Participants at the DLD Tel Aviv Digital Conference, Israel’s largest international high-tech gathering, held at the Old Train Station complex in Tel Aviv on Sept. 6, 2017. Photo: Miriam Alster/Flash90.

CTech – The Israel Innovation Authority (IIA) will invest nearly $4 million in a new call for proposals in the field of bio-convergence. The IIA announced on Thursday that it is inviting researchers in academia, hospitals, and commercial companies to submit requests for R&D funding to develop programs commercializing academic know-how for medical innovation in bio-convergence, an approach that integrates biology with additional disciplines from engineering such as electronics, AI, physics, computer science, nanotechnology, material science, and advanced genetic engineering. The total budget for the project will be NIS 13.5 million (approximately $3.92 million).

“Given that bio-convergence is still a burgeoning technological field, most relevant expertise in the area remains concentrated in academic institutions,” said Aharon Aharon, CEO of the Israel Innovation Authority. “The Israel Innovation Authority’s call for proposals will help in developing R&D programs with the potential to contribute to the commercial application of this technology. This synthesis of academia and industry is part of an overall attempt to develop an innovative ecosystem that will be an engine of growth for Israeli industry.”

This is the IIA’s first call for proposals from academia and industry in the field of bio-convergence in 2020, with the Israeli government’s tech investment arm hoping this will pave the way for commercial deployment through two separate tracks.

In the first track, the proposal must relate to applied multidisciplinary research in medicine, joining a top researcher in the life sciences with at least one leading researcher in the field of engineering, computer sciences, math, or physics. In the second track, the proposal will be for commercialization of medical expertise, developed through multidisciplinary life sciences research integrating engineering, computer science, mathematics, or physics.

The proposals must be submitted by September 21, with the results to be finalized in December 2020.