Wellington
Well, only about a year after a whole process started, the chemists, physicists, mathematiciansand engineers of Callaghan Innovation, the old IRL, find out more about their fate today.
Whether, or how, they fit under CI’s as yet undisclosed form and function may hopefully berevealed.
But given the protracted creation of a commercialisation agency that the science minister hasmore control over than the other Crown Research Institutes under his portfolio, don’t expect toomuch.
Today apparently it is more of a statement of intent that these scientists learn about, thoughnone of them are allowed to speak to media.
It may not be that science and scientists fit under what CI is to be.
However, given that cabinet’s yet to sign off the business case that senior ministers insistedbe drawn up before the end of June, Joe Public’s going to be just as much in the dark as thecollective expertise of the former IRL.
Heck, we can just add it to the rest of the collateral damage created when the CI cart was put infront of the horse, and New Zealand witnessed a publicly funded startup, startup, with little ideabeyond the word ‘commercialisation’ of what and how it was or is to operate.
Now, it could be that the science resource currently sitting within CI, could fit better underother structures such as universities, or even a new technology institute model.
But the last thing that we need is the old IRL’s science resource withering on the vine as ithas over the past year as nothing really happens.
So, today, with luck, a bit of direction from and by CI whose job its website tells us is ‘toaccelerate commercialisation of innovation by firms in New Zealand’.