The amount of grants approved by Tanufa was so far about NIS 4.5 million
From the beginning of this year until September 2002, 361 inventors and entrepreneurs applied to Tnufa, according to the manager of the Tnufa program in the Office of the Chief Scientist at the TMS, Jacob Fisher. After an initial screening, which included scanning patents in computer databases, about 200 requests for financial assistance were submitted.
The manager of the Tnufa program at TMS, Ya'akov Fisher, stated that the amount of grants approved by Tnufa between January and September 2002 was about NIS 4.5 million. It should be noted that the chief scientist at the TMS, Dr. Eli Ofer, approved an addition of NIS 2 million to the swing budget for this year upon taking office. Fisher further added that in light of the difficult situation that has prevailed for the past two years in the venture capital market in Israel, especially in the pre-seed phase where Nufa operates, the possibility of increasing Nufa's budget for 2003 to approximately NIS 20 million is now being considered.
In the last five years, a momentum program helped to establish about 150 new companies, which raised an amount of about one billion NIS. The cumulative sales of these companies have so far reached over 250 million NIS. An example of companies that arose with the help of Nuvafa: Curelite, Rostrant, Netzer Precision, Insist, Glycominds.
Tnufa regularly holds training workshops for beginning entrepreneurs on intellectual property protection, ways to commercialize inventions and technological developments, preparing business presentations, etc. Such a training workshop was held about a week ago and was attended by 25 new entrepreneurs, who recently turned to momentum. Professionals in the fields of intellectual property, marketing and venture capital lectured the participants on various aspects of the process of promoting a technological idea. During the workshop, the entrepreneurs learned about ways to protect intellectual property, how to prepare a persuasive presentation to present to an investor and also received a lot of advice from a professional investor regarding his expectations from the entrepreneur.
According to the CEO of the STAGEONE venture capital fund, Yuval Cohen, who also lectured at the workshop, there is currently an almost complete stagnation in the field of SEED investments in Israel: "I personally believe that this is a passing situation and those who invest today in quality projects will reap the rewards when the crisis passes, and the fund is proof Ours continues to invest in SEED even these days".
Cohen praised the initiative to hold the workshop, which in his opinion may help entrepreneurs at the beginning of their journey, to focus their efforts on raising capital in a more correct way, appropriate to the market situation.
The manager of the Tnufa program at TMS, Ya'akov Fisher, stated that he intends to regularly hold training workshops for all entrepreneurs applying for the first time to Tnufa: "Our experience shows that participating in a Tnufa workshop may help entrepreneurs promote their ideas and even prevent unnecessary complications in the future." The next workshop is planned to take place at Tnufa offices on 19.11.02/XNUMX/XNUMX.
Background on a momentum plan
The purpose of the Tnufa program is to encourage technological entrepreneurship by supporting the activity required of enterprises at the beginning of their steps, in order to promote a new technological idea towards industrial realization. The assistance allows the entrepreneurs to reach a decision regarding the viability of the venture before a lot of money and precious time has been invested in it.
The assistance to entrepreneurs as part of Nufa includes a financial grant of 85% of the approved budget, up to a ceiling of NIS 210,000 per program, intended for the following purposes: building a prototype; patent registering; preparation of a business plan; Business promotion.
