliance participants</p> <p ALIGN="left">The project will need to address the specific needs, cultural and economic differences, and goals of the individual participants in such trilateral alliances.  This is essential in order to develop generic mechanisms that overcome potential barriers and allow a new, higher level of development and exploitation of technology.  Briefly, for the potential trilateral alliance partners, these are:<br> <br> Many of the ground-breaking new product, process and service ideas are generated by innovative <a name="SMEs"><em><strong>SMEs</strong></em></a> or by start-up enterprises spun out from research and technology organisations.  The cost incurred and the resources required to take an 'invention' or 'idea' to a level at which it can be marketed, are increasing as technology becomes more complex.  Similarly, in a global economy it is rarely an option to develop only one's domestic market, and the resource demands of penetrating, developing and servicing international markets can be and often are beyond the capability of most SMEs.  Some of the potential SME partners are established businesses, which have made the transition to devolved management, able to cope with the challenges of anticipated growth resulting from a successful corporate alliance.  However, many of the most exciting product and service ideas are emerging from new/early-start firms, often within incubation units.  For these firms, corporate partnerships, while possibly representing the only viable means of quickly exploiting often-narrow windows of opportunity, may present additional challenges in terms of the need to develop and the management structure to cope with the anticipated growth.</p> <p ALIGN="right"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="left">Within the existing <em><strong><a name="venture capital">venture capital</a> community</strong></em> as, for for example, represented by the BVCA, there is cash available to finance the medium-term internal requirements of innovative SMEs.  With new fiscal measures across Europe and a growing realisation of the enormous growth potential of many technology firms, the availability of suitable funds for both early stage and development finance is growing.   However, the due diligence process can be costly and lengthy and very often a potential deal can falter because of the high risk presented in cases where SMEs lack the essential resources or capability to develop such resources needed to exploit international markets, quickly and effectively.  All venture capital firms will wish to see a medium term (say 5 year) exit route.  In a normal bilateral arrangement this is achieved through a trade sale, or public offer of some kind.  With the involvement of a corporate partner, processes will need to be developed which protect the potentially longer term relationship between SME and large company, while at the same time providing the venture capital partner with its required exit.  Issues such as potential differences in valuation of "the business" by the alliance partners will need to be addressed.</p> <p ALIGN="right"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="left">With today's emphasis on core business, many <a name="large companies"><em><strong>large companies</strong></em></a> are often poorly equipped to generate new products and services in areas which, while not meeting existing 'core' criteria, may have the capacity to threaten or enhance their existing business at some point in the future.  A partnership with an innovative SME could be a relatively low cost, low risk option, as compared with in-house development, of exploring new ideas, applications and markets.  Large companies have many of the costly capital and human resources in place to assist innovative SMEs with both product development and market entry and support.  Available resources might include complementary technology, product development and testing laboratories, prototyping and manufacturing capabilities, software development resources, existing European and global distribution and customer support facilities.  The decision to partner, using these resources, is frequently within the remit of the appropriate division, plant, or product manager.  However, in terms of providing cash, either as a loan, or in the form of an equity (risk) investment, to fund essential internal development costs within the SME partner, then few large companies have a strategy in place that will allow such investments.  Any decision to do so would be required to be taken at the highest (board) level and the very complexity of this process inhibits proposals being generated from within large companies.  Thus, many potentially rewarding partnerships with SMEs are not realised in practice.  Also, without a dedicated venture group within the large company, there is rarely a mechanism for it to promote its interests in corporate partnerships, to manage subsequent expressions of interest and perhaps most importantly, to shortlist promising cases and secure funding for them.  Independent brokers, such as the TRITEC catalyst partners, could perform this task admirably, and provide the necessary levels of security.  Large company collaborations are especially important to the viability and success of TRITEC as we aim to ensure that the project is firmly demand driven.  We propose to work closely with a select number of large companies in each region to learn about specific interests that they have, for which alliances with technology-based SMEs (those that fit particular profiles and offer particular 'assets'), could be a way forward.  We will treat any interests and needs in complete confidence, using it only in generic form in order to identify matching SME partners.   