Britech projects cover a wide range of sectors reflecting closely the primary technological synergies between the two countries.  The project selection and approval process seeks to harness the additive effect of synergy between companies – the “2 + 2 = 5” factor – through which Britech provides much of its added value.  By emphasising this synergy, even companies of quite modest existing technology means can achieve enormous benefits through the collaborative process.

Spin-off benefits

The collaborative partnerships generated by Britech often benefit from additional effects resulting from the process.  Naturally, these spin-off benefits differ from case to case but may be generally characterised into the four areas of Product, Market, Culture and Credibility.

Product

In addition to any new product being co-developed under a Britech-funded project, collaborative partners commonly identify additional, more immediate, opportunities to enhance their product portfolios through product adaptation and interchange.  Such arrangements would be very unlikely under normal circumstances, but once they are committed to close co-operation in Britech work, product exchange and licence deals are made much easier.

Furthermore, valuable technological innovations can result from the collaborative work in unexpected ways.  Britech has several excellent examples of such a ‘windfall’ benefit, where extremely valuable intellectual property has been discovered as a by-product of the Britech project.