New ideas that could change lives for the better are being developed in labs at universities across Canada every day. Challenges can sometimes arise, though, when figuring out how to bring these new ideas out into the wider world where people can benefit from them.

Queen’s committed itself to facing these obstacles when it founded the Dunin-Deshpande Queen’s Innovation Centre (DDQIC) in 2012, which offers a range of programs that promote the connection between research and entrepreneurship in higher education. Now Queen’s is looking to take its efforts even further as part of the National Invention to Innovation (i2I) Network, a project led by Simon Fraser University (SFU) that has just received more than $22 million in a Lab to Market Grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). Queen’s involvement in the project is being led by DDQIC.

The National i2I Network will bring together 14 Canadian research universities and health research institutes, along with 57 partner organizations, to provide innovation, commercialization, and entrepreneurship training for students, researchers, and highly qualified personnel in STEM and healthcare fields.

“Some of Canada’s top research talent has unrealized potential, and the National Invention to Innovation Network aims to help them discover it and share it with the world,” says Jim McLellan, Academic Director, DDQIC and National Associate Academic Director for i2I. “The programming the network will offer will empower participants to expand their leading-edge research work into ventures and other opportunities that will help them maximize the impact of their ideas.”

Empowering researchers to realize the potential of their ideas

The network will build upon the success of the original i2I program founded at SFU, which has been helping researchers unlock an entrepreneurial mindset since 2015. To date, i2I has trained over 500 graduates from more than 30 universities. Program alumni are advancing Canada’s innovation ecosystem as founders of their own science-based ventures, as translational scientists and mentors in research labs, as innovation champions in science-based industries, and sometimes a combination of all these paths.

Queen’s became the first external partner of the i2I program in 2020, and it has steadily become more involved, with DDQIC helping lead such initiatives as i2I’s Faculty Innovation Fellow Program Pilot, which was hosted in Kingston at the Donald Gordon Hotel and Conference Centre. DDQIC has also helped i2I establish a postdoctoral fellowship program focused on commercialization, which is also supported by Mitacs, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting innovation. Through DDQIC, Queen’s is the Ontario East Academic Partner for i2I, and a number of Queen’s-based ventures have participated in i2I programming, including CO2LTech, Dyamiris, and m-Detect.

“With so many close ties to i2I already in place, Queen’s is well positioned to help the new national network achieve its goals,” says Greg Bavington, Executive Director, DDQIC. “We’re very excited to lead Queen’s involvement in this important project and help inspire innovation across the country.”

Queen’s is also a collaborator on another project that recently received Lab to Market funding from NSERC. The project is led by Dalhousie University and is called Lab2Market: Canada’s National Network for Innovation, Commercialization and Entrepreneurship Skills Training of Students, Researchers and Highly Qualified Persons.

Queen's and DDQIC's Reputation for innovation

Queen’s involvement in the National i2I Network builds upon its successes in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship over the past few years, both through DDQIC and Queen’s Partnerships and Innovation. Recently, Queen’s was named one of 50 Ignition Schools in an inaugural list of top schools for advancing innovation compiled by Fast Company and Inc. magazines. In 2021, Queen’s received the Deshpande Symposium Award for The Entrepreneurial University. DDQIC has also been actively promoting entrepreneurship in Africa since 2021 through the Jim Leech Mastercard Foundation Fellowship Program, which has expanded to more than 350 African universities from 49 countries across Africa. Through the program, DDQIC has helped train more than 4000 participants over the past four years and regularly helps to train 1000 applicants in the first phase of the program each year. For this work, DDQIC was recognized with the Principal’s Globally Engaged Innovation Award, one of the annual Teaching and Learning Awards offered by the Office of the Principal at Queen’s.

Learn more on the DDQIC website and the SFU website.