Products should be need based, says US expert

Fri, Sep 17 

Advocating early engagement of entrepreneurs in research projects, Dr Manjit Singh Chhinnan from University of Georgia, called for need to understand consumers before developing any product. He was delivering a guest lecture on "Developing new food technologies and transferring them to private sector" at the Central Institute of Post Harvest Engineering and Technology (CIPHET).

Emphasising that multi-disciplinary coordination is required for developing commercially viable food products, Dr Chhinnan, said transfer of technology was the most crucial aspect for success of any product. "Eight-five per cent products developed in laboratories never gets market acceptance and only 10 per cent of products out of 15 per cent accepted by the market remains on shelf of stores after one year," he said tried to emphasis that developing products to market expectation was never easy.

He said they adopt mainly three approaches to transfer technology in the US. "When the entire research is funded by public money, then we provide information available to everyone. In case of partial funding from industry, we keep information delayed for public domain to benefit the sponsor. In certain cases where entire funding is from industry exclusive rights were issued."

CIPHET Director Dr R T Patil said around 17 externally funded projects were going on at CIPHET for development of technologies and CIPHET also is following four types of approaches for technology transfer where in all the entrepreneurs and his needs is the focal point.
(yahoo)