If the matches are appropriate and appear attractive to both parties, we will then seek to plug any gaps in available funds to support internal development of the SMEs, with cash from an appropriate VC partner.  And, importantly, we will seek to address the areas of potential conflict between the partners, as may exist over such matters as the VC firms' exit route mechanisms and future valuation of "the business".</p> <p ALIGN="right"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="left">All of these potential trilateral alliance participant organisations have their own unique cultures and values that can adversely affect communications between them and with the research and technology community.  This can further inhibit the development of potentially valuable partnerships and hence the successful exploitation of many new ideas.   Hence the role of the TRITEC partners, acting as catalysts in bringing together these parties, identifying issues and addressing concerns directly, and through introduction of other appropriate mechanisms.</p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"> </p> <p class="h4"><a name="Interested?">Interested?</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">If you are a<strong><em> large company</em></strong> and have responsibility for implementing business development strategy concerning aspects of your company's business we would welcome talking to you as soon as possible.  We need to work closely with a small number of large companies that recognise the potential value of participating with appropriate smaller companies that recognise the potential value of participating with appropriate smaller companies that may have new technology and/or ideas which could help them evaluate and/or realise identified new business opportunities.   As a demand driven project our ability to work alongside a core of large companies is vital to the success of the project.<br> <br> To maximise the transnational opportunities the project will focus in a distinct number of <em><strong>technology/application areas</strong></em> in which there is a significant cluster in each participating region.   These "clusters" will be finalised in the definition phase of the project, and will be drawn from:</p> <ul> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">electronic equipment and systems, generally</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">information and communications systems</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">software systems generally</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">engineering and manufacture of precision systems generally</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">medical and healthcare systems</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">transport systems and equipment</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">sensors, control, automation and robotics</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">materials technology and applications</p> </li> <li><p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">bio-engineering and bio-technology.</p> </li> </ul> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY">So, we're especially interested to hear from interested managers in companies and organisations operating within and/or servicing these technology/application areas.<br> <br> If you are with a <em><strong>smaller technology firm</strong></em>, trilateral alliances such as are described on this page, might represent the means to realise the true potential of your technology and/or business ideas.  If so, we'd like to hear from you, so we can try to match your knowledge, ideas and capabilities to the needs of a larger 'exploitation partner'.<br> <br> Also we need to be able to work closely with a small group of <em><strong>venture capital firms</strong></em> and <em><strong>business angels</strong></em> that are sympathetic to the concept and who are keen to explore its potential.<br> <br> In addition to one-to-one transactions, based on your interests in participating in suitable trilateral alliances, we are looking for people who can assist us more generally in an advisory capacity.  So, we are very keen to hear from senior managers, from large companies, smaller technology firms, sources of venture capital and also from specialist legal and financial professionals, managers in technology organisations, incubator units, etc.  We wish to create national and international advisory groups to contribute their knowledge and experience in order to help us ensure the project is a success.<br> <br> If you might be able to help in an advisory capacity and participate in the project, as outlined above, please contact <a href="mailto:john@tvt.co.uk">John Duckett</a> at TVT now.</p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"><a href="#Top of TRITEC page">Return to top of page</a></p> <p ALIGN="JUSTIFY"> </p> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tr> <td width="100%"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="150"> <tr> <td valign="middle" class="h4">Find out more    </td> <td valign="middle"><a href="mailto:tritec@tvt.co.uk"><img src="../images/write.gif" alt="tritec@tvt.co.uk" vspace="5" border="0" WIDTH="32" HEIGHT="32"></a></td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td width="20"><img src="../images/blank.gif" width="20" height="1" alt=" "></td> </tr> </table> <table border="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr> <td width="100%"></td> </tr> <tr> <td><hr> <p class="motto">Helping technology based companies and organisations to innovate in all aspects of their business</p> <p align="left">Thames Valley Technology Limited, Magdalen Centre, The Oxford Science Park, Oxford, OX4 4GA <br> Telephone 01865-784888,  Fax 01865-784333, E-mail  <a href="mailto:TVT@tvt.co.uk">TVT@tvt.co.uk</a> </td> </tr> </table> </body>