The Office of Innovation and Commercialization (OIC) with UC San Diego Entrepreneurship Center members and support from expertise from Mintz, is pleased to announce a call for applications for Accelerating Innovations to Market (AIM) 2025. This is designed to accelerate the translation of UC San Diego technologies to market and support the formation and growth of startups in the regional ecosystem. The call for applications is managed through the UC San Diego Infoready project submission platform.
New this year are expanded tracks for the broadest call for projects ever. With support from the University of California Office of the President and the Entrepreneurship Council, UC San Diego can double the funding available this year. We're excited to welcome projects focused on infant health and therapeutics derived from human milk as we build on groundbreaking work by the Human Milk Institute with support from industry partners Novonesis.
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion are key parts of what makes AIM a successful program with enduring impact. AIM intentionally seeks to recruit and engage entrepreneurs and innovators from historically marginalized communities as an integral strategy to address the underrepresentation of diverse founders and the communities that technologies are destined to serve. Furthermore, industry panelists are selected to represent the identity parity of the university because representation and role modeling are important at all levels of the program in the effort to advance the mission of OIC at UC San Diego. For more information, please visit Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Research Affairs.
Check out our Pre-Company Technology page to view some of the past awardees.
See key dates drop-down for holding panel presentation dates.
Want to learn how to advance your ideas to market? Stream our latest info session to see what makes a strong application!
Get all your questions answered about this year's call for AIM applications at a recent info session held on September 19, 2024.
A brief summary of the program, their entrance criteria, and target applicants are listed below. OIC will support and fund teams and projects in the in the Accelerating Innovations to Market (AIM) program who have met the criteria for funding in guidelines. Teams seeking matching funding commitment for de-risking their projects and advancing them to commercialization are particularly welcome. The funds are awarded for use during the 2024 - 2025 Fiscal Year (FY25). Given timeline for awards, spending may be allowed for the full 12 months from the award date.
Note: Please do not include proprietary or confidential information in your proposal as applications may be shared with funding and investment partners. For questions, contact aimgrant@ucsd.edu.
Accelerating Innovation to Market is an equal opportunity grant and does not discriminate against awardees based on social identity group affiliation. Considerationwill be provided for all teams based on clarity of IP and feasibility of reaching inflection points during the period of performance with support from the OIC Entrepreneurs In Residence program and industry partners, Mintz Law.