Innovation Labs Program

The program is aimed at assisting entrepreneurs in the preliminary stages of a project, who need unique infrastructures and expertise to prove the feasibility of a technological idea. The assistance is provided through innovation labs operated by the industry’s leading corporations via a model of open innovation.

• To provide entrepreneurs and startup companies with access to unique technological infrastructures, market insights, and specialized channels of marketing and expertise to which they currently lack access, with the aim of proving feasibility on the way to transforming a technological idea into a commercial product.
• To bolster and advance the Israeli economy in general and industry in particular, so that Israeli corporations operating a lab as part of the program can establish themselves and grow in Israel, and to assist foreign corporations in establishing reciprocal relations with Israel’s unique innovation ecosystem and to establish a presence in Israel.

• Commercial companies interested in establishing innovation labs, in accordance with a relevant call for proposals.
• Entrepreneurs and companies with a technological idea in the labs’ fields of specialty, and that are interested in POC and in crystallizing their idea into a commercial product, and in founding startup companies with global potential.

Companies and corporations chosen for the innovation labs:

• A broad platform for company use: the lab will facilitate collaborations with other companies in the industry, in academia, etc.
• Attractive costs: The Authority will fund 33% of the costs to establish the necessary technological infrastructure (50% in the periphery areas), up to a maximum of NIS 4 million, and will also fund 50% of the lab’s ongoing operating expenditures each year up to a maximum of NIS 500,000, without any requirement for financing by the entrepreneur.

Early Stage Entrepreneurs and Startups:

• • Attractive grant: a grant of up to 85% of the approved budget, up to a maximum sum of NIS 1 million, for an operative period of a year.
  • Comprehensive assistance from the lab, including unique technological infrastructures, assistance in checking commercial applicability via a pilot and in locating marketing channels, exposure to knowledge and expertise, connections with investors, partners and customers of the corporation operating the lab.
    The lab will also provide synergy with other similar companies accepted to the lab.

• Attractive conditions for entrepreneurs and startups in the early stages of a project: the entrepreneur is not required to establish a company before his project is approved by the Innovation Authority. The lab provides the entrepreneurs with the technological infrastructure necessary for proving feasibility via collaboration with leading corporations and allows the entrepreneurs to achieve a developmental milestone, to locate marketing channels, to establish connections with investors, etc.
• Opportunity for companies and corporations: exposure to the Israeli innovation ecosystem as a source of growth and as a foundation for building the company’s future strategy. They also benefit from the possibility of creating unique value for the organization (open innovation).