Okay. I'll talk about what CIHR is doing in this area, to illustrate a point.
We have thought hard about what the challenges are to commercialization and what our role as a federal agency is in that area, and we started a number of programs designed to deal with huge gaps in the commercialization pipeline.
The first gap is between funding academic research and where, for example, venture capital is prepared to invest. It's called the valley of death. It's true in Canada and it's true worldwide. Venture capitalists have moved to the right in terms of when they're prepared to invest.
So we've started a new program called a proof of principle program, where we've taken research that we have funded, academic fundamental research, and we've said, we'll give you more dedicated funding to enhance the value of that discovery for further commercialization.
We've also started a son of proof of principle, or a son of POP, where we've said, we'll give you another round of funding if you come in with a private sector partner. We'll put a dollar in for every two or more dollars that the private sector partner puts in.
That's been a hugely successful new program, and I can give you lots of anecdotes and stories on this.
A second program goes back to your business background, Mr. McCallum. You need not just dollars in venture capital, you also need knowledgeable dollars, dollars that can say, this is a good risk, this is not a good risk, this is a good scientist to invest in, this is not a good scientist to invest in. We have a dearth of those sorts of people in this country.
So we started a new program called science to business. This is a partnership with Canada's business schools. What we've said is we want to take recent graduates from science, PhDs in science, who will want to pursue a career in business, whether it's venture capital or running an entrepreneurial company, etc., and we've said, we'll put you through an MBA program at a business school. Now the applicants here, to us, are not the students, they're the business schools.